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枪支与种族--双重标准(下)

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This double-barrelled interpretation contributed to centuries of brutality against defenceless black Americans. Ms Anderson recounts a South Carolina militia's grisly response to a slave uprising in 1739 in which the enslaved were "tortured, shot, hanged and gibbeted alive". White militias "made Swiss cheese of [black] men's backs, especially those who had surrendered" during a massacre in Colfax, Louisiana, in 1873. President Theodore Roosevelt ordered the dishonourable discharge of 167 black soldiers in 1906, on the baseless suspicion that some in their ranks had shot whites in Brownsville, Texas.

这种双重解释导致了,长达几个世纪对手无寸铁的美国黑人的残酷镇压。安德森女士讲述了南卡罗来纳州民兵组织对1739年奴隶起义的可怕行径,奴隶们被“折磨、枪杀、活活绞死”。1873年,在路易斯安那州科尔法克斯的一场大屠杀中,白人民兵“用黑人的脊背做了瑞士奶酪,尤其是那些投降的黑人”。1906年,西奥多·罗斯福总统下令开除167名黑人士兵,理由是怀疑他们中的一些人在得克萨斯州布朗斯维尔枪杀了白人,而这怀疑毫无根据。

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The emptiness, for black Americans, of the right to bear arms is amply documented in Ms Anderson's vivid retelling. No landmarks of racial progress—neither Reconstruction in the 19th century, nor the civil-rights movement of the 20th—made a difference. Nor has the National Rifle Association (NRA), the zealous defender of gun rights that came to the fore in the 1960s, targeted this prejudice. In 1967 the NRA helped draft a bill in California to disarm the Black Panthers, a black self-defence organisation that "had broken no firearms laws". Ms Anderson notes that the association has been slow to respond to police violence against black men in recent years, including in 2016 when an officer shot and killed Philando Castile in St Paul, Minnesota, after Castile disclosed that he was (legally) carrying a gun.

安德森女士在她的书中生动且充分地讲述了,对于美国黑人来说,持枪权是多么的空虚无用。无论是19世纪的重建运动,还是20世纪的民权运动,种族运动都没有取得里程碑式的进步。美国步枪协会在20世纪60年代崭露头角,热衷于捍卫持枪权利的组织,就连他们也没有站出来反对这种偏见。1967年,全国步枪协会在加州协助起草了一份解除黑豹党武装的法案,而黑豹党作为一个黑人自卫组织并“没有违反枪支法”。安德森指出,该协会近年来对警察针对黑人男性的暴力行为反应迟缓,包括2016年发生在明尼苏达州圣保罗的事件,菲兰多·卡斯蒂尔公开自己(合法)携带枪支后,一名警察开枪打死了他。
Yet as a contribution to the contemporary debate over gun rights, "The Second" comes up short. The book makes no mention of Justice Clarence Thomas's long concurrence in McDonald v Chicago (2010), which covers much of the same historical ground. Like Ms Anderson, Justice Thomas, himself African-American, lamented as tragic the white supremacy that has persistently denied gun rights to black citizens. But the right to bear arms, in his eyes, remains key to their salvation. Ms Anderson could have grappled with that reading to hone her contrary view: that the amendment is "so inherently, structurally flawed" that it can "never be a pathway to civil and human rights" for black Americans.
然而,作为对当代枪支权利辩论的一项贡献,《第二》缺少了一点东西。书中没有提及克拉伦斯·托马斯法官在麦克唐纳诉芝加哥案(2010年)中长时间的判决,这些事几乎发生在相同的历史背景下。同安德森女士一样,身为非裔美国人的托马斯大法官也哀叹,白人至上主义一直剥夺黑人公民拥有枪支的权利,这是一场悲剧。但在他看来,携带武器的权利仍然是拯救他们的关键点。安德森女士本可以运用这一发声使她的反抗观点更加锋利:修正案“内在的、结构上的缺陷如此之大”,它永远不可能成为美国黑人“获得公民权利和人权的途径”。

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reconstruction [.ri:kən'strʌkʃən]

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n. 复兴,改造,再建

 
contrary ['kɔntrəri]

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adj. 相反的,截然不同的
adv. 相反(

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brand [brænd]

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n. 商标,牌子,烙印,标记
vt. 打烙印,

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prejudice ['predʒudis]

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n. 偏见,伤害
vt. 使 ... 存偏见,

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contemporary [kən'tempərəri]

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n. 同时代的人
adj. 同时代的,同时的,

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inherently

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association [ə.səusi'eiʃən]

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n. 联合,结合,交往,协会,社团,联想

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flawed [flɔ:d]

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adj. 有缺陷的;有瑕疵的;有裂纹的

 
concurrence [kən'kʌrəns]

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n. 赞同,意见一致,协力

 
interpretation [in.tə:pri'teiʃən]

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n. 解释,阐释,翻译,(艺术的)演绎

 


关键字: 经济学人 种族 枪支

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