full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Ilona Szabó de Carvalho: 4 lessons I learned from taking a stand against drugs and gun violence

Unscramble the Blue Letters


As for gun control, we were successful in changing, but not so much in controlling, the narrative. And this brings me to my next lesson: Never underestimate your opponents. If you want to succeed in changing the wrold, you need to know who you're up against. You need to learn their motivations and points of view. In the case of gun cronotl, we really underestimated our opponents. After a very ssucsecufl gun-collection program, we were elated. We had support from 80 percent of Brazilians, and thought that this could help us win the referendum to ban gun sleas to canilviis. But we were dead wrong. During a televised 20-day public debate, our opponent used our own agutenrms against us. We eendd up lnoisg the pupoalr vote. It was really terrible. The National Rifle Association — yes, the aiermacn NRA — came to Brazil. They inundated our campaign with their propaganda, that as you know, links the right to own guns to ideas of freedom and democracy. They simply threw everything at us. They used our national flag, our independence aenthm. They invoked women's rghtis and misused images of Mandela, Tiananmen Square, and even hetilr. They won by playing with people's fraes. In fact, guns were almost completely ignored in their campaign. Their focus was on individual rights. But I ask you, which right is more important, the right to life or the right to have a gun that takes life away? (Applause)

Open Cloze


As for gun control, we were successful in changing, but not so much in controlling, the narrative. And this brings me to my next lesson: Never underestimate your opponents. If you want to succeed in changing the _____, you need to know who you're up against. You need to learn their motivations and points of view. In the case of gun _______, we really underestimated our opponents. After a very __________ gun-collection program, we were elated. We had support from 80 percent of Brazilians, and thought that this could help us win the referendum to ban gun _____ to _________. But we were dead wrong. During a televised 20-day public debate, our opponent used our own _________ against us. We _____ up ______ the _______ vote. It was really terrible. The National Rifle Association — yes, the ________ NRA — came to Brazil. They inundated our campaign with their propaganda, that as you know, links the right to own guns to ideas of freedom and democracy. They simply threw everything at us. They used our national flag, our independence ______. They invoked women's ______ and misused images of Mandela, Tiananmen Square, and even ______. They won by playing with people's _____. In fact, guns were almost completely ignored in their campaign. Their focus was on individual rights. But I ask you, which right is more important, the right to life or the right to have a gun that takes life away? (Applause)

Solution


  1. hitler
  2. anthem
  3. successful
  4. control
  5. world
  6. sales
  7. american
  8. civilians
  9. rights
  10. losing
  11. fears
  12. arguments
  13. ended
  14. popular

Original Text


As for gun control, we were successful in changing, but not so much in controlling, the narrative. And this brings me to my next lesson: Never underestimate your opponents. If you want to succeed in changing the world, you need to know who you're up against. You need to learn their motivations and points of view. In the case of gun control, we really underestimated our opponents. After a very successful gun-collection program, we were elated. We had support from 80 percent of Brazilians, and thought that this could help us win the referendum to ban gun sales to civilians. But we were dead wrong. During a televised 20-day public debate, our opponent used our own arguments against us. We ended up losing the popular vote. It was really terrible. The National Rifle Association — yes, the American NRA — came to Brazil. They inundated our campaign with their propaganda, that as you know, links the right to own guns to ideas of freedom and democracy. They simply threw everything at us. They used our national flag, our independence anthem. They invoked women's rights and misused images of Mandela, Tiananmen Square, and even Hitler. They won by playing with people's fears. In fact, guns were almost completely ignored in their campaign. Their focus was on individual rights. But I ask you, which right is more important, the right to life or the right to have a gun that takes life away? (Applause)

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
civil society 8
drug policy 4
gun control 3
global commission 3
latin america 2
ban gun 2
gun sales 2
international drug 2
drug control 2
control regime 2
society diplomacy 2
drug policies 2
soap opera 2

ngrams of length 3

collocation frequency
ban gun sales 2
international drug control 2
drug control regime 2
civil society diplomacy 2

Important Words


  1. american
  2. anthem
  3. applause
  4. arguments
  5. association
  6. ban
  7. brazil
  8. brazilians
  9. brings
  10. campaign
  11. case
  12. changing
  13. civilians
  14. completely
  15. control
  16. controlling
  17. dead
  18. debate
  19. democracy
  20. elated
  21. ended
  22. fact
  23. fears
  24. flag
  25. focus
  26. freedom
  27. gun
  28. guns
  29. hitler
  30. ideas
  31. images
  32. important
  33. independence
  34. individual
  35. inundated
  36. invoked
  37. learn
  38. life
  39. links
  40. losing
  41. mandela
  42. misused
  43. motivations
  44. narrative
  45. national
  46. nra
  47. opponent
  48. opponents
  49. percent
  50. playing
  51. points
  52. popular
  53. program
  54. propaganda
  55. public
  56. referendum
  57. rifle
  58. rights
  59. sales
  60. simply
  61. square
  62. succeed
  63. successful
  64. support
  65. takes
  66. televised
  67. terrible
  68. thought
  69. threw
  70. tiananmen
  71. underestimate
  72. underestimated
  73. view
  74. vote
  75. win
  76. won
  77. world
  78. wrong