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Here are some things you may know about Lena Dunham, if you happen to have opened the pages of any New York periodical at any point in the last few years. She is the youthful impresario behind HBO’s series “Girls,” which has launched at least one think piece for every viewer in its audience; she is also the show’s star, in which capacity she frequently disrobes; and she is the author of a memoir-ish new book, which debuted to much attention last week. She is also a frequent agitator for liberal causes, most famously in the ad she cut for President Obama in 2012, which compared the experience of casting one’s first vote to, well, a different sort of magical first time.
过去几年里，只要你在任何一个时间，凑巧翻开过任何一本纽约刊物，你对莉娜·杜汉姆(Lena Dunham)的了解可能是以下这些：年纪轻轻就成了HBO剧集《都市女孩》(Girls)的管理者，这部剧集已经促使坊间对剧集的每一个观众都准备了至少一篇观点文章；她还是个剧集的主演，在其中频频宽衣解带；她写了一本带回忆录色彩的书，上周出版的时候引来不少关注。她还时常宣扬一些自由主义思想，其中最著名的是2012年为奥巴马总统剪辑的一条广告，片中她把一个人第一次投票的经历，跟生活中另一种奇妙的第一次相提并论。
Here is something you might not know about her: She has a number of reactionary admirers.
以下是一些你可能不知道的：她有不少思想反动的崇拜者。
I’m using “reactionary” rather than “Republican” advisedly: I don’t mean to imply that Tea Party activists are lining up to buy “Not That Kind of Girl,” Dunham’s comic (sort of) foray into non-fictionalized self-exposure, or that there’s a Fox News talk show waiting in her future.
这里我用“反动”而不是“共和党”，是经过一番考虑的：我不是在暗示，茶党激进人士在踊跃购买《不是那种女孩》(Not That Kind of Girl)，也就是杜汉姆那本用（类似）漫画手法进行非虚构自曝的首次尝试，或者她有朝一日会在Fox新闻频道(Fox News)做个脱口秀。
But within the small (but fun!) world of cultural conservatives who watch too much HBO, Dunham has a fan base. Let me explain why.
然而在看了太多HBO的文化保守人士那小小（但好玩！）的世界里，杜汉姆是有观众基础的。容我解释一下为什么。
Like most television shows about young urbanites making their way in the world, “Girls” is a depiction of a culture whose controlling philosophy is what the late Robert Bellah called “expressive individualism” — the view that the key to the good life lies almost exclusively in self-discovery, self-actualization, the cultivation of the unique and holy You.
和多数讲述年轻都市人打拼生活的电视剧一样，《都市女孩》是对一种文化的描绘，其中的主导哲学就是已故的罗伯特·贝拉(Robert Bellah)所称的“表现型个人主义”——这种哲学认为，幸福生活几乎完全要靠自我发现、自我实现，陶冶一个独特而圣洁的你。
This is a perspective with religious and political corollaries: It implies a God-as-life-coach theology, the kind that pulses through Oprah Winfrey’s current revival tour, and a politics in which the state is effectively a therapeutic agent, protecting the questing self from shocks and deprivation.
这样的看法免不了要往宗教和政治方面发展：它暗含着一种“神乃生活之导师”的神学，跟此刻贯穿在奥普拉·温弗瑞(Oprah Winfrey)复出巡回演说中的那种同属一类，它是一种政治，政府在这里的角色实际上是负责疗伤，让苦苦追寻的自我免遭震荡和贫穷的侵扰。
And to be a cultural conservative today means, above all, regarding expressive individualism as an idea desperately in need of correction and critique.
而最重要的是，身为一个当下的文化保守人士，意味着要将表现型个人主义视为一种亟需纠正和批判的理念。
Often the roots of this kind of conservatism are religious, since biblical faith takes a rather dimmer view of human nature’s inner workings, a rather darker view of the unfettered self. But the conservative argument is also a practical one: We don’t think expressive individualism actually makes people very happy.
这种保守主义往往是植根于宗教的，因为奉守经文的信仰，会对人性的内心思绪持有一种更暗淡的看法，对不受约束之自我的看法也更阴暗。但是保守派的理据同时也是很实际的：我们不认为表现型个人主义真的能给人带来幸福。
We have some sociological evidence for this contention, in the disintegration that has proceeded apace in poorer communities as American society has become more individualistic. But further up the income and education ladder, life is much more prosperous and stable, which means that the case against expressive individualism rests on impressions and experiences — on hard-to-prove generalizations about narcissism, anomie and quiet desperation among the young and well-to-do.
这个论点是有一些社会学证据的，只需要看看在美国社会进一步趋向于个人化的同时，一些相对贫困的社群的瓦解。然而顺着收入和教育的梯子再往上爬，生活就会变得富裕而稳定许多，就是说对表现型个人主义的反驳主要是以印象和体验为依据——对年轻人和富人群体中的自恋、失范和默默的绝望进行难以自圆其说的归纳。
Those impressions, those generalizations, are rarely reflected in pop culture. The best of contemporary TV is dark dark dark, but it’s the darkness of exotic realms — Westeros or Walter White’s meth lab, mob life or deep Louisiana. The defining portraits of younger, well-educated blue-state life, from “Friends” to “Sex and the City” to their imitators, are essentially propaganda for expressive individualism, sometimes allowing room for nuance but never for a real critique.
这些印象，这些归纳，很少能在流行文化中得到反映。当代电视的最佳创作就是阴暗阴暗再阴暗，但那是一种来自奇异世界的暗——维斯特洛大陆(Westeros)或瓦尔特·怀特(Walter White)的冰毒厨房，黑帮江湖或深处腹地的路易斯安那。从《老友记》(Friends)到《欲望都市》(Sex and the City)乃至它们的仿制品，对年轻的、受过良好教育的蓝州（代指价值观倾向于自由主义，政治上支持民主党的州）生活进行的典型描绘，本质上就是表现型个人主义的宣传广告，偶尔能有些细微的指摘之处，但对一个真正的批评者来说始终是不值一提的。
Except for “Girls.” The thing that makes Dunham’s show so interesting, the reason it inspired a certain unsettlement among some of its early fans, is that it often portrays young-liberal-urbanite life the way, well, many reactionaries see it: as a collision of narcissists educated mostly in self-love, a sexual landscape distinguished by serial humiliations — a realm at once manic and medicated, privileged and bereft of higher purpose.
《都市女孩》是个例外。杜汉姆的剧之所以有意思，之所以能在最初那批拥趸者心中激起某种不安，是因为它对年轻自由派都市潮人生活的描绘，往往是符合……呃……反动分子的看法的：它是浸淫在自爱教育中的自恋者发生的碰撞，其性爱剧情因为一系列的耻辱而显得引人注目——在这个世界里，人们既是疯癫、嗑药的，又高人一等却缺乏崇高目标。
Now there is plenty of charm and fun and human interest on the show as well, and I’m quite sure that Dunham does not intend the reading I’ve just offered. More likely she agrees with Elaine Blair, whose New York Review of Books article chided the show’s “nervous” liberal critics, and praised “Girls” for depicting the ways in which, thanks to the sexual revolution, “all of us can know more people in more ways than was ever previously allowed,” with “the ultimate prize to be wrung from all of these baffling sexual predicaments” being “a deeper understanding of oneself.”
这部剧也不乏魅力、笑料和人情味，而且我相信我在这里的解读并非杜汉姆的本意。她更可能认同的是伊莲·布莱尔(Elaine Blair)，后者在《纽约书评》(New York Review of Books)中的文章指责了该剧的那些“神经质的”自由派批评者，赞扬《都市女孩》把性解放之下，“我们大家都可以通过更多以往不被允许的方式结识更多人”这一点呈现了出来，而它的“终极回报就是从一件件令人困惑的性爱尴尬事件中”，“对自我产生更深刻的理解”。
This is Expressive Individualism 101. But the show is observant enough, artistic enough, to allow room for contrary interpretations. There are scenes — an extremely dark sexual encounter involving an otherwise likable male character near the end of season two — that make Blair’s sexual happy-talk seem frankly absurd. There are moments — a messed-up daughter’s encounter with her feckless dad, a character’s rant against her close friends’ self-absorption — that are almost puritanical (in a good way!) in their moral perspective.
这是一堂表现型个人主义基础课。但是这部剧足够敏锐，足够精美，给相反的阐释留出了空间。有一些场景——第二季接近尾声时有一次极端阴暗的性遭遇，所涉男性角色本来还颇招人喜欢——让布莱尔的那些关于性的打趣显得很荒唐。有一些瞬间——一个生活混乱不堪的女儿和不负责任的父亲的相遇，一个角色对其密友的自我沉醉的发泄——则有着清教徒般的道德视角（好的那种！）
Any reactionary affection for her work is doubtless unrequited. But it’s merited, because Dunham is doing a rare thing: She’s making a show for liberals that, merely by being realistic, sharp-edge, complicated, almost gives cultural conservatism its due.
反动人士对她的作品的喜爱无疑是单相思。但这是它应得的，因为杜汉姆在做的不是件寻常事：她在为自由人士做这部剧，但仅仅因为够真实、犀利、复杂，几乎帮文化保守主义说了句公道话。
