A student in a Simpsonville S.C. middle school is in the center of a racially charged incident that has shocked the sleepy little town located on the border of cosmopolitan Greenville. It is being reported that the student wore a tee shirt with a noose and a KKK slogan on it hidden under another shirt. He went to the schools lunch room and flashed the shirt to a roomful of students which included many African American:

Simpsonville police said that an eighth-grade student walked into the lunchroom on Thursday and lifted his shirt to show an undershirt with a racist slogan on it.

The police report said that the shirt had KKK on it, as well as the statement: “If you can’t run with the clan, then hang out with them,” with a picture of a noose.

Students said that the shirt and the display angered both black and white students.

Some students said they were afraid go to class on Friday because threats related to the incident.

School officials said that the eighth-grader was suspended from school and recommended for expulsion. The student was also arrested and faces charges of disturbing school. He was released to his parents.

Police said that the teen’s mother said she was upset with her son and that they were “not racist people and he should not have been wearing the shirt.”

The teen told police that he bought the shirt from the Redneck Store in Laurens. The store has recently been the focus of controversy because it was taken over by a church who hoped to close it down. The church later learned that the man who operates the store had made it part of the deal that he can operate the business in the building until he dies.

The store that sells the offensive shirt under the guise of “humor” has been a sore spot with locals looking to put the past behind them and unwilling to let the taint of White Nationalism to take root here again. The store is being run by a “former” Klansman and sells Klan robes, racist memorabilia and of course offensive tee-shirts.

The owner, Micheal Burden Jr., was assuredly laughing hysterically when the incident he no doubt helped orchestrate led to tensions in the school and rumors of violence. More than 300 students stayed home from school last Friday due to fears of conflict.

While many may play this off as a childish prank (and in the mind of the eighth grader who wore the shirt it may have been) and the result of bad parenting, I sense the invisible hand of others at work here. The Klan is increasingly marginalized in the south by a strong G.O.P. which broke the southern Democrats’ hold on the Palmetto State and a vibrant Greenville which has acted a draw for people from all over the country to settle in the surrounding areas, Simpsonville included.

With low crime and race relations far more genial than in the northeastern big cities I’ve lived in, like NYC or East Orange, N.J., the Klan’s best hope to remain relevant and attract recruits is to orchestrate incidents that they hope will lead to racially tinged violence.

I now reside just a five minute drive from Simpsonville and the wife and I are frequent visitors to Pete’s and the 24 hr Bi-Lo. We’ve been to Simpsonville many times, at all hours of the day and night and have never seen much in the way of overt racism, which long time readers will know I am always on the lookout for. This little stunt, which I believe was orchestrated by “former” Klansman Burden, may change all that.

WYFF4 has a video report, and MSNBC has coverage of the incident.