Gunshots rang out once again on a campus in the United States on Wednesday. Students and faculty raced out of harm's way, ducked under furniture, barricaded doors and hid in interior rooms, bathrooms and labs. The short-lived nightmare on the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles came one day before Wear Orange: National Gun Violence Awareness Day. Wear Orange was inspired by friends of Hadiya Pendleton, a 15-year-old Chicago high school student killed by gunfire in 2013. The group decided to honor her life by wearing orange the color worn by hunters in the woods to protect themselves and others. While the idea has been embraced by civic organizations, politicians and celebrities, it has been rejected by gun rights advocates. The National Rifle Association has attacked the campaign as "pointless," and said "participating is an easy way of scoring points for being 'socially conscious.'" Here is a look at the unique relationship between Americans and their guns. Any law-abiding citizen in the United States is allowed to own or carry a gun. That right comes from the U.S. Bill of Rights and the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. It says: "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." The Second Amendment was based partially on English common law, which describes an auxiliary right, supporting the natural rights of self-defense, resistance to oppression, and the civic duty to act in concert in defense of the state. To purchase a gun in the majority of states, a person needs to be of age, pass the FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check and fill out a firearms transaction record. However, background checks are not currently required for private sales, including those conducted at gun shows. Certain people are banned from owning weapons, including convicted criminals, people with mental health illnesses or non-U.S. citizens. But the system has major holes in it. According to the above context, answer the following question. The group Wear Orange probably feels:
OPTIONS:
- sad about the shooting at UCLA
- uncaring about the shooting UCLA
- happy about the shooting at UCLA
- not enough information
sad about the shooting at UCLA
--
The collaborative process between me and Claire Bridge has been good so far. Upon finding out her email address we had a brief email exchange culminating in me sending her a list of potential questions for the interview. Claire quite liked a lot of the questions, but overall there were too many, so we proceeded to reduce the number of questions to six main questions. These questions would then form the basis of the artist portrait, with an attempt to limit answers to no more than a minute, so little had to be cut for the final edit. The six questions we arrived at are as follows: How would you define creativity? What does it mean to you to be an artist? Do you feel a painting or piece of art can house an energy/a feeling from the original artist? Do you feel that your own works house this energy? Change and transformation are recurrent themes in your work. What are you exploring and why do these fascinate you? And recently we saw a change in your medium too, incorporating video works and photography. You seem to draw on many influences in your work, from quantum physics, astrophysics, to environmental ecology, psychology, philosophy and metaphysics. With titles like "Dark Matter", "Touching Infinity", "We are made of Stars", "Rising tides" and "A drop in the ocean" or "Alchemy". Can you tell us something more about the convergence of these ideas and influences? What continues to motivate and inspire you as an artist? We both felt these questions addressed the initial topic of exploring creativity, explored why Claire became an artist, gives insight into Claire's work and practise and looks toward the future of Claire's practice. After refining the questions, we proceeded to organise a day to film, which will be on the 16th September. Hopefully if all goes well we will both have an artist portrait that lives up to our expectations. According to the above context, answer the following question. What type of artist is Claire?
OPTIONS:
- not enough information
- animation
- contemporary
- graphic
contemporary
--
I normally do not post certain types of things on my blog or on social media, like political messages, but today I feel compelled. I've been thinking for the last few days about the most recent school shooting in Parkland, and my overwhelming emotion right after grief is rage. I am so angry it makes me cry and for those of you out there who know me, angry-cry is the end-stage, top-of-the-gauge level of angry for me. I am angry that as a nation, we continue to wring our hands and bemoan each mass shooting but we don't take any action to stop the next one. I am angry that our elected officials have failed us in the most spectacular way possible by being unable to work together or to set aside special interests to protect the lives and safety of Americans, including our most vulnerable citizens, our children. I am angry that time and time again, we the people and our elected officials weigh the value of human lives against countless other things (Second Amendment, special interests, party disagreements, inertia, whatever) and the value of human life comes up short in the calculations. I am angry at myself for believing at any point in the last several years that I could trust lawmakers to address this epidemic and I am angry at myself for feeling so helpless that I have not personally taken action. This stops now. I am angry that in 2012, 20 6-7 year old children and 6 adults were murdered in Sandy Hook and in the 5+ years since, we have done nothing meaningful to stop this. To me, this is tantamount to saying that we as a nation are OK with this. I don't think we are, but that's the message we're sending if we don't force our government to do something. According to the New York Times, there have been 239 school shootings nationwide since Sandy Hook with 438 people shot, 138 who died. According to the above context, answer the following question. Regarding the shooting, the New York Times is probably:
OPTIONS:
- Distrustful
- Angry
- not enough information
- Sad
not enough information
--
I have unfriended someone over his near daily harassment of me to come over to his way of thinking. Way back in 2006, when Facebook was a young whelp and I had a newborn who steadfastly refused to sleep at night, I would sit and connect with old friends from university and high school, many of whom I had not seen or spoken with in more than a decade. One of those people was Scott. Scott was a super nice guy. He was a year ahead of me at university. He was a bit socially awkward but you really couldn't hope to meet a more genuine individual. Like most people, Scott had had some ups and downs in his life. At some point he found religion. Like he really, really found it. Now, I am somewherere between an agnostic and an atheist but my attitude is generally live and let live. But Scott couldn't do that. Almoost every day he would send me some sort of message. "What do you pray about?" I don't. "God loves you, he gave his son for you, why don't you love Him?" Because I don't believe He or his Son exist. "What are you going to say when you die and stand before Satan instead of God?" Missed that by a mile, didn't I? This went on for a few months. His questions became increasing unhinged and the only thing that mattered to him were his beliefs. Mine were of no consequence. I had asked him, politely at first and then more assertively, to stop bombarding me with his attempts to convert me or to witness to me. All to no avail. Finally, I'd had enough and decided I had better things to do. I pulled the plug and unfriended Scott. He's sent me several friend requests over the years, all of which I have summarily ignored. According to the above context, answer the following question. What is probably true about Scott?
OPTIONS:
- He attended religious services
- not enough information
- He belongs to a neighborhood watch group
- He is not married
He attended religious services
--