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在动荡的时期 像母亲一样思考

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One morning, 18 years ago, I stepped out of a New York City subway on a beautiful day in September.

18年前的九月,在一个风和日丽的早上,我刚从纽约地铁中走出来。
The sun was warm and bright, the sky was a clear, perfect blue.
阳光温暖明媚,天空晴朗湛蓝。
I had my six-month-old son in one of those front-facing baby carriers, you know, so he could see everything.
我让六个月大的儿子坐在视野朝前的婴儿背带里,这样他就能看到所有事物了。
And when I turned right on Sixth Avenue, what he saw was the World Trade Center on fire.
就当我在第六大道右转的时候,他看见的是世贸中心化为了火海。
As soon as I realized that this was an attack, the first thing I did, without even really thinking about it,
当我意识到这是一场袭击时,我下意识做的第一件事
was to take my baby and turn him around in that carrier.
就是抱住我的宝贝,在背带里把他转过来。
I didn't want him to see what was going on.
我不想让他看到正在发生的事。
And I just remember feeling so grateful that he was still young enough that I didn't have to tell him that someone had done this on purpose.
我只记得当时很庆幸,他还小,我不需要告诉他这是有人蓄意而为。
9/11 was like crossing a border, a hostile border into dangerous, uncharted territory.
9/11事件就像跨越边境一样,跨越敌军边境,进入危险而陌生的领域。
The world was suddenly in this terrifying new place, and I was in this place as a new mother.
世界突然之间变成了可怕的新局势,而我则是这里的一位新手母亲。
I remember my thoughts kind of ping-ponging around from, "How am I ever going to protect this baby?"
我记得我当时的思绪如一团乱麻,一会儿想着“我究竟该怎样保护好这孩子?”,
to, "How am I ever going to get some sleep?"
一会儿想着“我到底有没有办法睡个好觉?”
Well, my son turned 18 this year, along with millions of other people who were babies on 9/11.
我儿子今年18岁了,和数百万经历9/11事件的婴儿一样。
And in that time, we have all crossed into this hostile, uncharted territory of climate breakdown,
在那段时间里,我们都跨进了这片充满敌意的未知区域,充斥着气候恶化、
of endless wars, of economic meltdowns, of deep political divisions,
战火不断、经济崩溃和深深的政治分歧,
of the many crises around the world that I don't need to list off, because they are blaring at you every single day from your news feed.
世界各地危机四起,我甚至不需要一一列举,因为每天的新闻动态都会大声地提醒大家。
But there is something I've learned in these 18 years of parenting and in my years leading a global women's rights organization.
但在做母亲的18年时间以及领导国际女性权益组织的多年经验中,我学会了一件事。
There is a way to face these big crises in the world without feeling overwhelmed and despairing.
我们是有办法不被窒息、不带绝望地面对世界上这些大型危机的。
It's simple, and it's powerful. It's to think like a mother.
方法很简单,也很有效:那就是像母亲一样思考。
Now, to be clear, you don't have to be a woman or a parent to do this.
需要说明的是,你不一定要是女性,也不一定要有孩子。
Thinking like a mother is a lens that's available to everybody.
像母亲一样思考是每个人都可以做到的事。
The poet Alexis De Veaux writes, "Motherhood is not simply the organic process of giving birth.
诗人亚历克西斯·德·维奥写过,“身为人母不仅仅是分娩的生物过程。
It's an understanding of the needs of the world."
它还是对世界需求的理解。”
Now, it's easy to focus on all of the obstacles to making this the world we want: greed, inequality, violence. Yes, there is all of that.
我们容易关注到阻止世界成为我们想要的模样的各种障碍:贪婪、不公、暴力。没错,存在这些障碍。
But there's also the option to plant a seed, a different seed, and cultivate what you want to see grow, even in the midst of crisis.
但我们还可以选择播下种子,一颗不同的种子,并培养出你们想让其生长的事物,即便在危机之中也是如此。
Majid from Iraq understands this. He is a housepainter by trade and someone who believes deeply in equal rights for women.
来自伊拉克的玛吉德明白这一点。他是一名房屋油漆工,他坚信女性应该获得平等的权利。
When ISIS invaded northern Iraq where he lives, he worked with a local women's organization to help build an underground railroad,
当伊斯兰国ISIS入侵他所住的伊拉克北部时,他和当地一个女性组织合作,帮助建造了地下铁路,
an escape network for women's rights activists and LGBTIQ folks who were targeted with assassination.
这个铁路网络帮助了女性权益活动人士以及LGBTIQ人士这些被暗杀的目标逃脱。
And when I asked Majid why he risked his own life to bring people to safety, he said to me,
当我问玛吉德为什么要冒着生命危险将人们带到安全的地时,他对我说:
"If we want a brighter future, we have to build it now in the dark times so that one day we can live in the light."
“如果我们想要更光明的未来,我们现在就必须在黑暗时刻中创造未来,唯此我们有朝一日才能在光明之下生活。”
That's what social justice work is, and that's what mothers do.
这就是社会正义的事业,这也是母亲们所做的事。
We act in the present with an idea of the future that we want to bring about.
我们在当下行动,心怀想要创造的未来。
All of the best ideas seem impossible at first.
所有伟大的想法一开始都看似不可能。
But just in my lifetime, we've seen the end of apartheid,
但就在我的有生之年,我们见证了种族隔离的终结,
the affirmation that women's rights are human rights, marriage equality, the fall of dictators who ruled for decades and so much more.
女权被确立为人权,婚姻平等,统治数十年的独裁者下台,以及很多其他的事情。
All of these things seemed impossible until people took action to make them happen,
这些事情曾经都看似不可能,直到人们采取了行动,将它们实现,
and then, like, almost right away, they seemed inevitable.
随后,几乎是在转瞬间,这些事情似乎变成了必然。
When I was growing up, whether we were stuck in traffic or dealing with a family tragedy,
在我小时候,无论我们遇到了堵车,还是要面对家庭的不幸,
my mother would say, "Something good is going to happen, we just don't know what it is yet."
我母亲都会说,“会有好事发生的,我们只是还不知道是什么好事。”
Now, I will admit that my brothers and I make fun of her for this,
我得承认,我和兄弟们都会借此笑话她,
but people ask me all the time how I deal with the suffering that I see in my work in refugee camps and disaster zones,
但人们一直问我,我是怎么面对工作中在难民营和灾区所见到的苦难,
and I think of my mom and that seed of possibility that she planted in me.
这时我就会想到我的母亲,以及她在我心中种下的那颗可能性的种子。

在动荡的时期 像母亲一样思考

Because, when you believe that something good is coming and you're part of making it happen,

因为当你相信会有好事发生,并且你也在促成它发生的时候,
you start to be able to see beyond the suffering to how things could be.
你就会开始看到苦难以外的东西,看到事物可能的样子。
Today, there is a new set of necessary ideas that seem impossible but one day will feel inevitable:
今天,有一套必要的新想法,虽然看似不可能,但终有一天会变为必然:
that we could end violence against women, make war a thing of the past,
我们可以终结对女性的暴力,让战争成为过去式,
learn to live in balance with nature before it's too late and make sure that everybody has what they need to thrive.
及时学会与自然和谐相处,并确保大家都有蓬勃发展所需的条件。
Of course, being able to picture a future like this is not the same thing as knowing what to do to make it come about,
当然,能够构想这样的未来并不等同于知道该怎样将未来化为现实,
but thinking like a mother can help with that, too.
但是,像母亲一样思考也能帮助我们实现未来。
A few years ago, East Africa was gripped by a famine,
几年前,东非遭遇饥荒,
and women I know from Somalia walked for days carrying their hungry children in search of food and water.
我所认识的一些索马里女性背着饥饿的孩子徒步数天,寻找食物和水。
A quarter of a million people died, and half of them were babies and toddlers.
25万人在饥荒中死亡,其中一半是婴幼儿。
And while this catastrophe unfolded, too much of the world looked away.
灾难席卷而来时,世界上太多国家都视而不见。
But a group of women farmers in Sudan, including Fatima Ahmed -- that's her holding the corn -- heard about what was happening.
但苏丹有一群女性农民,其中包括法蒂玛·艾哈迈德--拿着玉米的那个就是她--她们听说了发生的事情。
And they pooled together the extra money that they had from their harvest and asked me to send it to those Somali mothers.
于是,她们把收成所得的结余凑在一起,请我送给那些索马里的母亲们。
Now, these farmers could have decided that they didn't have the power to act.
这些农民本可以表示自己没有行动的力量。
They were barely getting by themselves, some of them.
她们中的一些人自己也只能勉强维持生计。
They lived without electricity, without furniture.
她们没有电,没有家具。
But they overrode that. They did what mothers do: they saw themselves as the solution and they took action.
但是她们毫不在意。她们做了母亲们会做的事:她们认为自己能够解决问题,并采取了行动。
You do it all the time if you have kids.
如果你有孩子的话,你一直都在这么做。
You make major decisions about their health care, their education, their emotional well-being,
你会做很多重大决定,比如孩子的医疗、教育、情感健康,
even if you're not a doctor or a teacher or a therapist.
即使你并不是医生、老师或心理治疗师。
You recognize what your child needs and you step up to provide it the best you can.
你能看出孩子的需求,并挺身而出,尽自己所能去满足他们的需求。
Thinking like a mother means seeing the whole world through the eyes of those who are responsible for its most vulnerable people.
像母亲一样思考,意味着要尽可能像弱者一样去感受整个世界。
And we're not used to thinking of subsistence farmers as philanthropists,
我们并不习惯将勉强糊口的农民与慈善家联系起来,
but those women were practicing the root meaning of philanthropy: love for humanity.
但是那些女性展示的正是慈善的根本意义:对人类的爱。
What's at the core of thinking like a mother shouldn't be a surprise: it's love. Because, love is more than just an emotion.
像母亲一样思考的核心应该并不出人意料:那就是爱。因为爱不仅仅是一种情感。
It's a capacity, a verb, an endlessly renewable resource -- and not just in our private lives.
它还是一种能力,一个动词,一份无穷无尽的可再生资源--不仅限于我们的个人生活里。
We recognize hate in the public sphere. Right? Hate speech, hate crimes. But not love.
我们能认出公共领域里的仇恨。对吧?仇恨言论、仇恨犯罪。但我们认不出爱。
What is love in the public sphere?
公共领域里的爱是什么?
Well, Cornel West, who is not a mother but thinks like one, says it best: "Justice is what love looks like in public."
康奈尔·韦斯特并非母亲,但他像母亲一样思考,他一针见血地说:“正义就是爱在公众面前的样子。”
And when we remember that every policy is an expression of social values,
当我们想起每一项政策都是社会价值观的表现,
love stands out as that superstar value, the one best able to account for the most vulnerable among us.
爱就是其中独树一帜的明星价值观,它最能够支持我们当中最弱势的群体。
And when we position love as a kind of leading edge in policy making,
当我们把爱作为制定决策的首要因素时,
we get new answers to fundamental social questions, like, "What's the economy for?"
我们就获得了解答社会根本问题的新答案:比如,“经济增长是为了什么?”
"What is our commitment to those in the path of the hurricane?" "How do we greet those arriving to our borders?"
“我们对遭受飓风侵袭的人们应做出什么承诺?”“我们该如何应对抵达我们边境的人们?”
When you think like a mother, you prioritize the needs of the many, not the whims of the few.
当你像母亲一样思考的时候,你就会将多数人的需求放在首位,而不是去迎合少数人的兴致。
When you think like a mother, you don't build a seawall around beachfront property,
当你像母亲一样思考的时候,你就不会在滨海区的房子周围建造防波堤,
because that would divert floodwaters to communities that are still exposed.
因为那会将洪水引开,冲击到没有防护的社区。
When you think like a mother, you don't try to prosecute someone for leaving water for people crossing the desert.
当你像母亲一样思考的时候,你就不会因某人把水留给穿越沙漠的人而对其提出起诉。
Because, you know... Because you know that migration, just like mothering, is an act of hope.
因为,你明白...因为你明白,移居就像身为人母一样,是怀抱希望的行为。
Now, not every mother thinks like a mother.
并不是每一位母亲都会像母亲一样思考。
When presented with a choice, some of us have made the wrong one,
在面临选择时,有些人会选错,躲在武器、铁丝网或特权后面,
hiding behind weapons or barbed wire or privilege to deny the rest of the world,
否定世界上的其他一切,认为自己能够在武装救生船上,
thinking they can see their way to safety in some kind of armed lifeboat fueled by racism and xenophobia.
借着种族主义和仇外情绪的燃料,找到通往安全的路。
Not every mother is a role model, but all of us have a choice.
并非每位母亲都是榜样,但我们所有人都可以选择。
Are we going to jump on that armed lifeboat or work together to build a mother ship that can carry everyone?
我们是要跳上那条武装救生船,还是要合作建造一艘能承载所有人的母亲之船?
You know how to build that mother ship, how to repair the world and ease the suffering.
你知道该如何建造那艘母亲之船,如何修复世界,缓解苦难。
Think like a mother. Thinking like a mother is a tool we can all use to build the world we want. Thank you.
像母亲一样思考。像母亲一样思考是我们都能运用的方法去打造我们想要的世界。谢谢大家。

重点单词   查看全部解释    
border ['bɔ:də]

想一想再看

n. 边界,边境,边缘
vt. 与 ... 接

 
divert [di'və:t]

想一想再看

vt. 转移,使欢娱
vi. 转移

联想记忆
core [kɔ:]

想一想再看

n. 果心,核心,要点
vt. 挖去果核

 
vulnerable ['vʌlnərəbl]

想一想再看

adj. 易受伤害的,有弱点的

联想记忆
humanity [hju:'mæniti]

想一想再看

n. 人类,人性,人道,慈爱,(复)人文学科

 
greed [gri:d]

想一想再看

n. 贪心,贪婪

 
impossible [im'pɔsəbl]

想一想再看

adj. 不可能的,做不到的
adj.

联想记忆
protect [prə'tekt]

想一想再看

vt. 保护,投保

联想记忆
option ['ɔpʃən]

想一想再看

n. 选择权,可选物,优先购买权
v. 给予选

联想记忆
migration [mai'greiʃən]

想一想再看

n. 移民,移往,移动

 

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