So I was born on the last day of the last year of the '70s. I was raised on "Free to be you and me" -- (cheering) hip-hop -- not as many woohoos for hip-hop in the house. Thank you. Thank you for hip-hop -- and Anita Hill. (Cheering) My parents were radicals -- (Laughter) who became, well, grown-ups. My dad facetiously says, "We wanted to save the world, and instead we just got rich." We actually just got "middle class" in Colorado Springs, Colorado, but you get the picture. I was raised with a very heavy sense of unfinished legacy.
我出生於70年代 最後一年 的最後一天 我是被“自在作自己” (註:1974年New Seekers的一首主打歌) (掌聲) 和嘻哈音樂給養大的 顯然現場沒有太多人幫嘻哈音樂歡呼 謝謝你們.謝謝你們幫嘻哈音樂歡呼 也謝謝你們幫Anita Hill歡呼 (註:1991年因受到男性主管的性騷擾﹐公然起訴聯邦大法官的女子)(掌聲) 我父母是激進份子 (笑聲) 然後 長大成人 我爸曾開玩笑說 我們想要拯救世界 結果卻變得有錢“ 說真的我們不過是 科羅拉多州的中產階級 但你懂他的意思 我在一個沉重 且未完成的使命下長大
At this ripe old age of 30, I've been thinking a lot about what it means to grow up in this horrible, beautiful time, and I've decided, for me, it's been a real journey and paradox. The first paradox is that growing up is about rejecting the past and then promptly reclaiming it. Feminism was the water I grew up in. When I was just a little girl, my mom started what is now the longest-running women's film festival in the world. So while other kids were watching sitcoms and cartoons, I was watching very esoteric documentaries made by and about women. You can see how this had an influence. But she was not the only feminist in the house.
站在30歲的邊緣 我一直在思考長大的意義 在這個可怕又美麗的年代 最終我為我自己下了一個結論 這是一場充滿矛盾的旅程 第一個矛盾的地方是 長大好像就是不斷的否決過去 又突然的想修正回來 我從小生長在充滿女性主義的環境中 當我還是個小女孩時 我媽媽開始創辦了 到目前為止世界上為期最久的女性電影節 當其他小孩還在看喜劇與卡通時 我都在看圈內的 女性製作的女權記錄片 你可以想見它的影響力 但我媽可不是這個家 唯一的女權主義者
My dad actually resigned from the male-only business club in my hometown because he said he would never be part of an organization that would one day welcome his son, but not his daughter. (Applause) He's actually here today. (Applause) The trick here is my brother would become an experimental poet, not a businessman, but the intention was really good.
事實上我爸也從我家附近一家 只允許男性加入的俱樂部中退出了 因為他說,他絕不會成為只歡迎他兒子 而不歡迎他女兒,那種俱樂部的一份子 (掌聲) 事實上他今天也在場 (掌聲) 他的想法是 我哥會變成一個實驗詩人 而不是商人 他的出發點是好的
(Laughter)
(笑聲)
In any case, I didn't readily claim the feminist label, even though it was all around me, because I associated it with my mom's women's groups, her swishy skirts and her shoulder pads -- none of which had much cachet in the hallways of Palmer High School where I was trying to be cool at the time. But I suspected there was something really important about this whole feminism thing, so I started covertly tiptoeing into my mom's bookshelves and picking books off and reading them -- never, of course, admitting that I was doing so. I didn't actually claim the feminist label until I went to Barnard College and I heard Amy Richards and Jennifer Baumgardner speak for the first time. They were the co-authors of a book called "Manifesta." So what very profound epiphany, you might ask, was responsible for my feminist click moment? Fishnet stockings. Jennifer Baumgardner was wearing them. I thought they were really hot. I decided, okay, I can claim the feminist label. Now I tell you this -- I tell you this at the risk of embarrassing myself, because I think part of the work of feminism is to admit that aesthetics, that beauty, that fun do matter. There are lots of very modern political movements that have caught fire in no small part because of cultural hipness. Anyone heard of these two guys as an example?
其實在任何時候,我不會特別對外宣稱我是女性主義者 即使我被她們環繞 因為那總會讓我聯想到我媽以及她的女性社團 她的那些長裙,墊肩 在帕米爾高中的走廊上 都特別顯眼 那是當時我嘗試裝酷的地方 但我猜這些有關女權的東西 可能非常重要 所以我開始偷偷的接近我媽的書櫃 拿本書然後開始閱讀 當然,我永遠都不會承認的 我不會給自己貼上女權主義的標簽 直到我進入了伯納大學 第一次聽到了愛咪李奇與珍妮佛卡納的演講 他們是Manifesta這本書的前作者 你也許會問,那到底對當下的我,有著甚麼樣深刻的頓悟 以及重大影響呢? 網襪 珍妮佛當時正穿著網襪 我覺得超辣! 因次我決定,好,我可以幫自己貼上女權主義的標籤 現在我告訴你們這些 我冒著自己會被取笑的風險 因為我覺得為女性主義工作的一部分 就是承認美學,承認美麗 和樂趣的重要 有非常多的現代政治運動 因為創新文化 產生很大的影響 大家有聽到我用他們兩個來做例子嗎?
So my feminism is very indebted to my mom's, but it looks very different. My mom says, "patriarchy." I say, "intersectionality." So race, class, gender, ability, all of these things go into our experiences of what it means to be a woman. Pay equity? Yes. Absolutely a feminist issue. But for me, so is immigration. (Applause) Thank you. My mom says, "Protest march." I say, "Online organizing." I co-edit, along with a collective of other super-smart, amazing women, a site called Feministing.com. We are the most widely read feminist publication ever, and I tell you this because I think it's really important to see that there's a continuum.
我要感謝母親給我帶來女權主義的觀念 但我和她的女權主義很不同 我母親說"父權主義" 我說"交集" 種族, 階級, 性別, 以及能力 都會逐漸變成 成為一個女人的必然經驗 薪資平等?當然,這絕對是女權的議題 但對我而言,移民也是 謝謝 我母親說過"遊行示威" 而我說"線上組織" 我之前跟著一群非常棒又超級聰明的女人們 一起弄了一個網站 叫做" Feministing.com" 我們的網站是被最多人瀏覽的女性出版網站 我告訴你們這個 是因為我覺得看著她們延續下去 是一件非常重要的事
Feminist blogging is basically the 21st century version of consciousness raising. But we also have a straightforward political impact. Feministing has been able to get merchandise pulled off the shelves of Walmart. We got a misogynist administrator sending us hate-mail fired from a Big Ten school. And one of our biggest successes is we get mail from teenage girls in the middle of Iowa who say, "I Googled Jessica Simpson and stumbled on your site. I realized feminism wasn't about man-hating and Birkenstocks." So we're able to pull in the next generation in a totally new way.
女權主義的部落格基本上是21世紀中 女性意識的提升 我們也直接承受了政治影響 女權主義 是能夠讓商品從沃爾瑪下架的 曾經有個變態管理員因為寄恐嚇信給我們 而被前十名的好學校開除 而我們的最大成功之一 就是我們曾經收過一個愛荷華州的小女孩來信說 " 我在搜尋Jessica Simpson 時, 碰巧進到你們的網站 它讓我了解,女權主義並不是恨男生或是勃肯鞋 " 所以我們能夠用一種全心的方式 讓下一代加入我們的行列
My mom says, "Gloria Steinem." I say, "Samhita Mukhopadhyay, Miriam Perez, Ann Friedman, Jessica Valenti, Vanessa Valenti, and on and on and on and on." We don't want one hero. We don't want one icon. We don't want one face. We are thousands of women and men across this country doing online writing, community organizing, changing institutions from the inside out -- all continuing the incredible work that our mothers and grandmothers started. Thank you.
我母親也曾提過Gloria Steinem(註:她是著名的美國女性人權先鋒) 而我說"Samhita Mukhopadhyay" Miriam Perez, Ann Friedman, Jessica Valenti, Vanessa Valenti, 還有許許多多的女權主義者 我們不要只有一個英雄 我們不要只有一個標章 我們不需要只有一張臉來代替我們所有人 我們是一起生活在這個國家的數以千萬的女人和男人 從事著網路創作,社區組織 從體制裡開始改變 所有人都在從事著這不可思議的工作 從母親們或祖母們就開始的工作 謝謝
(Applause)
掌聲
Which brings me to the second paradox: sobering up about our smallness and maintaining faith in our greatness all at once. Many in my generation -- because of well-intentioned parenting and self-esteem education -- were socialized to believe that we were special little snowflakes -- (Laughter) who were going to go out and save the world. These are three words many of us were raised with. We walk across graduation stages, high on our overblown expectations, and when we float back down to earth, we realize we don't know what the heck it means to actually save the world anyway. The mainstream media often paints my generation as apathetic, and I think it's much more accurate to say we are deeply overwhelmed. And there's a lot to be overwhelmed about, to be fair -- an environmental crisis, wealth disparity in this country unlike we've seen since 1928, and globally, a totally immoral and ongoing wealth disparity. Xenophobia's on the rise. The trafficking of women and girls. It's enough to make you feel very overwhelmed.
這讓我想到第二個矛盾點 讓我們意識到我們的眇小 同時保持我們 偉大的信念 跟我同年代的很多人 因為父母的用心栽培,以及受到自尊式的教育 都社會化的相信 我們會走出自己的一片天和拯救世界 (笑聲) 因為我們都是最特別的小雪花 我們曾經跟著三個字長大 我們走過畢業階段 先是高於我們的期待 然後我們又回到現實 我們忽然發現自己根本不知道 拯救世界真正的意義 主流媒體常常描繪我們這個世代 是冷漠的時代 準確一點來說 我們其實深感打擊 說句公道話,打擊我們的不只這些 像是環境危機 我們國家的貧富差距 不止我們所看到的 自1928年 全球都存在在不道德與貧富差距中 仇外的傾向逐漸加溫 非法販賣婦女及女童... 這些都足以讓我們感到難以承受
I experienced this firsthand myself when I graduated from Barnard College in 2002. I was fired up; I was ready to make a difference. I went out and I worked at a non-profit, I went to grad school, I phone-banked, I protested, I volunteered, and none of it seemed to matter. And on a particularly dark night of December of 2004, I sat down with my family, and I said that I had become very disillusioned. I admitted that I'd actually had a fantasy -- kind of a dark fantasy -- of writing a letter about everything that was wrong with the world and then lighting myself on fire on the White House steps. My mom took a drink of her signature Sea Breeze, her eyes really welled with tears, and she looked right at me and she said, "I will not stand for your desperation." She said, "You are smarter, more creative and more resilient than that."
在2002年 當我畢業於柏納大學時 我曾親身經歷過 我充滿熱情,準備要有所做為 我開始為一家非營利公司工作 我進入研究所,我打電話籌款 我上街頭,我做義工 但這些似乎都無關緊要 2004年12月 在某個特別漆黑的夜晚 我坐下來和我的家人說 我決定不抱任何幻想了 我承認我曾有個幻想 有點黑暗的幻想 就是寫一封信 關於這世界上所有的錯 然後在白宮的階梯上 引火自焚 我媽 喝下一口她最愛的調酒“海風” 眼裡充滿了眼淚 她直直看著我說 “我絕對不會容忍 你的絕望行徑” 她說“你更聰明,更有創意 更有彈性,你不應如此。”
Which brings me to my third paradox. Growing up is about aiming to succeed wildly and being fulfilled by failing really well. (Laughter) (Applause) There's a writer I've been deeply influenced by, Parker Palmer, and he writes that many of us are often whiplashed "between arrogant overestimation of ourselves and a servile underestimation of ourselves." You may have guessed by now, I did not light myself on fire. I did what I know to do in desperation, which is write. I wrote the book I needed to read. I wrote a book about eight incredible people all over this country doing social justice work. I wrote about Nia Martin-Robinson, the daughter of Detroit and two civil rights activists, who's dedicating her life to environmental justice. I wrote about Emily Apt who initially became a caseworker in the welfare system because she decided that was the most noble thing she could do, but quickly learned, not only did she not like it, but she wasn't really good at it. Instead, what she really wanted to do was make films. So she made a film about the welfare system and had a huge impact. I wrote about Maricela Guzman, the daughter of Mexican immigrants, who joined the military so she could afford college. She was actually sexually assaulted in boot camp and went on to co-organize a group called the Service Women's Action Network.
我第三個矛盾點是 長大不過是瞄準巨大的成功 然後徹底失敗 (笑聲) (掌聲) 影響我很深的作家 Parker Palmer(教育、社區、社會改變問題的作者) 他說我們往往“在自大,高估與 卑微地低估自己中” 鞭打自己 你現在可以看到 我沒有引火自焚 我做了我在絕望中所做的,就是寫 我寫了本我需要閱讀的書 書中描寫我們國家 八位從事社會正義 了不起的人士 其中有來自底特律的 Nia Martin-Robinson 和兩個民權運動家 她將一生奉獻於 環境正義 我寫 Emily Apt 一開始她加入社福團體 因為她認為這是她所能做的最崇高的事 但很快發現 她不但不喜歡 她甚至做不好 她真正想做的事情,其實是拍電影 她拍了一部有關社會福利制度的電影 有很大的影響力 我寫 Maricela Guzman ,一個墨西哥移民之女 她參加軍隊 只為了付大學學費 她在新兵訓練營被性侵 於是創建了一個叫 女兵行動網的組織
What I learned from these people and others was that I couldn't judge them based on their failure to meet their very lofty goals. Many of them are working in deeply intractable systems -- the military, congress, the education system, etc. But what they managed to do within those systems was be a humanizing force. And at the end of the day, what could possibly be more important than that? Cornel West says, "Of course it's a failure. But how good a failure is it?" This isn't to say we give up our wildest, biggest dreams. It's to say we operate on two levels. On one, we really go after changing these broken systems of which we find ourselves a part. But on the other, we root our self-esteem in the daily acts of trying to make one person's day more kind, more just, etc.
我從他們之中學到的是 我不能因為一個人沒有達到崇高的目標 就認為他們失敗 他們往往在極為疾首的社會體制裡工作 像是軍隊、國會 以及教育體制等等 但是他們設法成為這些體制內 人性化的力量 到最後 還有什麼比這些更重要的 Cornel West 說"這當然是個失敗" 但這是個多好的失敗經驗" 這不是要我們放棄偉大的夢想 他是要我們應該有兩種做法 一個是 我們真的進入這些我們身處的 失敗的體系 但把我們的自尊放在日常生活中 試圖使每個人的每一天 更寬容 更公正...
So when I was a little girl, I had a couple of very strange habits. One of them was I used to lie on the kitchen floor of my childhood home, and I would suck the thumb of my left hand and hold my mom's cold toes with my right hand. (Laughter) I was listening to her talk on the phone, which she did a lot. She was talking about board meetings, she was founding peace organizations, she was coordinating carpools, she was consoling friends -- all these daily acts of care and creativity. And surely, at three and four years old, I was listening to the soothing sound of her voice, but I think I was also getting my first lesson in activist work.
當我還是個小女孩的時候 我有些奇怪的習慣 其一是 我習慣躺在我舊家廚房的地板上 左手吸吮我的拇指 右手握著我媽冰冷的腳趾 (笑) 我常偷聽我媽講電話 她常常在電話中討論董事會議 當時她正創辦和平組織 她要協調合夥用車,她要安慰朋友... 這些所有日常的關懷和創意 可以肯定的是,在三、四歲的時候 我聽到她安定人心的聲音 這也是我成為積極份子的第一課
The activists I interviewed had nothing in common, literally, except for one thing, which was that they all cited their mothers as their most looming and important activist influences. So often, particularly at a young age, we look far afield for our models of the meaningful life, and sometimes they're in our own kitchens, talking on the phone, making us dinner, doing all that keeps the world going around and around. My mom and so many women like her have taught me that life is not about glory, or certainty, or security even. It's about embracing the paradox. It's about acting in the face of overwhelm. And it's about loving people really well. And at the end of the day, these things make for a lifetime of challenge and reward.
我採訪的積極份子 毫無共通處,除了她們 都說她們的母親 是影響她們 成為積極份子的重要原因 所以 特別在我們年輕的時候 我們往往在遠方 找尋一個富有意義的生活的模範 有時這個模範就在我們自家廚房 講電話,做晚餐 盡一切讓世界持續前進 我媽 還有眾多像我媽一樣的女人 都教我 人生不是為了榮耀 或確定 甚至不是安全感 而是欣然接受矛盾 在難以承受的狀況下開始行動 好好愛人 在一日結束後 這些事會讓我們的一生 充滿挑戰和回饋
Thank you.
謝謝
(Applause)
(掌聲)