Gun Violence Awareness Day is on June 1, 2023. This is also known as the Wear Orange Day, and was founded to honor survivors and victims of gun violence.
It originally began on June 2, 2015, on what would have been the 18th birthday of Hadiya Pendleton. Pendleton was shot and killed on a playground in Chicago on January 29, 2013, just a week after she had marched in President Obama’s second inauguration parade.
Why Do People Wear Orange?
Not long after Pendleton was killed, her friends began to wear orange as a tribute and commemoration of her life, as safety orange is the color hunters wear in the woods to protect themselves and others.
We WEAR ORANGE to honor Hadiya, and all of the other people who are wounded or killed due to gun violence.
