The Subtle Seed of Hatred

To say that I am appalled by racism would be a vast understatement; especially when I am confronted with such forms of hatred in the church. They are more subtle than they used to be, a comment here, or there, but just as ugly and hate filled.
Ethnocentrism is a pet peeve of mine, because it seems so clear in scripture that such a lifestyle shouldn't even be in our mindset. Our minds should be focused on loving God and others, all of the commandments hang on these two commands.
In my idealism and naivety, I just assumed that the concept of love is a no brainer to Christians, and that racism (of all things) would be considered wrong.
Then a comment was made to me the other day that has bothered me ever since. I mentioned to a member of the church that I was teaching a few abstinence classes in a school nearby. I continued by mentioning that they were good kids, the comment returned to me was, "good?! That's not what I've heard. I had a friend who went there and she said she was the only white girl in the school!" Maybe this particular person didn't mean it the way it came out (I am going to give the benefit of the doubt on this one.) However, I was insanely hurt. I've spent 4 days with these amazing, smart, beautiful kids, and someone made the assumption that because there is diversity in the school, they aren't good kids!
When did we start thinking things like this? When did we think it was ok to say that kids that are privilidged enough to go to a better school, are automatically better kids?
It is stereotypes like these that keep things from getting better. Not to mention, I still think that if more Christians would stop living in fear and live by the great commission and great commandment, there wouldn't be any school with violence, hatred, etc. because we would have already conquered it with our love.
This was a reminder to me, to watch my words. To watch my labels. To watch writing people off before I give them a chance. Genocide is started with racism and hatred, redemption is started with love.