Stella Young在Ted英语演讲：谢谢夸奖，但我可不是指引你的动力(中英双语+)

史黛拉•杨(Stella Young)是一位喜剧演员，也是一名新闻记者。她与其他人不同的仅仅是她是一名残疾人。她始终在强调，这一点并不代表她理所当然就应该成为人们的励志榜样。在这个有趣的演讲中，杨把社会将残疾人当做励志范本进行的宣传描述成了“励志情色片”。

I grew up in a very small country town in Victoria. I had a very normal, low-key kind of upbringing. I went to school, I hung out with my friends, I fought with my younger sisters. It was all very normal. And when I was 15, a member of my local community approached my parents and wanted to nominate me for a community achievement award. And my parents said, "Hm, that's really nice, but there's kind of one glaring problem with that. She hasn't actually achieved anything." (Laughter) 

我在维多利亚的 一个小乡镇长大。 我受的教育平凡而普通。 我上学，跟朋友一起玩， 跟妹妹们吵架。 一切都再普通不过了。 在我15岁的时候，一名社区的工作人员 找到我的父母， 想要提名我 一个社区成就奖。 我的父母说：“嗯，这是件好事儿， 不过有个比较明显的问题。 她从来也没取得什么成就啊。”（笑声）

And they were right, you know. I went to school, I got good marks, I had a very low-key after school job in my mum's hairdressing salon, and I spent a lot of time watching "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Dawson's Creek." Yeah, I know. What a contradiction. But they were right, you know. I wasn't doing anything that was out of the ordinary at all. I wasn't doing anything that could be considered an achievement if you took disability out of the equation. Years later, I was on my second teaching round in a Melbourne high school, and I was about 20 minutes into a year 11 legal studies class when this boy put up his hand and said, "Hey miss, when are you going to start doing your speech?" And I said, "What speech?" You know, I'd been talking them about defamation law for a good 20 minutes. And he said, "You know, like, your motivational speaking. You know, when people in wheelchairs come to school, they usually say, like, inspirational stuff?" (Laughter) "It's usually in the big hall." 

他们说的对。我上学，成绩还不错。 毕业之后在妈妈的发型设计沙龙有个很普通的工作， 我还花很多时间看各种肥皂剧， 比如”吸血鬼猎人巴菲“和”恋爱时代“。 没错，是有点矛盾。 不过他们说得对， 我压根儿也没有过任何不寻常的作为。 我从来也没做过任何可以被当做是成就的事情， 如果不考虑身体有缺陷这一点的话。 几年以后，我再次回到 一个墨尔本高中的教书， 当我在11年级（相当于中国高中）的一堂法律课上刚讲了大概20分钟时， 一个男孩举手问道： “女士，你什么时候才能开始演讲？” 我说：“什么演讲？” 事实上，我已经就诽谤法讲了二十多分钟了。 

And that's when it dawned on me: This kid had only ever experienced disabled people as objects of inspiration. We are not, to this kid -- and it's not his fault, I mean, that's true for many of us. For lots of us, disabled people are not our teachers or our doctors or our manicurists. We're not real people. We are there to inspire. And in fact, I am sitting on this stage looking like I do in this wheelchair, and you are probably kind of expecting me to inspire you. Right? (Laughter) Yeah. 

就是在那个时候我开始意识到：这孩子一直把残障人士当做一种励志对象。 对这个孩子来说，我们并不是什么激励对象， 这也不是他的错，很多人都有这种想法。对很多人来说，残障人士并不是老师，医生或者美甲师。 我们不是真实的人，我们的存在只是为了激励别人。现在，我在这个讲台上， 坐着轮椅演讲，你们可能多少也会期待我能对你们有所激励，对吧？（观众笑声）我说的没错吧。

Well, ladies and gentlemen, I'm afraid I'm going to disappoint you dramatically. I am not here to inspire you. I am here to tell you that we have been lied to about disability. Yeah, we've been sold the lie that disability is a Bad Thing, capital B, capital T. It's a bad thing, and to live with a disability makes you exceptional. It's not a bad thing, and it doesn't make you exceptional. 

不过，女士们先生们，恐怕我要让你们非常失望了。 我在这里不是为了激励你们。 我来这儿是想告诉你们我们对残疾有错误的认识。 没错，我们一直被错误的灌输残疾是件坏事，很——糟——糕的事。 这是件坏事，带着残缺生活会让你与众不同。 其实，这并不是件坏事，也不会让你变得多出众。

And in the past few years, we've been able to propagate this lie even further via social media. You may have seen images like this one: "The only disability in life is a bad attitude." Or this one: "Your excuse is invalid." Indeed. Or this one: "Before you quit, try!" These are just a couple of examples, but there are a lot of these images out there. You know, you might have seen the one, the little girl with no hands drawing a picture with a pencil held in her mouth. You might have seen a child running on carbon fiber prosthetic legs. And these images, there are lots of them out there, they are what we call inspiration porn. (Laughter) And I use the term porn deliberately, because they objectify one group of people for the benefit of another group of people. So in this case, we're objectifying disabled people for the benefit of nondisabled people. The purpose of these images is to inspire you, to motivate you, so that we can look at them and think, "Well, however bad my life is, it could be worse. I could be that person."

在过去的几年，这个谎言 通过社交媒体被传的更广了。 你们可能看过这样的图片：生活中唯一的残缺就是消极的态度。“ 或者这个：”你的理由不成立。” 亦或者：“不要轻易放弃，继续尝试！” 这只是其中的几个例子， 这样的图片还有很多。 你们还可能看到过这个， 一个没有手臂的小女孩儿 把笔刁在嘴里画画。 你们可能也见过一个孩子借助 碳纤维义肢奔跑。 类似这样的图片， 太多了， 我们管这些叫励志情色片。 （观众笑声） 我故意用“情色片”这个词的， 因为他们为了另一群人的利益， 而把一群人物化。 现在，我们正在物化残障人士， 以满足非残障人士的利益。 这些图片是 想要鼓舞你们，激励你们， 这样我们看到这些残疾人的时候 就会想：“哦，我的生活再糟， 也还是有比我更糟的。 还好我不是那个人。” 

But what if you are that person? I've lost count of the number of times that I've been approached by strangers wanting to tell me that they think I'm brave or inspirational, and this was long before my work had any kind of public profile. They were just kind of congratulating me for managing to get up in the morning and remember my own name. (Laughter) And it is objectifying. These images, those images objectify disabled people for the benefit of nondisabled people. They are there so that you can look at them and think that things aren't so bad for you, to put your worries into perspective.

但如果你就是那个人呢？ 我已经记不清有几次， 有陌生人向我走过来， 想要告诉我他们认为我很勇敢， 很励志， 这还是在我没有 成为公众人物之前的事。 他们只是因为我早上能够正常起床， 还能记着我自己的名字 而祝贺我。（观众笑声） 这就是物化。 这些图片 物化了残障人士，好让他们 能够激励非残障人士。 他们的存在，就在于能够让你们 庆幸自己过的还不坏， 把担心抛在脑后。 

And life as a disabled person is actually somewhat difficult. We do overcome some things. But the things that we're overcoming are not the things that you think they are. They are not things to do with our bodies. I use the term "disabled people" quite deliberately, because I subscribe to what's called the social model of disability, which tells us that we are more disabled by the society that we live in than by our bodies and our diagnoses. 

不过残障人士的生活 的确有些挑战。 我们确实需要克服一些困难。 不过我们需要克服的那些事 跟你们想像的不一样。 这些事跟我们身体本身的缺陷没什么关系。 我刻意使用“残疾人”这个词， 因为我可以接受这种社会普遍认同的残疾， 这让我们认识到，相比较我们身体本身的 缺陷和病症，我们所居住的社会 让我们更觉得自己是残疾人。 

So I have lived in this body a long time. I'm quite fond of it. It does the things that I need it to do, and I've learned to use it to the best of its capacity just as you have, and that's the thing about those kids in those pictures as well. They're not doing anything out of the ordinary. They are just using their bodies to the best of their capacity. So is it really fair to objectify them in the way that we do, to share those images? People, when they say, "You're an inspiration," they mean it as a compliment. And I know why it happens. It's because of the lie, it's because we've been sold this lie that disability makes you exceptional. And it honestly doesn't. 

其实我像现在这样已经相当久了。 感觉还挺不错的。 我想做什么都能做， 而且我也知道怎么做那些力所能及的事儿， 就跟你们一样， 图片里的那些孩子也是这样。 他们并没做什么不同寻常的事儿。 他们只是最大程度的 让自己的身体发挥功能。 那么通过传播这些图片 来物化他们 真的公平吗？ 当人们说：”你真励志，” 他们以为这是一种赞美。 我知道大家为什么这么做。 是因为我们一直以来都被灌输一种错误的思想： 残缺可以让你变得出色。 其实不是。 

And I know what you're thinking. You know, I'm up here bagging out inspiration, and you're thinking, "Jeez, Stella, aren't you inspired sometimes by some things?" And the thing is, I am. I learn from other disabled people all the time. I'm learning not that I am luckier than them, though. I am learning that it's a genius idea to use a pair of barbecue tongs to pick up things that you dropped. (Laughter) I'm learning that nifty trick where you can charge your mobile phone battery from your chair battery. Genius. We are learning from each others' strength and endurance, not against our bodies and our diagnoses, but against a world that exceptionalizes and objectifies us. 

我知道你们在想什么。 我在讲台上否认这种激励作用， 你们就会想：“天呐，史黛拉， 难道你就不会受其他事物的激励吗？” 事实是，我会。 我无时无刻不在从其他残障人士身上学习。 不过我学习，并不是我比他们幸运多少。 我学到的是，用烧烤棍 把你掉的东西捡起来 是个相当不错的主意。（观众笑声） 我觉得用电动轮椅的电池给手机充电 也是个绝妙的点子。 太有才了！ 我们互相学习彼此的坚强和隐忍， 不是对抗身体缺陷和疾病的坚强， 而是对抗整个社会区别对待我们， 物化我们的这种风气。 

I really think that this lie that we've been sold about disability is the greatest injustice. It makes life hard for us. And that quote, "The only disability in life is a bad attitude," the reason that that's bullshit is because it's just not true, because of the social model of disability. No amount of smiling at a flight of stairs has ever made it turn into a ramp. Never. (Laughter) (Applause) Smiling at a television screen isn't going to make closed captions appear for people who are deaf. No amount of standing in the middle of a bookshop and radiating a positive attitude is going to turn all those books into braille. It's just not going to happen. 

我真心认为这种针对我们残障人士的谎言 就是最大的不公。 这让我们的生活变得很困难。 还有那句名言：”生活中唯一的残疾 就是消极的态度“， 这简直就是胡说八道， 因为事实根本不是这样 这只是社会认同的残疾。 笑的再多也不会让你费力攀爬的楼梯 变成可以通过轮椅的斜坡。 永远都不会。（观众笑声）（掌声） 对着电视机屏幕笑， 也不能让聋哑人听懂 没有字幕的节目。 在书店里呆的再久， 释放再积极的正能量， 也不能把这些书变成盲文。 这都是不可能的事情。 

I really want to live in a world where disability is not the exception, but the norm. I want to live in a world where a 15-year-old girl sitting in her bedroom watching "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" isn't referred to as achieving anything because she's doing it sitting down. I want to live in a world where we don't have such low expectations of disabled people that we are congratulated for getting out of bed and remembering our own names in the morning. I want to live in a world where we value genuine achievement for disabled people, and I want to live in a world where a kid in year 11 in a Melbourne high school is not one bit surprised that his new teacher is a wheelchair user. 

我真心期待能活在这样一个世界里， 残疾不再是当成一种特殊，仅仅是普通现象。 一个坐在卧室里 看”吸血鬼猎人巴菲” 的15岁女孩， 不会因为她能正常坐着 就被提名什么成就奖。 在我期望的社会里， 人们不放低他们对 残障人士的期待， 不会因为他们早上能正常起床，记得自己的名字 就对他们大加赞赏。 我期待的社会，人们会认可残障人士 真正的成就， 我期待的社会里， 一个墨尔本高中11岁的孩子 不会因为他的新老师需要轮椅代步 而感到吃惊。 

Disability doesn't make you exceptional, but questioning what you think you know about it does. 

残障不会让你变得出色， 但质疑你原本自以为了解的事物，可以让你进步。

Thank you. (Applause)

【词汇笔记】
1.low-key ：adj. 低调的，软调的；抑制的
2.upbringing：n. 教养；养育；抚育
3.hung out 闲逛
4.contradiction矛盾；否认；反驳
5.equation方程式，等式；相等；反应式
6.motivational动机的；激发性的；有关动机的；动机说明
7. manicurists指甲修饰师
8.porn色情描写，色情文学；黄色书刊，色情照片（等于pornography）
9.captions
n. 题注，字幕；插图说明（caption的复数形式）
v. 加上标题（caption的第三人称单数形式）

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