1. In her feature this week, ANNA MINARD attempts to link domestic violence to mass shootings. Using your critical thinking skills, explain how much stronger this piece would have been if Ms. Minard had simply stuck to telling the story, rather than pivoting the whole hulking feature into a lame gun-control screed early on and then running her own credibility into the ground.

2. GOLDY and DOMINIC HOLDEN decided to write the news lead in the form of a board game. What do you believe their reasons were for doing this?

(a) Goldy and Dominic have a poor understanding of the state's budget and are attempting to employ the frivolity of a game to disguise the fact that they know very little about the topic at hand.

(b) Goldy and Dominic think life is a big joke and treat everything like it is "funny."

(c) Goldy and Dominic are lazy.

(d) All of the above.

3. DAN SAVAGE and his brother BILL SAVAGE review each other's books this week. Though the reviews are dolled up in the form of a jokey, aren't-we-precious humorous tone, this is obviously an egregious breach of journalistic ethics. How could this idea have survived all the way through the publication process, from inception to distribution, without one single brave soul standing up and admitting that it was a bad idea? Does The Stranger fear Dan Savage that much? Or has the abuse of cheap, legal marijuana dulled the paper's attention to such important moral issues as nepotism? Did anyone ever, in the whole process of publication, genuinely believe this idea was amusing?

4. PAUL CONSTANT reviews a restaurant that serves $12 sandwiches. In essay form, please explain how anyone could justify a universe in which 18,000 children starve to death every day, but an upscale eatery charges $12 for a gussied-up roast beef sandwich.

5a. EMILY NOKES promotes a Stranger-sponsored music show. Do you think Ms. Nokes wrote this piece

(a) before the Savages shredded the very last scrap of journalistic integrity that this newspaper had, or

(b) after the Savages shredded the very last scrap of journalistic integrity that this newspaper had?

5b. Draw a graph demonstrating which piece, the book review or the self-promotional music preview, is more morally shameful.

6. Do you think JEN GRAVES is joking? Why or why not? recommended