查理週報獲頒美國筆會言論自由獎引發論戰

Guests at your typical $1,250-a-plate Manhattan fund-raiser usually face no quandary more urgent than “red or white?”

通常，在那種門票1250美元的曼哈頓籌款宴會上，來賓需要即刻拿的主意，往往不過是喝“紅酒還是白酒”這樣的問題。

But when representatives of the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo step onstage Tuesday to receive an award for “freedom of expression courage” at PEN American Center’s literary gala, the roughly 800 guests will face a more complicated choice: standing ovation, walkout or something in between?

但週二參加美國筆會中心(PEN American Center)“文學之夜”的約八百名與會者，面對法國諷刺刊物《查理週報》(Charlie Hebdo)的代表被授予“言論自由勇氣獎”(freedom of expression courage)時，需要拿的主意則更爲複雜：是起身鼓掌、抽身離席、還是模棱兩可？

During the past week, the news that six prominent writers, including Peter Carey, Michael Ondaatje and Francine Prose, had pulled out as gala table hosts to protest what they saw as the magazine’s cultural intolerance and Islamophobia has set off an unusually intense war of words in the heart of the American literary establishment.

過去一週裏，包括彼得·凱里(Peter Carey)、邁克爾·翁達傑(Michael Ondaatje)、弗朗辛·普羅斯(Francine Prose)在內的六位知名作家表示，不會作爲主持人出席頒獎活動，以表達自己對《查理週報》的文化狹隘和反伊斯蘭傾向的不滿。消息傳出之後，立刻在美國文學圈的核心人物中挑起了一場激烈異常的口水戰。

The controversy has ricocheted across social media and op-ed pages worldwide, as partisans have traded impassioned arguments and sometimes ad hominem insults. By the weekend, more than 200 of PEN’s roughly 4,000 members — including Junot Díaz, Joyce Carol Oates, Lorrie Moore and Michael Cunningham — had signed a letter saying that the award crossed a line between “staunchly supporting expression that violates the acceptable, and enthusiastically rewarding such expression.”

意見各方激烈論戰，有時甚至對對手進行人身攻擊。這場論戰也很快蔓延至各個社交網絡和世界各地報刊的評論版。截至上週末，在約四千名筆會成員中，已有包括胡諾特·迪亞斯(Junot Díaz)、喬伊斯·卡羅爾·歐茨(Joyce Carol Oates)、洛麗·摩爾(Lorrie Moore)以及邁克爾·坎寧安(Michael Cunningham)在內的逾兩百人簽署了聯名信，表示頒發此獎是越界之舉，“堅定支持過分言論和積極鼓勵過分言論”之間是有區別的。

The debate is emotional and complex. But the battle lines are generally drawn between those who believe that PEN’s core mission includes celebrating Charlie Hebdo’s courageous perseverance after the Jan. 7 attack on its office by Muslim extremists that left 12 people dead and those who believe that the magazine’s cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad promote bigotry and reinforce the second-class status of a Muslim underclass in France.

雖然爭論混亂且缺乏理性，但觀點大致可分爲兩派。一方認爲《查理週報》在1月7日總部受到穆斯林極端分子襲擊，12人遇襲身亡之後，對其表現出的勇敢執着給予嘉獎是美國筆會的核心使命；另一方認爲該刊物有關先知默罕默德(Prophet Muhammad)的漫畫讓偏見升級，導致本就處於社會下層的法國穆斯林更難擺脫二等公民的現狀。

There has also been debate about the debate, with some seeing an example of fractious freedom of expression in action while others see a spectacle that has generated more heat than light.

人們對這場論戰本身也是爭論不斷。有人視之爲引發分歧的“言論自由”被付諸實踐；另一些人看到的更多是“爭”而不是“論”。

“With this boycott the Charlie Hebdo debate has come to embody all the limitations, and now the futility, of the freedom of expression argument vis-à-vis Muslims in particular and minorities in general,” Nesrine Malik, a Sudanese-born, London-based commentator, wrote in The Guardian.

“這場對《查理週報》獲獎的抵制行動引發的論戰充分體現了言論自由理論對社會少數羣體、尤其是穆斯林的侷限性，甚至現在看來言論自由理論對這些羣體是沒有價值的。”出生於蘇丹、現居倫敦的評論員內斯林·馬利克(Nesrine Malik)在《衛報》(The Guardian)上寫道。

“We are trapped between people who see a knowing establishment prejudice against Muslims (and other ethnic or racial minorities) everywhere, and those who refuse to believe it exists,” she wrote.

“一些人知道，對於穆斯林（或其他少數種族）無處不在、心照不宣的歧視由來已久；另外的一些人則拒絕相信這種歧視的存在。他們把我們夾在了中間，”她寫道。

The controversy revives a debate that flared up in January over whether some of Charlie Hebdo’s cartoons were racist. It is drawing in new partisans, and may take on greater urgency after the shootings on Sunday in Texas, where two gunmen, one of whom the F.B.I. had previously investigated for links to Islamic terrorism, attacked a conference organized by an anti-Islam group that included a Muhammad cartoon contest.

此次論戰重燃了今年一月對於《查理週報》漫畫是否種族歧視的討論。週日的德克薩斯州槍擊案後，這一討論也許更顯重要，吸引更多人關注。週日，兩名持槍者襲擊了一個反伊斯蘭組織的集會，集會活動包括了一個默罕默德漫畫比賽。其中一名襲擊者因涉嫌與伊斯蘭恐怖組織相關，曾受到聯邦調查局(FBI)調查。

To some, the bigoted nature of Charlie Hebdo’s cartoons is clear. “It’s a racist publication,” Ms. Prose, a former president of PEN, told The Nation last week. “Let’s not beat about the bush.”

對於部分人來說，《查理週報》的狹隘和偏執顯而易見。“它就是份種族歧視刊物，”筆會的前主席普羅斯女士上週對美國《國家》雜誌(The Nation)說，“這點我們不用拐彎抹角。”

The writer Luc Sante, who also signed the letter of protest, said that while the work of Georges Wolinski, one of the cartoonists killed in the attack, “was humane and large-spirited,” some of Charlie Hedbo’s contributors trafficked in “sophomoric troll humor.”

作家盧克·桑特(Luc Sante)也簽署了聯名抗議信。雖然他評價遇襲身亡的漫畫家之一喬治·沃林斯基(Georges Wolinski)的作品“充滿人性、非常大度”，但認爲部分《查理週報》供稿人傳播的卻是“不成熟的挑釁式幽默”。

“The fact alone that black and Arab people are offended by the way they were depicted — leaving religion to the side — should have made PEN think before celebrating Charlie Hebdo,” Mr. Sante said in an email.

“即便撇開宗教不談，許多黑人和阿拉伯人對那些描繪自己的漫畫感到憤怒，僅僅因爲這一點，筆會就應該在讚頌《查理週報》前仔細斟酌。”桑特先生在電子郵件中寫道。

Defenders of the award counter that such arguments overlook the full scope and context of Charlie Hebdo’s cartoons. They point to websites like Understanding Charlie Hebdo Cartoons, which offers detailed analysis of some of the magazine’s ruder images, or to a study published in Le Monde in February stating that, contrary to the notion that the publication focused obsessively on Islam, fewer than 2 percent of the magazine’s covers between 2005 and 2015 primarily mocked Islam.

該獎的辯護者反駁稱，那樣的觀點未能全面地看待《查理週報》漫畫的語境。他們指出像“瞭解查理週報漫畫”這樣的網站提供了對於該雜誌部分較爲粗糙的圖片的詳細分析， 或是一項二月份發表在法國《世界報》(Le Monde)上的研究。該研究顯示，和《查理週報》過分專注於穆斯林的觀念正好相反的是，在2005年至2015年之間不到百分之二的雜誌封面主要嘲笑了穆斯林。

The conversation about Charlie Hebdo in France has indeed been different from those in the United States. There, the magazine is widely seen as a leftist, anti-establishment irritant and champion of the underdog, carrying on a long French tradition of scabrous satire. The former President Nicolas Sarkozy was a particularly despised target, and the magazine has been unsparing in its evisceration of the right-wing, anti-immigrant National Front.

在法國，當人們談論到《查理週報》時，態度的確明顯與在美國不同。在那裏，它被普遍看成是一份左翼、反建制的刺激刊物，爲弱者代言，傳承着法國悠久的粗俗式諷刺傳統。前總統尼古拉·薩科奇(Nicolas Sarkozy) 就是常被其鄙視的目標。而且，該刊物還一直不遺餘力地對反移民的右翼政黨國民陣線(National Front) 大加挖苦。

In an interview last week with the French magazine Les Inrocks, Rénald Luzier, the cartoonist who works under the name Luz and drew the cover image of Mohammed for the first issue after the attacks, said Charlie Hebdo’s creed was not hatred but “a joyful atheism.”

在上週，雷納德·魯西爾(Rénald Luzier)接受了法國雜誌《Les Inroks》的採訪。這位以魯茲(Luz)爲筆名並在襲擊後的那期刊物中畫了穆罕默德的封面畫像的漫畫家，當時聲稱《查理週報》的信條不是仇恨，而是“令人歡喜的無神論.”

Still, as the shock of the attacks has begun to fade, the French debate has broadened, and some prominent intellectuals have questioned what lies beneath the “I Am Charlie” slogan.

儘管如此，隨着襲擊帶來的震驚開始減退，法國進行了更廣泛的辯論，一些重要的知識分子開始質疑“我是查理”標語下掩藏的真實面孔。

In an interview about his new book, “Who Is Charlie?,” to be released in France on Thursday, the center-left historian and demographer Emmanuel Todd described the Jan. 11 demonstrations that brought millions to the streets of Paris and other French cities in support of the magazine as “a sham.” The march, he argued, purported to unite all of France but in fact brought together an urban, historically atheist elite and a rural, Roman Catholic, traditionally anti-republican demographic, but not the Muslim underclass.

在一次對他的即將於週四在法國發行的新書《誰是查理》的採訪中，左翼歷史學家和人口學家艾曼紐·託德(Emmanuel Todd)把1月11日那場聲援《查理週報》的遊行描述成“一場騙局”。那場示威活動聚集了巴黎和其他法國城市的數百萬人。他說，他們聲稱要團結全法國，但其實只團結了都市中那些傳統上秉持無神論的精英和鄉村的那些傳統上反共和的羅馬天主教徒，而不包括底層社會的穆斯林。

“For the first time in my life, I wasn’t proud to be French,” Mr. Todd said in a cover interview this week with the magazine L’Obs. “When four million people come together to say that caricaturing the religion of others is an absolute right — and even a duty! — and when these others are the weakest members of society, one is perfectly free to say that we’re fine, we’re in the right, that this is a great country. But that is not the case.”

“我有生第一次不以我是法國人而驕傲，”託德在本週的一次《新觀察家》(L’Obs)的封面採訪中說。“當四百萬人聚到一起說以漫畫諷刺其他人的宗教是絕對的權力，甚至是責任，並且當這些其他人是社會最弱勢羣體時，一個人可以自由地說我們挺好，我們沒錯，這是一個偉大的國家。但事實並非如此。

The real threat to France, he said, isn’t Muslims but “this crazy new religion I call ‘radical secularism.’ ”

對法國的真正威脅，他說，不是穆斯林們，而是“這個我稱爲‘極端世俗主義’的新宗教。”

Some of the writers protesting the PEN award say that acknowledgment of this aspect of the French context has been missing from the American conversation.

一些抗議筆會授獎的作家聲稱，在美國的相關討論中，對法國這方面情況的承認無跡可尋。

The novelist Rachel Kushner, one of the six hosts who withdrew, said that the award could be intended to honor free speech, but actually reinforced a cultural and legal order that limits the free expression of religious beliefs — for example, by banning head scarves in schools.

小說家蕾切爾·庫什納(Rachel Kushner)是撤出晚會的六位主持人之一，她說該獎本來是用來獎勵言論自由的，但事實上卻強化了一個限制宗教信仰自由表達的文化和法律秩序——比如說，禁止在學校戴面紗。

The defense of Charlie Hebdo “is always on secularist grounds,” Ms. Kushner said in an email. “But some in France — the very same marginalized sector of society who see themselves as targeted by some of Hebdo’s covers — are targeted by laws that enforce secularism.”

對《查理週報》的維護“總是以世俗主義爲基礎的”，庫什納女士在一封郵件中說。“但是在法國的一些人——那些被社會邊緣化的人，覺得自己成了《查理週報》封面的打擊對象的人——成爲了執行世俗主義的法律的打擊對象。”