E. Movie violence these days is louder and bloodier than ever before. When a bad guy was shot in a black-and-white Western, the most we saw was a puff of smoke and a few drops of fake blood. Now the sights, sounds, and special effects often jar us more than the real thing. Slow motion and pyrotechnics conspire to make movies and TV shows more gruesome than ever.
F. University of Illinois psychologist Leonard Eron studied children at age eight and then again at eighteen. He found that television habits established at the age of eight influenced aggressive behaviour through childhood and adolescent years. The more violent were the programs preferred by boys in the third grade, the more aggressive was their behaviour, both at that time and ten years later.
G. In the debate about execution and human dignity, supporters and opponents of the death penalty have found very little common ground. Since the 18th century, those who wish to abolish the death penalty have stressed the significance of requiring governments to recognize the importance of each individual. However, supporters of this penal practice see nothing wrong with governments deliberately killing terrible people who commit terrible crimes.
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Reality Television
Reality television is a genre of television programming which, it is claimed, presents unscripted dramatic or humorous situations and features ordinary people rather than professional actors. It could be described ___ (A). Although the genre has existed in some form or another since the early years of television, ___ (B).
Reality television covers a wide range of television programming formats, from game or quiz shows to surveillance-focused productions such as Big Brother. Critics say that the term «reality television is somewhat of a misnomer ___ (C). The participants of these shows are often put in exotic locations or abnormal situations and are sometimes coached to act in certain ways by off-screen handlers, whereas the events on screen are manipulated through editing and other post-production techniques.
Part of reality televisions appeal is ___ (D). Reality television also has the potential to turn its participants into national celebrities, mainly in talent and performance programmes such as Pop Idol, ___ (E).
Some commentators have said that the name «reality television is an inaccurate description for several styles of programme included in the genre. In competition-based programmes such as Big Brother and The Real World, producers design the format of the show and control the day-to-day activities and the environment, ___ (F). Producers specifically select the participants, and use carefully designed scenarios, challenges, events, and settings to encourage particular behaviours and conflicts
1. the current explosion of popularity dates from around 2000
2. though frequently Big Brother participants also reach some degree of celebrity
3. that is rather popular with teenagers
4. because such shows frequently portray a modified and highly influenced form of reality
5. as a form of artificial documentary
6. creating a completely fabricated world in which the competition plays out
7. due to its ability to place ordinary people in extraordinary situations
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Harrys World
Its best to be here early, especially on Saturdays. The rising pitch of the kettle is whistle joined with the faint hiss from the little blue camping stove. Twenty years old, that stove, found the receipt in a drawer just the other day a bargain at four pounds fifty but it always pays to hang onto the receipts. Its Saturday today. By eight-thirty the staff have all arrived, I cant hear them directly, but the soft, distant voices of the lifts rising and falling give them away.
Of course, there is routine that measures time doesnt it? Even the period before Christmas and during the sales that follow, routine is still there, although the time stretches and contracts as the public ebb and flow through the building like an unpredictable tide routine will still be there, disguised, beneath the surface, an undertow. As the management ritually pull out their hair, thicken their arteries, bark at their coworkers and re-prioritise their priorities behind it all routine will be waiting. Everyone here is a slave to it.. even if they move on, get married, die.. there will always be others to master, to enslave. I too am a slave to routine.. but I dont mind.
I look at the long white envelope with my name printed neatly in the centre, its edges slightly curled as though to fend off the surrounding army of clutter on the desk. An intruder. A foreign object.
I go down the stairs and open the main doors. Cant keep the public waiting. Today is much like any other day. In amongst the structure of routine women drift like ghosts amid the lingerie, touching here, feeling there while husbands linger on the periphery of their erratic orbits, faces masked with bored indifference; in the homeware section, tweed-skirted ladies lift the lids on teapots; sniff, like careful poodles at bowls of Pot Porri, turn everything upside down to check the price and replace it quickly at the approach of an eager assistant. The sun streams through the plate glass windows in great broad beams, igniting every chrome fitting, while tired and wayward children are narrowly missed by my trolleys wheels.
At 11 oclock I go to the meeting with Mr. Radcliffe, the manager. He is a fat man, and the smallest motion on his part induces him to break into a sweat. He sits across the desk from me with the air of a man who has never dared to look a day in the eye. He speaks quickly and a little pompously, his eyes drifting toward the clock on the wall more often than my face. He says his words carefully, as though trying to pull each one down with the gravity of his tone. He endeavours to grant some words such as «free time, «benefit package, «pension fund, «hobbies and «exemplary service an even greater weight of importance, but succeeds only in sweating some more as he glances to the clock.
In the staff canteen at lunchtime I see Mr. Radcliffe again as he orders a main course and two sweets, but this is not an unusual occurrence as far as I am aware. I dont often come here, preferring to eat in my room upstairs, there I can read uninterrupted. But today I choose the canteen, although even here I am isolated to an island table set for six thats fine. I am not so naive to be unaware that I have a certain reputation here a kind of gruff aloofness. I dont actually believe this is part of my nature.. or at least it never used to be. I like to be my own man, thats all. Ive little time for idle gossip. Years ago, when the new, young starters would arrive in June or July, I was more sociable. They would plague me for tips on the horses, or pop up to my «office for a skive or a cup of tea. But it all got a little out of hand. I no longer had any peace. So I became a little testy with them, and my annoyance soon became more organised. I became unpredictable and aggressive, this became a bit of a game, then a habit, and in the end.. finally.. me.