噓 cangming: 大外宣洗版洗起來了喔 真噁心 04/07 12:13
推 lc85301: 這篇中肯啊，看看美國現在的處境 04/07 12:35
This Land of Denial and Death - Covid-19 and the dark side of American
exceptionalism
美國，否認與死亡之地--- Covid-19與美國例外論的黑暗面
原文：New York Times https://tinyurl.com/ujtf3wu
譯文：觀察者
https://www.guancha.cn/PaulKrugman/2020_04_07_545751.shtml
作者：Paul Krugman
Death comes at you fast. Just three weeks ago the official line at the White
House and Fox News was that the coronavirus was no big deal, that claims to
the contrary were a politically motivated hoax perpetrated by people out to
get Donald Trump. Now we have a full-blown health crisis in New York, and all
indications are that many other cities will soon find themselves in the same
situation.
死亡飛快地向你襲來。就在三週前，白宮和福克斯新聞的官方說法還是這個新冠病毒沒什
麼大不了的，相反的說辭都是居心不良的政治謊言，是那些想讓川普下台的人在搞鬼。現
在，紐約全面暴發衛生危機，所有的跡象都表明，很多城市很快也會陷入同樣的境地。
And it will almost certainly get much worse. The United States is on the
worst trajectory of any advanced country — yes, worse than Italy at the same
stage of the pandemic — with confirmed cases doubling every three days.
幾乎可以肯定，情況會越來越糟。在發達國家當中，美國處在最糟糕的發展軌跡上——沒
錯，比處於大流行這個階段時的意大利還要糟糕，確診病例每三天翻一番。
I’m not sure that people understand, even now, what that kind of exponential
growth implies. But if cases kept growing at their current rate for a month,
they would increase by a factor of a thousand, and almost half of Americans
would be infected.
我不確定大家是否明白，這種指數級的增長意味著什麼。如果它以目前的速度持續增長一
個月，數量將增加一千倍，幾乎一半的美國人將被感染。
We hope that won’t happen. Many although not all states have gone into
lockdown, and both epidemiological models and some early evidence suggest
that this will “flatten the curve,” that is, substantially slow the virus’
s spread. But as we wait to see just how bad our national nightmare will get,
it’s worth stepping back for a few minutes to ask why America has handled
this crisis so badly.
我們希望這種情況不要發生。許多州已經處於封鎖狀態，雖然並非所有州都這麼做，但流
行病學模型和一些初步證據都表明，這將會“壓低曲線”，也就是說，大大減緩病毒的傳
播速度。但是，當國家的噩夢觸底之前，我們有必要後退幾步問一問，為什麼美國的應對
如此之爛。
Incredibly bad leadership at the top is clearly an important factor.
Thousands of Americans are dying, and the president is boasting about his TV
ratings.
最高領導人的昏庸，顯然是一個重要因素。數以千計的美國人正在死去，而總統還在炫耀
他的收視率。
But this isn’t just about one man. Neither the scientific denial that
crippled the initial response to this pandemic, nor the tens of thousands of
unnecessary deaths that now seem likely, are unique to Covid-19. Among
advanced countries, the United States has long stood out as the land of
denial and death. It’s just that we’re now seeing these national character
flaws play out at a vastly accelerated rate.
但這不只是一個人的問題。無論是導致對大流行的初期應對不力的科學否認，還是現在看
來可能發生的成千上萬的不必要死亡，都並非新型冠狀病毒肺炎所獨有。在發達國家中，
美國一直以來都是否認和死亡之國。只是我們現在看到，這些國家性格上的缺陷，正在以
越來越驚人的速度呈現出來。
About denial: Epidemiologists trying to get a handle on the coronavirus
threat appear to have been caught off guard by the immediate politicization
of their work, the claims that they were perpetrating a hoax designed to hurt
Trump, or promote socialism, or something. But they should have expected that
reaction, since climate scientists have faced the same accusations for years.
關於否認：試圖遏制住新冠病毒威脅的流行病學家猝不及防，他們的工作迅速被政治化，
即指稱他們的所作所為是用來傷害川普、宣傳社會主義或者其他目的的騙局。但對於這種
反應，他們不應該感到意外，因為氣候科學家多年來面臨著同樣的指控。
And while climate-change denial is a worldwide phenomenon, its epicenter is
clearly here in America: Republicans are the world’s only major
climate-denialist party.
雖然否認氣候變化是一種全球性的現象，但它的中心顯然是在美國：共和黨是世界上唯一
否認氣候變化的主要政黨。
Nor is climate science the only thing they reject; not one of the candidates
contending for the G.O.P.’s 2016 nomination was willing to endorse the
theory of evolution.
氣候科學也不是他們唯一反對的東西；沒有一個共和黨2016年總統提名候選人的角逐者表
示願意支持進化論。
What lies behind Republican science denial? The answer seems to be a
combination of fealty to special interests and fealty to evangelical
Christian leaders like Jerry Falwell Jr., who dismissed the coronavirus as a
plot against Trump, then reopened his university despite health officials’
warnings, and seems to have created his own personal viral hot spot.
共和黨否認科學的背後是什麼？答案似乎是對特殊利益集團以及小傑裡‧福爾韋爾等福音
派基督教領袖這二者的忠誠的結合。福爾韋爾認為冠狀病毒是針對川普的陰謀，然後不顧
衛生官員的警告重新開放了他的大學，似乎已經自己動手創造了一個病毒傳播熱點。
The point, in any case, is that decades of science denial on multiple fronts
set the stage for the virus denial that paralyzed U.S. policy during the
crucial early weeks of the current pandemic.
無論如何，關鍵的一點是，幾十年來在多個方面對科學的否認，為否認病毒奠定了基礎，
而對病毒的否認在當前大流行關鍵的前幾週令美國的政策無法運轉。
About death: I still sometimes encounter people convinced that America has
the world’s highest life expectancy. After all, aren’t we the world’s
greatest nation? In fact, we have the lowest life expectancy among advanced
countries, and the gap has been steadily widening for decades.
關於死亡：我有時還是會遇到一些人，他們堅信美國人的預期壽命是全世界最高的。畢竟
，我們不是世界上最偉大的國家嗎？事實上，我們的預期壽命是發達國家中最低的，幾十
年來，這一差距一直在穩步擴大。
This widening gap, in turn, surely reflects both America’s unique lack of
universal health insurance and its equally unique surge in “deaths of despair
” — deaths from drugs, alcohol and suicide — among working-class whites
who have seen economic opportunities disappear.
這種不斷擴大的差距，反過來，肯定反映了美國獨有的全民健康保險缺失，以及同樣獨有
的“絕望之死”——因毒品、酒精和自殺導致的死亡——在看到經濟機會消失的白人工人
階級中的激增。
Is there a link between the hundreds of thousands of excess deaths we suffer
every year compared with other rich countries and the tens of thousands of
additional excess deaths we’re about to suffer from the coronavirus? The
answer is surely yes.
與其他富裕國家相比，我們每年多死數十萬人，而我們即將因冠狀病毒而多死數萬人，這
兩者之間有什麼聯繫嗎？答案當然是肯定的。
In particular, when we conduct a post-mortem on this pandemic — a stock
phrase that, in this case, isn’t a metaphor — we’ll probably find that the
same hostility to government that routinely undermines efforts to help
Americans in need played a crucial role in slowing an effective response to
the current crisis.
具體來說，當我們對疫情進行“解剖分析”——這個慣用語在此刻已經不是什麼隱喻——
我們可能會發現，對政府的敵意經常破壞對有需要的美國人的幫助，而在減緩對當前危機
的有效反應方面，這種敵意也發揮了關鍵作用。
What about the larger picture? Is there a link between the uniquely American
prevalence of science denial and America’s uniquely high mortality? To be
honest, I’m still trying to figure this out.
那更大的圖景呢？在美國獨有的否定科學之風盛行和美國獨有的高死亡率之間有聯繫嗎？
老實說，我還在思考這個問題。
One possible story is that the U.S. political landscape gives special power
to the anti-science religious right, which has lent its support to
anti-government politicians. But I’m not sure whether this is the whole
story, and the power of people like Falwell is itself a phenomenon that
demands explanation.
一種可能的說法是，美國的政治格局賦予了反科學的宗教右翼以特殊權力，後者曾支持反
政府的政治人物。但我不確定這是否是一個全面的說法，像福爾韋爾這種人掌握的權力，
本身就是一個需要解釋的現象。
In any case, the point is that while America is a great nation with a
glorious history and much to be proud of — I consider myself very much a
patriot — the rise of the hard right has, as I said, also turned it into a
land of denial and death. This transformation has been taking place gradually
over the past few decades; it’s just that now we’re watching the
consequences on fast forward.
在任何情況下，重要的是，儘管美國是一個擁有光輝歷史的偉大國家，有許多值得驕傲的
方面——我深深認為自己是一名愛國者——但強硬右派的崛起，正如我說的，也在把美國
變成一座否定與死亡之國。這種轉變在過去幾十年裡逐漸發生；只是現在我們正在目睹後
果以快進的方式展開。
--
論述謬誤：1 轉移議題 change of subject、2 偷換概念 concept swap、3 虛假目標
strawman argument、4 人身攻擊 ad hominem、5 感性辯護 appeal to emotion、
6 關聯替代因果 correlation as causation、7 不當類比 false analogy、8 不當引申
slippery slope、9 同義反覆 circular reasoning、10 無知辯護 argument from
ignorance、11 引用權威 appeal to authority、12 黨同伐異 appeal to faction
--
※ 發信站: 批踢踢實業坊(ptt.cc), 來自: 76.183.127.209 (美國)
※ 文章網址: https://www.ptt.cc/bbs/IA/M.1586228676.A.475.html