Desperation is no excuse for anti-social behavior.

I am calling out exactly that sentiment, because it removes the intelligence, agency, and morality from the people you’re discussing by reducing them to animals. You call them lessers and stop holding them to the same standard — and that so many did so here, despite poverty being unrelated, is precisely the evidence their motivation for doing so was racial stereotypes and not facts.

You see the same with, eg, excusing gangland violence as “poverty”, despite areas with much higher poverty (including foreign nations) not experiencing the same anti-social behavior.