How Bad is American Life? Americans Don’t Even Have Friends Anymore

美國人的生活有多糟糕? 美國人連朋友都沒有了


One of the things that I try to teach Americans about is that they’re living in a disintegrating society. When I say that, many think I’m insulting them, or talking down to them. Alas, I’m speaking factually and formally. Let me explain.
Take a look at the chart above. What does it say? A number of things which should never be true in a healthy society.

我想告訴美國人的一件事就是，他們生活在一個分裂的社會中，當(dāng)我這么說的時候，很多人認(rèn)為我是在侮辱他們，或者用居高臨下的口氣對他們說話，唉，我說的是事實，也是很正經(jīng)的，讓我來解釋一下。
看看上面的圖表。
上面說的是什么？在一個健康的社會里，有一些事情是不應(yīng)該發(fā)生的。

People who’ve lived abroad — or people who aren’t Americans — often note the same strange, upsetting feature of American life. It feels remarkably unfriendly. America’s a weirdly hostile, aggressive place. Everyone seems to be an enemy — and I’m not just speaking politically, but in a broader social context.

在國外生活過的人--或者美國以外的人--會經(jīng)常注意到美國生活中一個奇怪的、令人不安的特點，那就是美國給人感覺非常不友好，美國是一個奇怪的充滿敵意和侵略性的地方，每個人似乎都是敵人-- 我說的不只是政治上，而是在更廣泛的社會背景下。
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Now, Americans, at least the ones who’ve never lived elsewhere, are baffled by this. Aren’t we polite? Aren’t we nice? Kind of, sometimes, on the surface, is the answer. But on deeper levels America’s, a remarkably unfriendly place. Let me give you a few examples.

美國人，至少是那些從未在其他地方生活過的人，對此感到困惑。我們不是很有禮貌嗎？我們不是很好嗎？表面上看有些時候確實如此，但在更深層次上，美國是一個非常不友好的地方，讓我給你舉幾個例子。

Simple acts of politeness and friendship are seen as odd in America. Americans don’t treat each other with dignity. My doctor friend once fell down on the subway in a major city…and nobody lifted a finger to help her. In the rest of the world — more or less all of it — that would be a deeply abnormal act. In America, that kind of indifference is completely normal. Who wants to get involved? Weakness is a liability, isn’t it? I can’t afford to be late for work! She’s making me late for work with her weakness! And so on.

在美國，簡單的禮貌和友誼在美國被視為奇怪的行為，美國人不尊重彼此，我的醫(yī)生朋友有一次在一個大城市的地鐵上摔倒了...... 沒有人伸出一根手指去幫她，在世界其它地方，這會是一種非常不正常的行為，在美國，這種冷漠是完全正常的。
誰會去管？虛弱是一種負(fù)擔(dān)，不是嗎？我可不能上班遲到！她的虛弱會讓我上班遲到！諸如此類。

When you go to work in America, it’s totally normal for your boss to shout at you, yell at you, demean you, belittle you. In fact, such things are seen as “teamwork” or “team building” and so on. Corporate culture prizes its little aggressive “hard chargers.” But in the rest of the world — again, more or less all of it, especially the rich world — being treated like this called what it is: abuse. If your boss shouts at you or calls you names in Europe or Canada, you can get them fired, because it’s a grave violation of formal codes and social norms both. In America, you have to take it…and thank them.

在美國，當(dāng)你去工作時，你的老板對你大喊大叫，貶低你，輕視你，這些都是很正常的。
事實上，這樣的事情被看作是 "團隊工作 "或 "團隊建設(shè) "等等，企業(yè)文化推崇其積極進(jìn)取的 "硬漢"，但在世界其他地方——同樣，或多或少可以說是所有的地方，尤其是富裕的世界——被這樣對待會被視為：虐待。
在歐洲或加拿大，如果你的老板對你大喊大叫或罵你，你可以反炒他的魷魚，因為這嚴(yán)重違反了法規(guī)和社會規(guī)范，但在美國，你必須接受...并且感謝他們。

But without a doubt the weirdest feature of American life, the one that makes it so unfriendly, is the one that’s the simplest, but hardest to explain. Americans don’t have friends. They don’t really have relationships at all very much in the way that a healthy society does. That’s what the chart above says. Half of Americans say they don’t even have four close friends. More than 1 in 10 Americans now reports having no close friends at all.

但毫無疑問，美國生活中最怪異的特征---- 使其如此不友好的特征---- 也是最簡單但最難解釋的特征。
美國人沒有朋友，他們根本不像一個健康的社會那樣擁有真正的人際關(guān)系，這就是上面的圖表所表達(dá)出來的內(nèi)容。
一半的美國人說他們甚至沒有四個親密的朋友，超過十分之一的美國人報告說根本沒有親密的朋友。

That’s completely bizarre. Totally pathological. That’s a really shocking — yet unsurprising — statistic. People in America don’t even have friends anymore? That’s a feature of living in a collapsing society. It’s very Soviet. Very North Korean. Very Iran. Friendship comes to be a luxury — and a liability. Suspicion, aggression, hostility, and cruelty take over, as life becomes a bitter, brutal battle for self-preservation.

這真是太奇怪了，完全病態(tài)，這是一個令人震驚但并不令人驚訝的統(tǒng)計數(shù)字。
美國人連朋友都沒有？這是生活在一個崩潰的社會的一個特征，很有蘇聯(lián)風(fēng)格，非常朝鮮，非常伊朗。

友誼變成了一種奢侈品ーー也是一種負(fù)擔(dān)，懷疑、侵略、敵意和殘忍占據(jù)了我們的生活，因為生活變成了一場痛苦的、殘酷的自保之戰(zhàn)。
Wierder still, Americans have been acculturated to think that all this — not having basic human relationships — is completely normal. As if reality TV and tweets from some dumb celebrity and porn make up for it. They seem to think not even having friends, which means being unfriendly as a way of life, existing in a society without the most basic of social bonds anymore, is just how life is. It’s not. That’s a story that statistics can only partially tell, though, so let me paint you a picture.

更可怕的是，美國人已經(jīng)被培養(yǎng)成認(rèn)為這一切--沒有基本的人際關(guān)系--是完全正常的，仿佛真人秀和一些愚蠢的名人以及色情推特可以彌補這一點。他們似乎不去想沒有朋友這個問題，這意味著不友好變成了他們的一種生活方式，生活在一個不再有最基本社會紐帶的社會，就是生活本該的樣子，但事實并非如此。
不過，這一統(tǒng)計數(shù)字只能部分說明問題，所以讓我給你描繪一下。

In Paris and Rome, the bistros and piazzas spill over with…friends. People laugh and cheer and smile. They hug each other and embrace and kiss. Life is remarkably social. It’s notably warm. Friendship is what makes life, society, work, every day rituals, go. People exist in this wet and messy and beautiful matrix of sociality. You can’t separate yourself from it. It’s everywhere, the air you breathe. Basic human relationships — the vulnerability, fragility, emotionality of them — abound. People are connected in complex, enduring, deep, and intimate ways, invisible lines cutting through the heart of everything, everywhere. And they like living that way.

在巴黎和羅馬，小酒館和廣場上到處都是朋友，人們歡笑，歡呼，微笑，他們互相擁抱，親吻，生活是非常有社會性的，很溫暖，友誼使得生活、社會、工作、每天的儀式得以進(jìn)行。
人們生活在一個濕漉漉的、凌亂的、溫暖和美麗的社會性矩陣中，你不能把自己和它分開，它無處不在，如同呼吸的空氣。

基本的人際關(guān)系ーー脆弱、脆弱、情緒化ーー比比皆是，人們以復(fù)雜的、持久的、深刻的、親密的方式聯(lián)系在一起，無形的線條穿透一切事物的心臟，無處不在，他們喜歡這樣的生活方式。
America’s completely different. Life is cold. It’s antisocial, asocial. Nobody’s hugging and kissing in the streets — as friends. Those invisible lines don’t connect people. Nobody much seems to feel anything. The smiles are fake and the stares blank. Americans keep their distance from one another, suspicious. They don’t spill out of the bars, really, except at 3AM, dead drunk. They’re not having fun. That European joie de vivre — which is a complex product of a society profoundly rich in social bonds, in friendship, in delight in others’ experiences, in empathy and relationaility, in the emotional wealth and depth and intimacy of living they produce — does not exist in America. All of that wet, messy, warm stuff is a totally foreign, alien concept.

美國則完全不同，生活是冷漠的，是反社會的，非社會的，沒有人在街上像朋友般擁抱和親吻，那些看不見的線并沒有把人們聯(lián)系起來，似乎沒有人有感覺，笑容是假的，目光是空洞的，美國人彼此保持著距離，疑神疑鬼。
他們不會從酒吧里走出來，真的，除非是凌晨3點，醉得一塌糊涂，他們沒有樂趣，沒有歐洲人的生活樂趣--這是一個社會的復(fù)雜產(chǎn)物，社會紐帶、友誼、對他人經(jīng)歷的喜悅、同情和關(guān)系，以及它們所產(chǎn)生的情感財富、深度和生活的親密性--在美國統(tǒng)統(tǒng)不存在，所有那些濕漉漉的、凌亂的、溫暖的東西都是完全陌生的概念、外來的概念。

That’s the first thing the chart above says. I’m drawing what some social scientists would call a “normative conclusion.” People should have friends. Why? Because, well, we’re social creatures. Friendship keeps us sane, grounded, anchored. It might seem like a small thing, but as Derrida pointed out, in fact, it’s the basis of a healthy society. Without friendship — aka social bonds — a social has no fabric weaving it together. America’s a disintegrating society in that broad sense. It is coming undone. It’s social fabric has been unravelled.

這就是上面的圖表所說的第一件事，我正在得出一些社會科學(xué)家稱之為 "規(guī)范性結(jié)論 "的東西：人們應(yīng)該有朋友。
為什么？因為，我們是社會動物。
友誼使我們保持理智，接地氣，扎根，這可能看起來是一件小事，但正如德里達(dá)指出的，事實上，它是一個健康社會的基礎(chǔ)。
沒有友誼--又稱社會紐帶--一個社會就沒有了編織在一起的織物，從廣義上講，美國是一個正在瓦解的社會，它正在走向解體，它的社會結(jié)構(gòu)已經(jīng)崩裂了。

The second thing the chart above says is that all the above has gotten worse. There’s been a stunning, catastrophic decline in friendship in America — again, the most basic and elemental and powerful of social bonds. In 1990, a third of Americans had 10 or more close friends. Today, just 13 percent do.

上面的圖表說的第二件事是，上述所有情況都在變得更糟。在美國，友誼這最基本、最強大的社會紐帶已經(jīng)出現(xiàn)了驚人的、災(zāi)難性的下降--1990年，三分之一的美國人有10個或更多的親密朋友，而今天，只有13%的人有10個或更多的親密朋友。

Why is that? Because America’s a collapsing society.
Let me give you a bit of context. America’s always been a disconnected society. Americans have always been bad at friendship. You don’t have to think very hard about why. That’s what they’ve been taught, and then they’ve been taught that competition and acquisitiveness and hostility and greed are the best and correct ways to life.

為什么會這樣？因為美國是一個崩潰的社會。
我給你提一點背景，美國一直是一個脫離聯(lián)系的社會，美國人不善于交友，你不需要很認(rèn)真地思考原因，因為這就是他們被教導(dǎo)的東西，他們被教導(dǎo)的是，競爭、貪婪、敵意是最好和最正確的生活方式。

So it’s a hyper individualistic, hyper materialistic society. Money and things matter more than people. People are seen as disposable and expendable, commodities to be traded up in a game of status and sex and power the moment they’re no longer useful, thrilling, exciting. People only really have instrumental value in American life — they’re means, not ends.
所以這是一個超個人主義，超物質(zhì)主義的社會，金錢和物質(zhì)比人更重要。人被視為可拋棄的和可消耗的，是在地位、性和權(quán)力的游戲中被交易的商品，一旦他們不再有用，不再令人激動，不再令人興奮就會被拋棄，人在美國生活中只有工具性價值ーー他們是手段，而不是目的。
But even in that context, what’s happened is really weird and disturbing and strange. Only in genuinely collapsing societies do we see statistics so bleak — people just don’t have friends. Why is that? Well, because friendship becomes both a liability and a luxury. It becomes a luxury that’s unaffordable. As societies collapse, people grow poorer. They don’t have time or money or energy to “invest” in friendship, as an American might say. A European might just say it’s pretty hard to go to the bistro for a three hour lunch when you’re working three jobs and still can’t pay the bills.

但即使在這種情況下，所發(fā)生的事情也非常奇怪，令人不安，只有在真正崩潰的社會中，我們才會看到如此慘淡的統(tǒng)計數(shù)據(jù)--人們根本沒有朋友。
為什么會這樣？嗯，因為友誼既是負(fù)擔(dān)，也是一種奢侈品，它成為一種讓人無法負(fù)擔(dān)的奢侈品。
隨著社會的崩潰，人們變得越來越窮，美國人可能會說，他們沒有時間、金錢或精力來 "投資 "友誼，而一個歐洲人可能會說，當(dāng)你做著三份工作卻仍然無法支付賬單的時候，就算去小酒館吃上三個小時的午餐也相當(dāng)郁悶。

Friendship became a luxury that Americans simply couldn’t afford. America’s a nation of neo-serfs now: people who are indebted for life to billionaires. They never pay off their debts — they die in them. They’re busy working away busily their whole lives long in this weird shell game. What time, energy, money, room, does that leave for friendship? And what emotional space does it leave either?
友誼成了美國人根本負(fù)擔(dān)不起的奢侈品。美國現(xiàn)在是一個新世代農(nóng)奴國家： 這些人一輩子都欠著億萬富翁的債，他們永遠(yuǎn)無法還清他們的債務(wù)ーー他們在債務(wù)中死去，他們在這個詭異的騙局中忙碌地工作一輩子，時間，精力，金錢，空間，這給友誼留下了什么時間、精力、金錢和空間？它還能留下什么情感空間？
That’s why friendship became a liability in America, too. Friendship isn’t just an expensive luxury now. Friends are also something you don’t want. Americans — to the rest of the world — are pathologically suspicious. They don’t seem able to see each other as human beings at all. That’s because they’re made to live in a weird, strange, antisocial way: they have to get up and compete with everyone else for the basics, jobs, healthcare, education, retirement, a little bit of money to pay the bills and put a roof over their heads.

這就是為什么友誼在美國也成為一種負(fù)擔(dān)，友誼現(xiàn)在不僅僅是一種昂貴的奢侈品，朋友也是你不想要的東西。
美國人，相比于世界其他國家來說，病態(tài)的多疑，他們似乎根本無法將對方視為人類，這是因為他們被要求以一種奇怪的、陌生的、反社會的方式生活：他們必須一爬起床就與其他人競爭基本的東西，工作、醫(yī)療、教育、退休、一點點支付賬單的錢，以及在他們頭上的屋頂。

They have to do it over and over again, until they die. There’s no letup, it’s relentless. And there’s no room for mercy, because it really is a fight to the death.
Lose that job? There goes your healthcare? Whoops, now you have to pay some crazy million dollar bill. There goes your house and life savings! Out on the street? Too bad! I guess you die.

他們不得不一次又一次地這樣做，直到他們死去，沒有任何停頓，無情，而且沒有憐憫的余地，因為這真的是一場生死之戰(zhàn)。
丟了工作？你的醫(yī)療保險泡湯了？哎，現(xiàn)在你得付一大筆錢了，你的房子和畢生積蓄都沒了！流落街頭？太糟糕了！我猜你會死。
原創(chuàng)翻譯：龍騰網(wǎng) http://top-shui.cn 轉(zhuǎn)載請注明出處


When that’s your life, friendship really is a liability. Maybe this friend will impose on you and make you late for work. Maybe that one will call you during a crucial meeting. Maybe this one will take up the time the corporation who owns your life demands. Maybe that one will need a bit of money — and what do you have to give

當(dāng)這就是你的生活時，友誼真的是一種負(fù)擔(dān)，也許這個朋友會干擾到你，讓你上班遲到，也許這個人會在一個關(guān)鍵的會議期間給你打電話，也許這個人會占用你的生存所系的工作時間，也許這個人會要你拿錢——而你有什么可給的。

Let me put that another way. When everyone else is your competitor, rival, adversary, in a contest for the basics of existence — a little money, medicine, food, shelter — the norms of friendship don’t and can’t develop. Instead of the European and Canadian norms of gentleness, humour, dignity, warmth, you get the Americans norms of indifference, enmity, aggression, hostility, cruelty.

讓我換一種說法，當(dāng)其他人都是你的競爭對手、同行、敵人，為了生存的基本需要—— 一點點錢、藥品、食物、住所——而競爭時，就不會發(fā)展出友誼的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)，也不可能發(fā)展出來，與歐洲和加拿大的溫柔、幽默、尊嚴(yán)、熱情的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)不同，美國的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)是冷漠、侵略、敵意和殘忍。

Worse, Americans don’t even get how perverse and backwards such a culture is. They celebrate aggression and hostility as if they were virtues, and look down on gentleness and warmth as forms of weakness. That’s because in American society, materialistic, individualistic, any kind of warmth or gentleness does equal death, or at least comes with a steep price.

更糟糕的是，美國人甚至不知道這樣的文化是多么的變態(tài)和落后，他們贊美攻擊性和敵意，好像它們是美德，而把溫柔和溫暖看成是軟弱，這是因為在美國社會，物質(zhì)主義、個人主義，任何形式的溫暖或溫柔都等同于死亡，或者至少要付出高昂的代價。
原創(chuàng)翻譯：龍騰網(wǎng) http://top-shui.cn 轉(zhuǎn)載請注明出處


But the cost is that Americans live badly, badly stunted lives. They don’t have friends, they don’t have basic human relationships anymore, and not having formed social bonds, they can’t invest in public goods and make a working politics. Americans seem to exist as atoms of appetite, little floating animalcules of rage and greed in this weird, blank matrix of aggression and hostility, and they’re taught and told that’s the way life should be and the only way it can be.

但真正的代價是美國人生活得很糟糕，嚴(yán)重發(fā)育不良，他們沒有朋友，他們不再有基本的人際關(guān)系，沒有形成社會聯(lián)系，他們不能投資于公益事業(yè)，也不能創(chuàng)造一個有效的政治生態(tài)。
美國人似乎像食欲的原子一樣存在著，在這個充滿侵略和敵意的怪異、空白的矩陣中，充滿著憤怒和貪婪的小小的浮動微生物，他們被教導(dǎo)和告知生活就應(yīng)該是這樣的，也是唯一的生活方式。

Americans don’t get how bewildering and strange this is, really, at all, to exist in a society where aggression and hostility are norms, but basic human relationships like friendship are punished, sanctioned, prevented, and broken apart, by institutions who want to keep people socially, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually weak and stunted. They’ve only ever lived, most of them, in the baffling paradox of an antisocial society — a place where people are not really allowed to treat each other like human beings. They don’t really grasp the lixs at work, or how deeply abnormal it is to live like this, in this sad, depressed, isolated, disconnected way.

美國人完全不知道，在一個侵略和敵意成為常態(tài)的社會里，這是多么令人困惑和奇怪，在一個社會中，侵略和敵意是規(guī)范，但像友誼這樣的基本人際關(guān)系卻被懲罰、制裁、阻止和破壞，這一體系讓人們在社會上、心理上、情感上和精神上變得軟弱和發(fā)育不良。

他們中的大多數(shù)人只是生活在一個令人困惑的反社會悖論中ーー在這個社會中，人們不能真正地把彼此當(dāng)作人來對待，他們并沒有真正理解其中的聯(lián)系，或者說，也不知道以這種悲傷、沮喪、孤立、斷絕聯(lián)系的方式生活是多么的不正常。
But of course European thinkers have excelled at analysing America this way. Marx would have said that all this is alienation and immiseration. Americans are left so poor, so exploited, by the corporations and billionaires who impoverish them, they don’t even have resources left to invest in the most basic of human relationships.

顯然，歐洲的思想家們擅長用這種方式分析美國，馬克思會說，這些都是異化和貧困帶來的結(jié)果，美國人是如此貧窮，被讓他們貧窮的企業(yè)和億萬富翁所剝削，他們甚至沒有資源來投資于最基本的人際關(guān)系。

Derrida and Baudrillard would have followed up and pointed out that without friendship, a society withers. It rips itself apart. People must regard one another as friends in some basic way for a society to survive, after all — or else fascism, authoritarianism and overt militarism take hold.

德里達(dá)和鮑德里亞會進(jìn)一步指出，沒有友誼，一個社會就會枯萎，會把自己撕裂，畢竟，一個社會要想生存，人們必須以某種基本方式把彼此視為朋友——否則法西斯主義、獨裁主義和公開的軍國主義就會占據(jù)上風(fēng)。

All that, of course, is exactly what is happening in America. Just as there’s been a catastrophic collapse in social bonds, beginning with the most basic of human relationships, friendship, so too, paralleling it, there’s been a startling rise in hate. Fanaticism, superstition, violence, brutality, the overt fascism of Trumpism, the authoritarianism of the modern-day GOP. These are flip sides of a coin. Americans are unable to form social bonds anymore, impoverished, desperate, beaten, abandoned, and in the absence of social bonds, all the many forms of hate rise like cancers.

當(dāng)然，這一切正是當(dāng)下美國正在發(fā)生的事情，正如社會紐帶出現(xiàn)了災(zāi)難性的崩潰，從人類最基本的關(guān)系--友誼開始，與之平行的是，仇恨也出現(xiàn)了驚人的增長，狂熱、迷信、暴力、殘暴、特朗普式的公開法西斯主義、現(xiàn)代美國共和黨的獨裁主義，這些都是同一個硬幣的正反面，美國人無法再形成社會紐帶，遭受貧窮、絕望、被毆打、被拋棄，在缺乏社會紐帶的情況下，所有這些各式各樣形式的仇恨像癌癥一樣上升。
原創(chuàng)翻譯：龍騰網(wǎng) http://top-shui.cn 轉(zhuǎn)載請注明出處


There’s much more to say on the topic. I could talk about, for example, how “social media” emerged to give Americans fake friends — the junk food equivalent of real relationships — just as genuine bonds were imploding. That certainly helped things along. Still, it’s the larger points you should see.

關(guān)于這個話題還有很多可以說，例如，我可以談?wù)勗谡嬲挠H密關(guān)系破裂的時候“社交媒體”是如何出現(xiàn)的，如何給美國人提供虛假的朋友 ( 相比真實的朋友就是垃圾) ，這當(dāng)然有助于事情的發(fā)展，不過，你應(yīng)該看到的是更重要的觀點。

America’s a pathologically unhealthy place to be, to live, to exist.
I don’t think Americans will ever really get how strange it is to live without basic human relationships — but the rest of us should take note. This is how societies die.

美國是一個病態(tài)的不健康的地方，不適合生活，不適合生存，美國人，越來越多地沒有朋友。
我認(rèn)為美國人永遠(yuǎn)不會真正明白沒有基本人際關(guān)系的生活是多么奇怪——但我們其他人應(yīng)該注意到這一點，社會就是這樣滅亡的。