Tree. Rope. Journalist. Some assembly required.
That was the saying on the back of a black T-shirt a man wore at a Donald Trump rally.
The man's face can't be seen but he's obviously white.
Who else would wear a T-shirt in 2016 that jokes about lynching? Or perhaps he's serious. He might honestly believe that there's nothing wrong with journalists that can't be fixed by stringing them up.
These are the kind of sentiments that have been allowed to be broadcast in public in the 2016 presidential election, which comes to a merciful end tonight when the polls close.
Much has been written about whether the reporting of Trump's rants allowed his supporters to declare open season on any group they didn't like or whether Trump seized the Republican nomination by riding the longheld anger of millions of Americans, a rage the mainstream media simply dismissed as ignorance and bigotry before now.
It's both, of course. Trump, using both his fortune and his fame, provided the social licence for people to behave badly in public, to treat others rudely and say horrible things with reckless abandon.
Another image that made the online rounds after the first presidential debate crystallized Trump's candidacy with these comments:
"Imagine a woman who showed up unprepared, sniffling like a coke addict and interrupting her opponent 70 times. Let's further imagine that she's had five kids by three men, was a repeated adulterer, had multiple bankruptcies, paid zero federal taxes and rooted for the housing crisis in which many thousands of families lost their homes. Wait ... there's more: she has never held any elected office in her life."
Framing his misconduct through gender is revealing but the same lens works for men. A regular Joe Blow with similar credentials would have few friends and difficulty keeping a job, never mind qualifying for leader of the world's most powerful democracy.
Yet as horrible as this election has been, there are some positives to be found already and more yet to be uncovered in the aftermath.
No self-respecting man wants to treat women and speak of them the way Trump has, not only because it's wrong but also because it would rightfully destroy their reputation. In the wake of this election, women now have a sharp scalpel to work with.
"Are you Trumping me?"
That question, using his name as a verb to sum up every demeaning comment - from blatant bullying to subtle dig - every woman has ever put up with now places the onus on men to either immediately and publicly justify their behaviour or grow up and shut up.
That's a good thing.
This election has clearly shown that, despite the excellent social progress made, sexism and racism remain rampant in modern society. Furthermore, a double standard still allows affluent white men to continue to hold these outdated and offensive views. An increasing number of men are stepping forward to say they not only reject such sentiments and the men who hold them, they are actively promoting the eradication of this behaviour.
That reckoning has been long overdue.
So is finally paying attention to the millions of families that have been left behind by the rapid pivot to a globalized, technological economy that has little room for low-skill, high-paying jobs. More needs to be done for these people than to tell them to stop complaining, go back to school and get a job.
Journalists need to do better telling their stories, as well as being more accountable, both to each other and to their audiences. The best journalism expands the awareness and sensitivity of communities to the injustice and inhumanity in their midst. Instead of exposing Trump as a charlatan and a threat as soon as possible, reporters and pundits gleefully covered Trump's character assassinations because they thought it was hilarious to see and hear senior politicians of both political parties treated so badly. It stopped being funny when Trump went after journalists and encouraged his supporters to do so as well.
The last positives hopefully start tonight - that Trump is nowhere near the White House come January, that this election has forever ruined the chances of a man like him to be elected dogcatcher, never mind president, and that modern conservatives can regain control of a Republican Party hijacked by lunatics who are neither conservatives nor modern.
-- Managing editor Neil Godbout
