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美国版真理大讨论(2):大学里有啥不能讨论的?(译文/原文)

2018-02-20 Amy wax 雷尼尔译 西雅图雷尼尔

译者前言

在上一篇《Paying the Price for the Breakdown of the Country’s Bourgeois Culture》即《美国版真理大讨论:美国奋斗文化崩溃的代价(译文/原文)》于2017年8月9号发表之后,在美国的思想界和文化界引起了轩然大波。原文的作者宾夕法尼亚大学法学院教授Amy Wax受到了来自各方面的攻击:包括但不限于宾夕法尼亚大学法学院33名教授联名写公开信要求开除她,宾夕法尼亚法学院的院长要求她休长假,学界和舆论界的持续炮轰。


2018年,2月16日 Amx Wax教授在《华尔街日报》发表了一篇新的文章《What Can’t Be Debated on Campus》继续探讨美国的核心价值观和言论自由所遇到的问题。

译文

今天的美国校园中充斥着所谓言论自由和价值观自由的夸夸其谈,嘴皮子上夸张地支持着自由表达和观点多样性。但我通过最近撰写有争议专栏文章的经历,了解到,其实大多数这种夸夸其谈是没有多大价值。只有当人们面对他们所不喜欢的言论时,才能看清楚他们的这种夸夸其谈究竟是不是他们真实的想法。


我与圣地亚哥大学法学院 Larry Alexander教授合写的专栏文章《Paying  the Price for the Breakdown of the Country’s Bourgeois Culture 》于2017年8月9号作为头版头条刊登在 《费城询问报》上。文章中,我们首先列出了当今美国社会的一些病态:

太少的美国人真正能够适应现代社会所需要的工作。适龄男性劳动参与率处于大萧条以来的最低点,鸦片类毒品滥用现象非常普遍,凶杀和暴力困扰着内陆城市。几乎有一半的孩子都是非婚生子女,而更多的孩子由单身母亲抚养。许多大学生缺乏基本的技能,高中生的排名低于世界上其他二十几个国家!

美国适龄男性劳动参与率历史曲线 图由译者补充

然后我们讨论了“文化准则”,即一系列理所应当的行为(这些准则从二战结束之后到60年代中期,在美国社会得到广泛认可):

先结婚然后再要小孩,为了家庭和孩子们努力维护婚姻。为了找到高收入的工作,努力获得所需的教育。努力工作,拒绝懒散。尽可能为你的客户和雇主多做一些事情。做一个爱国者,随时准备为国家服务。尽可能维护邻里和睦,具有公民意识,慈善意识。避免在公开场合使用粗俗的语言,尊重权威。避免药物滥用和犯罪。


这些文化准则定义了一个成年人的责任,文中进一步提到

这些文化准则为社会的生产效率提高,教育水平的提高,社会和谐起到了巨大的作用。


而事实上这种行为规范依托的“奋斗文化”自1960年代以来就已经开始土崩瓦解。我们声称,这种奋斗文化的崩溃很大程度上解释了当今社会的很多社会悲剧,因此我们呼吁重新拥抱这种“奋斗文化”走上解决这些社会问题的漫漫长路。


在整篇文章最具有争议性的部分中,我们指出有些文化并没有让自己的民众为适应这个高效现代化社会做好准备,我们举例:

好比印第安人的文化是为游牧猎人设计的,但不适合21世纪的发达国家。在一些白人工薪阶层中的单亲,反社会的亚文化,在一些城市黑人中反白人说唱文化,在一些西班牙移民中的反融合亚文化同样无法适应21世纪社会的需求!

Amy Wax教授 图片来自华尔街日报

各界对这段文字的反应让我提出了一个问题,即学术界,甚至是整个美国社会如何处理那些非正统的观点?有据可查的是,今日的美国大学比以往任何时候更多地掌握在那些政治光谱偏左(极左)的学界人士手里。那么这些左派学者应该如何处理那些和他们的“政治正确”相差很远的观点呢?


正确的回应方式应该是,进行合理的辩论:试图用逻辑,证据,事实和实质性的论断,来证明为什么这些观点是错误的。这种文明的对话在我们这样的法学院尤为重要,因为法学院就是致力于教会学生如何从一个问题的各个角度出发进行思考和探讨。一般来讲,学术机构应该成为人们可以自由思考和分析那些影响我们社会和生活方式重要问题的地方,然而在今天这种强制政治正确的氛围中是不可能的。


我们这些在学界的学者们最不应该做的一件事情就是是发表毫无逻辑的言论:喊口号,谩骂,诽谤,人格侮辱和不经思考,毫无意义的标签。同样,我们这些学者不应该不提供合理的论据而直接拒绝他人的观点。然而,近年来,不止一次我自己或者看到其他学术机构一再遇到这些违反公共实践标准的事情,而且我们也看到这一趋势在社会上不断蔓延。

加州伯克利大学反对Milo(一个右派的编辑)集会变成一场骚乱(图由译者补充)


有人可能会回应说,无理的诽谤和歇斯里地的谴责也是言论,必须也予以捍卫。而我最近的经历让我重新思考这一立场。在我们和别人辩论时,我们应该要有更高的标准。当然,人们有权抛出“种族主义”,“性别歧视”和“仇外心理”种种标签 - 但这并不是正确的做法。随便贴标签不会给人于启发,教诲或教育。事实上,他们只是通过贴标签来阻止并扼杀不同意见。


现在说说,去年八月份我们的专栏发表后发生了什么? 我收到了大量所在大学和其他地方学生和教授的一系列信件,声明和请愿书,纷纷谴责了这篇文章是仇恨言论,种族主义,白人至上主义者,仇外心理,异族主义等等。也有人要求将我驱逐出校,并从学术委员会中除名。但这些要求没有一个是通过严肃和正式的渠道来解决我们之间观点的分歧。


我们的校刊《宾夕法尼亚日报》发表了一篇回应,并由我的五位宾大法学院同事签名。他们指责我们赞美20世纪50年代的罪恶。因为50年代的十年是公开实践种族歧视,限制女性机会的十年。我并不同意这样的看法,1950年代是有一些问题,但是这些问题瑕不掩瑜。而且我们在专栏中,已经看到这些问题,并明确表明了我们对这些问题的态度,所以这篇回应并没有任何新东西传递给我们。但至少这个回应试图在提出一个论点来和我们进行探讨。


而那封由33位宾大法学院同僚签署的公开信,就连这一点都没有做到!这封信从专栏和我们的采访报告中断章取义,然后谴责我们两人,并断然拒绝了我们的所有观点。然后,它还呼吁学生监督我并随时报告他们所谓的“偏见”。这封公开信没有任何辩论,也没有任何实质内容,也没有任何推理,也没有指出我们的专栏文章错在哪里。


我们已经听够了各种关于榜样的话题:榜样是如何为学生和其他人树立了积极范本,供人学习和模仿!在我看来,签署这封公开信的33位教授都是反面的楷模。我想对学生和公民们说:请不要跟随他们的脚步-谴责他人的观点而提不出任何合理的论点。请拒绝他们所带的节奏!他们不仅没有教你行使公民话语权( 这是自由教育和民主的必要条件),而且他们的行为所传递的信息是合理的公民讨论是不必要的!


正如纽约大学的Jonathan Haidt 博士于9月在学术网站Heterodox Academy上所写的那样:当你们因为与一位同事的言论有分歧而签署的每一封公开信都使我们更接近一个世界即通过社会力量和政治力量来解决分歧,而不是通过辩论和说服!”在此文发表之后,公开信的两位签名者 Jonathan Klick和Jonah Gelbach对Haidt 博士在Heterodox Academy 发表的这篇质疑公开信的文章作出了回应,并为公开信提供了辩护意见。


但值得令人高兴的是,读者们对公开信的评论非常深刻!

一封读者写道,这封公开信

“既没有反例,也没有反驳Wax的论点,只是生硬地断言她错了,这好令人尴尬啊!”

另一位写道:

”这封信是自以为是的伪善典型表现,完全不能像Wax教授与Alexander教授一样如此有力地表达的论点......父母们请注意,如果你想让你的女儿或儿子学会如何解决有争论的问题,请不要把它们送到宾夕法尼亚法学院。”

宾大法学院

在专栏文章发表之后不久,我遇到了一位我很久没有见过的同事。我便问侯他暑假过得怎么样?他说他的暑假过得相当糟糕,而且看起来非常严肃。我还以为有人死了。然后他解释道,他的暑假非常糟糕的原因是我的专栏文章。因为我的攻击会对学校,学生,教师造成损害。连我一位耶鲁法学院左倾的学生都觉得这个故事很有趣 - 谁能想到一篇专栏文章能够毁掉某些人的暑假!但是,这件事除了荒谬之外,还请注意用词的斟酌:“attack”和“damage”通常是用于敌人而不是同事或公民之间的对话。事实上,这至少从另外一个侧面反映了他们这种敌对的观念:“它们不鼓励表达不受他们欢迎的想法和言论。”


我和我们的副院长也有过类似的交谈。由于她的官方身份无法签署公开信,但她辩解说签署公开信是必要的。她告诉我,公开信必须要写下来才能让我引起重视!这样才能让我重新思考我写下的内容,并理解我的言论所造成的破坏与伤害,这样我以后才不会再次这样做。消息非常明确:停止异端。


我们法学院的同事中只有一半在公开信上签名。有一位没有在公开信上签名的教授给我发了一封深思熟虑,律师风格的电子邮件,解释她是如何想的以及她为什么不同意我在专栏中的特定主张。我们之间进行了友好的电子邮件交换,我们依然是亲切的同事。在此之中我也学到了很多东西,同时我也了解到她的部分观点与我保持一致,事情本应该是这么运作的。


在签署这封信的33个人当中,只有一个人跑来跟我谈专栏文章这件事,我很感激。在大约三分钟我们的谈话中,他承认他并没有完全拒绝我专栏中的所有内容。他承认,奋斗文化的价值观并不是那么糟糕,也不是所有的文化都是同等的。鉴于这些是专栏文章的要点,那我就奇怪了问他为什么在信上签了字。他的回答是,因为我在接受《宾夕法尼亚日报》采访时,他不喜欢我的说法,即全球移民涌向欧洲裔白人国家的趋势表明某些文化的存在着优越性。这触发了他的“code“,让他嗅到了纳粹主义的味道!


那么好,让我再次声明我从来不支持纳粹主义!


此外这种指控某段言论是某些事情的触发信号或者狗哨声或者类似的说法(我们经常能听到这种指控,即便人们有时只是陈述了某些能够证明的事实),这种指控是令人百口莫辩的。这好比我们指控某个演讲者的演说引起了某些听众感情受到了伤害,感到被边缘化一样。使用这种语言(学生们已经非常好地学会了这招)的目的就是终止讨论和辩论。让一切他们认为不可接受的言论止步于沉默。


正如Humpty Dumpty对爱丽丝说的那样,我们可以可以利用文字说出任何我们希望这些文字表达的意思。但是又是谁能决定这些言论是不是某些事情的代码或者狗哨声的资格呢?当然那些掌权者-在学术界这意味着左派。

humpty dumpty 的名言

我33位同事可能相信他们正在保护学生们免于受到有害意见的伤害,但他们这么做对学生们并没有好处。学生们并不需要被保护,他们反而需要接触到各种不同观点的讨论和了解看问题的不同角度。这种接触将教会他们如何思考。正如John Stuart Mill 所说的那样,“只知道他自己一方的人,对彼此都知之甚少。”

John Stuart Mill 是19世纪英国著名的哲学家,经济学家

在专栏文章发表之后几个月里,我收到了来自全国各地的1000多封电子邮件 - 大部分都是支持性的,有些批评,但这些批大部分都是深思熟虑并充满敬意的。许多人都表达了这样的想法:“你说出了我们的想说但不敢说的想法!”-这句话是我们这个公民社会的悲哀啊! 许多人敦促我不要退缩,怯懦,道歉。我非常同意他们的观点,异议者已经道歉的太频繁了!


至于宾夕法尼亚大学,号召反对我的行动还在持续进行中。我们法学院的院长最近建议我明年休假并停止一年级的必修课的教学。他解释说,他受到很多因为我不受欢迎的观点而要求驱逐我的压力,并希望我的离开会使争议能够平息下来。当我提醒他,他理应是一位抵制这种无理要求的领导,他解释说,他是一个“多元化的院长”,他必须要倾听并容纳“各方面”的意见。


民主是在谈话和辩论中,而不是一团和气中茁壮成长的。我每天都会在媒体上看到一些事情,并且每天都会听到一些令我感到愤怒和侮辱的事情,甚至有一些是关于我朋友半真半假的事情。感到冒犯与愤怒往往地盘有关,这种感觉是是我们一个开放社会的重要组成部分。我们应该教导我们的年轻人适应这些事情,而不是相反。


讨厌,拒绝和回避和我们持不同政治理念的人是不利于我们国家发展的。我们在一起生活,我们需要一起解决我们的问题。这些和我们观点不同的人总有可能在某些方面可以为我们提供一些东西,在某些方面可以作出贡献,在某些东西方面可以教导我们。如果我们看不到这一点那么是危险的!正如 Heather Mac Donald 在“国家评论”中谈及我那边有争议的专栏文章时所写的那样:“如果左翼对不平等现象的分析是错误的....而文化比较分析反而是更接近事实真相的呢?如果真正的改革行为是应受惩罚的“仇恨言论”,那么我们很难知道这个国家该如何解决其社会问题。“ 换句话说,我们很有可能被现在所灌输的正统观念带上歧路。


美国道路是历来是以文明的方式进行自由和公开的辩论。我们的大学校园和整个社会应该回到这条道路上来。

原文

There is a lot of abstract talk these days on American college campuses about free speech and the values of free inquiry, with lip service paid to expansive notions of free expression and the marketplace of ideas. What I’ve learned through my recent experience of writing a controversial op-ed is that most of this talk is not worth much. It is only when people are confronted with speech they don’t like that we see whether these abstractions are real to them.

The op-ed, which I co-authored with Larry Alexander of the University of San Diego Law School, appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer on Aug. 9 under the headline, “Paying the Price for the Breakdown of the Country’s Bourgeois Culture.” It began by listing some of the ills afflicting American society:

Too few Americans are qualified for the jobs available. Male working-age labor-force participation is at Depression-era lows. Opioid abuse is widespread. Homicidal violence plagues inner cities. Almost half of all children are born out of wedlock, and even more are raised by single mothers. Many college students lack basic skills, and high school students rank below those from two dozen other countries.

We then discussed the “cultural script”—a list of behavioral norms—that was almost universally endorsed between the end of World War II and the mid-1960s:

Get married before you have children and strive to stay married for their sake. Get the education you need for gainful employment, work hard and avoid idleness. Go the extra mile for your employer or client. Be a patriot, ready to serve the country. Be neighborly, civic-minded and charitable. Avoid coarse language in public. Be respectful of authority. Eschew substance abuse and crime.

These norms defined a concept of adult responsibility that was, we wrote, “a major contributor to the productivity, educational gains and social coherence of that period.” The fact that the “bourgeois culture” these norms embodied has broken down since the 1960s, we argued, largely explains today’s social pathologies—and re-embracing that culture would go a long way toward addressing those pathologies.

In what became the most controversial passage, we pointed out that some cultures are less suited to preparing people to be productive citizens in a modern technological society, and we gave examples:

The culture of the Plains Indians was designed for nomadic hunters, but is not suited to a First World, 21st-century environment. Nor are the single-parent, antisocial habits prevalent among some working-class whites; the anti-‘acting white’ rap culture of inner-city blacks; the anti-assimilation ideas gaining ground among some Hispanic immigrants.


The reactions to this piece raise the question of how unorthodox opinions should be dealt with in academia—and in American society at large. It is well documented that American universities today are dominated, more than ever before, by academics on the left end of the political spectrum. How should these academics handle opinions that depart, even quite sharply, from their “politically correct” views?

The proper response would be to engage in reasoned debate—to attempt to explain, using logic, evidence, facts and substantive arguments, why those opinions are wrong. This kind of civil discourse is obviously important at law schools like mine, because law schools are dedicated to teaching students how to think about and argue all sides of a question. But academic institutions in general should also be places where people are free to think and reason about important questions that affect our society and our way of life—something not possible in today’s atmosphere of enforced orthodoxy.

What those of us in academia should certainly not do is engage in unreasoned speech: hurling slurs and epithets, name-calling, vilification and mindless labeling. Likewise, we should not reject the views of others without providing reasoned arguments. Yet these once common standards of practice have been violated repeatedly at my own and at other academic institutions in recent years, and we increasingly see this trend in society as well.

One might respond that unreasoned slurs and outright condemnations are also speech and must be defended. My recent experience has caused me to rethink this position. In debating others, we should have higher standards. Of course one has the right to hurl labels like “racist,” “sexist” and “xenophobic”—but that doesn’t make it the right thing to do. Hurling such labels doesn’t enlighten, inform, edify or educate. Indeed, it undermines these goals by discouraging or stifling dissent.

So what happened after our op-ed was published last August? A raft of letters, statements and petitions from students and professors at my university and elsewhere condemned the piece as hate speech—racist, white supremacist, xenophobic, “heteropatriarchial,” etc. There were demands that I be removed from the classroom and from academic committees. None of these demands even purported to address our arguments in any serious or systematic way.

A response published in the Daily Pennsylvanian, our school newspaper, and signed by five of my Penn Law School colleagues, charged us with the sin of praising the 1950s—a decade when racial discrimination was openly practiced and opportunities for women were limited. I do not agree with the contention that because a past era is marked by benighted attitudes and practices—attitudes and practices we had acknowledged in our op-ed—it has nothing to teach us. But at least this response attempted to make an argument.

Not so an open letter published in the Daily Pennsylvanian and signed by 33 of my colleagues. This letter quoted random passages from the op-ed and from a subsequent interview I gave to the school newspaper, condemned both and categorically rejected all of my views. It then invited students, in effect, to monitor me and to report any “stereotyping and bias” they might experience or perceive. This letter contained no argument, no substance, no reasoning, no explanation whatsoever as to how our op-ed was in error.

We hear a lot of talk about role models—people to be emulated, who set a positive example for students and others. In my view, the 33 professors who signed this letter are anti-role models. To students and citizens alike I say: Don’t follow their lead by condemning people for their views without providing a reasoned argument. Reject their example. Not only are they failing to teach you the practice of civil discourse—the sine qua non of liberal education and democracy—they are sending the message that civil discourse is unnecessary. As Jonathan Haidt of New York University wrote in September on the website Heterodox Academy: “Every open letter you sign to condemn a colleague for his or her words brings us closer to a world in which academic disagreements are resolved by social force and political power, not by argumentation and persuasion.” Two signers of the open letter, Jonathan Klick and Jonah Gelbach, responded to Dr. Haidt’s post by writing pieces for Heterodox Academy that challenged the substance of the op-ed, with the latter adding a defense of the open letter’s condemnation of my views.

It is gratifying to note that the reader comments on the open letter were overwhelmingly critical. The letter has “no counterevidence,” one reader wrote, “no rebuttal to [Wax’s] arguments, just an assertion that she’s wrong.... This is embarrassing.” Another wrote: “This letter is an exercise in self-righteous virtue-signaling that utterly fails to deal with the argument so cogently presented by Wax and Alexander.... Note to parents, if you want your daughter or son to learn to address an argument, do not send them to Penn Law.”


Shortly after the op-ed appeared, I ran into a colleague I hadn’t seen for a while and asked how his summer was going. He said he’d had a terrible summer, and in saying it he looked so serious I thought someone had died. He then explained that the reason his summer had been ruined was my op-ed, and he accused me of attacking and causing damage to the university, the students and the faculty. One of my left-leaning friends at Yale Law School found this story funny—who would have guessed an op-ed could ruin someone’s summer? But beyond the absurdity, note the choice of words: “attack” and “damage” are words one uses with one’s enemies, not colleagues or fellow citizens. At the very least, they are not words that encourage the expression of unpopular ideas. They reflect a spirit hostile to such ideas—indeed, a spirit that might seek to punish the expression of such ideas.


I had a similar conversation with a deputy dean. She had been unable to sign the open letter because of her official position, but she defended it as having been necessary. It needed to be written to get my attention, she told me, so that I would rethink what I had written and understand the hurt I had inflicted and the damage I had done, so that I wouldn’t do it again. The message was clear: Cease the heresy.

Only half of my colleagues in the law school signed the open letter. One who didn’t sent me a thoughtful and lawyerly email explaining how and why she disagreed with particular assertions in the op-ed. We had an amicable email exchange, from which I learned a lot—some of her points stick with me—and we remain cordial colleagues. That is how things should work.

Of the 33 who signed the letter, only one came to talk to me about it, and I am grateful for that. About three minutes into our conversation, he admitted that he didn’t categorically reject everything in the op-ed. Bourgeois values aren’t really so bad, he conceded, nor are all cultures equally worthy. Given that those were the main points of the op-ed, I asked him why he had signed the letter. His answer was that he didn’t like my saying, in my interview with the Daily Pennsylvanian, that the tendency of global migrants to flock to white European countries indicates the superiority of some cultures. This struck him as “code,” he said, for Nazism.

Well, let me state for the record that I don’t endorse Nazism!

Furthermore, the charge that a statement is “code” for something else, or a “dog whistle” of some kind—we frequently hear this charge leveled, even against people who are stating demonstrable facts—is unanswerable. It is like accusing a speaker of causing emotional injury or feelings of marginalization. Using this kind of language, which students have learned to do all too well, is intended to bring discussion and debate to a stop—to silence speech deemed unacceptable.

As Humpty Dumpty said to Alice, we can make words mean whatever we want them to mean. And who decides what is code for something else or what qualifies as a dog whistle? Those in power, of course—which in academia means the Left.

My 33 colleagues might have believed they were protecting students from being injured by harmful opinions, but they were doing those students no favors. Students need the opposite of protection from diverse arguments and points of view. They need exposure to them. This exposure will teach them how to think. As John Stuart Mill said, “He who knows only his own side of the case, knows little of that.”

I have received more than 1,000 emails from around the country in the months since the op-ed was published—mostly supportive, some critical and for the most part thoughtful and respectful. Many expressed the thought, “You said what we are thinking but are afraid to say”—a sad commentary on the state of civil discourse in our society. Many urged me not to back down, cower or apologize. And I agree with them that dissenters apologize far too often.

As for Penn, the calls to action against me continue. My law school dean recently asked me to take a leave of absence next year and to cease teaching a mandatory first-year course. He explained that he was getting “pressure” to banish me for my unpopular views and hoped that my departure would quell the controversy. When I suggested that it was his job as a leader to resist such illiberal demands, he explained that he is a “pluralistic dean” who must listen to and accommodate “all sides.”

Democracy thrives on talk and debate, and it is not for the faint of heart. I read things every day in the media and hear things every day at my job that I find exasperating and insulting, including falsehoods and half-truths about people who are my friends. Offense and upset go with the territory; they are part and parcel of an open society. We should be teaching our young people to get used to these things, but instead we are teaching them the opposite.

Disliking, avoiding and shunning people who don’t share our politics is not good for our country. We live together, and we need to solve our problems together. It is also always possible that people we disagree with have something to offer, something to contribute, something to teach us. We ignore this at our peril. As Heather Mac Donald wrote in National Review about the controversy over our op-ed: “What if the progressive analysis of inequality is wrong…and a cultural analysis is closest to the truth? If confronting the need to change behavior is punishable ‘hate speech,’ then it is hard to see how the country can resolve its social problems.” In other words, we are at risk of being led astray by received opinion.

The American way is to conduct free and open debate in a civil manner. We should return to doing that on our college campuses and in our society at large.

译后小结

这篇文章很长但是观点还是一如既往的犀利。读到某些地方,如果熟悉文革历史的背后不由会感到一阵寒意。特别是当左翼学者号召学生监督Wax教授言行的举动,以及现在还在持续的驱逐Wax教授的行为。


美国的历史正如Amy Wax教授所说,是在公民之间自由公开的辩论中前进的。小到一个小区的规定,学校的规定,大到国家的走向,政策的取舍,宪法的解释都是充满了讨论与辩论。美国有一套非常有名的《联邦党人文集》,最早就是连载于纽约当地的几份报纸上的政论小短文。这些短文中有很多关于美国宪法的探讨,联邦与州之间关系的讨论,发展后遇到新问题的讨论,以及各种力量关系之间的制约的讨论。这本文集到现在成了了解并理解美国的运作机制绕不过去的文集。而反方同样有anti-federalist papers,各方都有表述。

联邦党人文集

抛开Wax教授第一篇文章中谈到的奋斗文化不说,就说这篇文章中提到的言论自由。美国人民引以为豪的第一修正案所保护的权利言论自由,今天在美国的新环境下受到全面挑战。


一方面,在媒体,大学等左翼占绝对主导地位的地方,一切不合他们口味的言论都会被扼杀。Wax教授所遇到的问题就是一个真实并正在发生的典型例子。另外一方面,技术的发展使得精细化控制言论自由变的非常可行和高效。比如,最近借着所谓打击俄罗斯网络渗透的借口,逐渐引入各种自动审查机制。以及在大选期间,各大左倾科技公司对右派言论的封杀和大规模删帖(twitter删除hashtag, reddit关闭右倾讨论组,google的政治类搜索自动提示和各种左翼的fact check)都是对言论自由赤裸裸的侵犯。


而Amx教授的文章以重新探讨美国价值观为切口,发起了对言论霸权的挑战。而文中最令人感到讽刺的是,一位自诩“pluralistic dean”多元化校长,以维护倾听多元不同意见为借口,要求一位因为发表了不同于他们观点的教授滚蛋的事实。


理越辩越明,道越论越清没有激烈的思想交锋,就没有对现实社会深层的认知!


注:

  1. Amx的系列讨论,我只译了第一篇和最新的一篇,有兴趣的可以把整个文章系列找出来看看。我会收集整理各方的观点,放到一个专门的网站上去。

  2. 文中一个词的翻译 Bourgeois Culture 我采用两种译法一种是直译,资本主义文化,布尔乔亚,在马克思体系中有特别的含义。另外一种是意译,奋斗文化。这个词确实有点nb,可以写一篇论文。我这里的意译是基于对美国自由资本主义阶段的价值观,以及对所谓美国梦的理解。

  3. 中国很多理所应当的说法在美国是犯左派忌讳的。比如,落后就会挨打,就会被认为宣传社会达尔文进化论。


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