For most non-racists, it goes without saying that race-related violence is unacceptable.

Sadly it also happens often enough that we aren't going to tweet/write a comment saying "this is bad" every single time it happens.

Whereas the BBC journalist using that word was a) not a common event b) as seen in this thread not such a binary good/bad thing even among non-racists and c) affects news standards that broadcast to huge numbers of people.

If I could prevent one physical attack by allowing one use of the word on the TV I would, but I don't think it's at all hypocritical or virtue signalling that many people felt it more important to talk about the journalism than the case being reported.