面对声势浩大的“光盘行动”
你心中闪现的是什么？
——
食堂阿姨颤颤巍巍的手？
餐盘里刮不干净的最后一粒米？
还是来势汹汹的全球粮食危机？
"锄禾日当午”的农民伯伯？
在美国
粮食危机，非法移民，农场工人，正在唤醒社会公众的同理心。
Bruce Goldstein, the president of the Washington, D.C.-based organization Farmworkers Justice, said that after the novel coronavirus was declared a global pandemic in March, he saw many people become worried about their access to food for the first time. Not necessarily because of cost, but because the farmworkers who grow, harvest and manufacture it — the majority of whom are undocumented immigrants — may have been forced to stop working.
华盛顿Farmworkers Justice组织的主席Bruce Goldstein说，自从三月新冠疫情在全球蔓延以来，他看到很多人第一次开始担心粮食的供给问题。他们并不是担心粮食的价格，而是担心种植、收获、加工粮食的农场工人。其中绝大多数人可能因无证移民的身份而不得不停止工作。
"They became aware, or more aware than in the past, of who exactly is producing food for them," Goldstein said.
Goldstein说道：“人们开始关注，或者说比以前更加关注，到底是谁在为他们生产粮食。”
But then states across the country quickly began classifying those farmworkers as "essential employees," people who — even if they didn't have legal protections against deportation or access to healthcare in the country — were needed to keep food on American tables.
但随后，美国各州很快开始将这些农场工人归类为“重要员工”，因为美国需要他们保证粮食供给，即便现在没有法律能够保护他们免遭驱逐出境，同时，他们在美国境内也无法享有医疗保障。
The pandemic spotlighted exactly how integral the labor of undocumented and migrant workers is to our country's food system. However, as election results continue to trickle in, it's clear that many Americans still voted for Trump, whose platform has consistently included vocal anti-immigrant and anti-refugee rhetoric.
新冠疫情恰恰凸显出，这些无证移民农场工人对于整个国家的粮食供应体系如此不可或缺。尽管特朗普政府的政策一贯反对移民和难民，但随着大选结果逐渐明了，还有很多人将选票投给了特朗普。
A large part of that is due to America's eroding sense of empathy, which only seems to have further disintegrated over the last four years.
这一结果很大程度上是因为，美国人的同理心正在逐渐削弱，而在过去的四年中，这种同理心似乎又进一步瓦解了。
我们正在远离
Dr. Sarah Konrath is an associate professor of philanthropic studies at Indiana University and director of the Interdisciplinary Program on Empathy and Altruism Research. She studies the decline of empathy and rise of narcissistic behavior, and published a study in 2011 about North American college students' self-reported scores on a widely used empathy scale.
Sarah Konrath是印第安纳大学慈善学研究的副教授，同时她也是“同理心与利他主义”跨学科研究项目的负责人。她主要研究人们同理心下降以及自恋行为提升这一现象，2011年，Konrath发表了一份研究报告，她以北美的大学生为对象，发放了权威的同理心衡量表，并收集学生们的自我评估得分。
"In that paper, we tracked those scores from 1979, when the scale was first developed, to 2009, which was the latest year," Konrath said. "We found out that the college students in the late 1970s and early '80s scored higher in empathy than college students over time, especially in the post-2000 period."
“我们将获得的数据与这份衡量表刚推出时1979年，和最近2009年学生们的得分情况相比对。”Konrath说道，“我们发现，70年代末至80年代早期的这一代学生，要比之后的、尤其是2000年后的学生更有同理心。”
Empathy can be defined in several ways, but many researchers agree that it can be summarized as the ability to understand and share the feelings of others. According to Konrath, who is in the middle of producing an update to the study, there are a number of potential contributing factors, including shifts in family, community and government structures. One of the most perceptible is the relative isolation in which many Americans now live.
同理心有多种定义，但众多学者一致认为同理心可以被概括为理解和分享他人感受的能力。Konrath最近正在更新调查数据，她指出，同理心有很多影响因素，包括家庭、社区、政府架构的变化，其中影响最明显的，就是当下很多美国人所处的一种相对隔绝的状态。
Dr. Jamil Zaki, a Stanford neuroscientist and author of "The War for Kindness: Building empathy in a fractured world," said that people empathize most easily "when they can see others' suffering with their own eyes, or when their actions are visible to others."
斯坦福大学神经学家、《为善而战：在破碎的世界中建立同理心》一书的作者Jamil Zaki博士说，“当人们能够亲眼看到别人的痛苦，或者当人们的行为被他人看到时”，最容易产生同理心。
"But the modern world has stripped them away," Zaki told the Washington Post in 2019. "Humans increasingly live in cities and live alone. We see more people than ever but know fewer of them. Rituals that used to bring us into regular contact, ranging from bowling leagues to grocery shopping, have been replaced by more solitary pursuits, often carried out online. The result is our interactions with each other are often thinned out, anonymous and tribal — barren soil for empathy."
“但现代世界已经从人们身上剥夺了同理心，”2019年，Zaki在接受《华盛顿邮报》采访时表示：“越来越多的人们独自生活在城市里。我们遇见的人越来越多，但熟知的人却越来越少。从保龄球联赛到杂货店购物，以往那些让我们保持联系的活动转移到了线上，并被更多的独处需求所取代。人们之间的交流逐渐淡薄、匿名、狭隘，共情能力也日渐贫瘠。”
In the age of Instacart orders and Whole Foods check-outs lined with Amazon Prime lockers, it's easy to see how many Americans have become increasingly disconnected from the reality of who harvests their food, and that kind of anonymity could certainly breed the idea that whomever is doing that work isn't a member of your community, but a faceless stranger. Add in potential differences in racial background and immigration status, and — as Zaki asserts, our interactions have grown increasingly tribal — that only accentuates a certain sense of "otherness."
It also contributes to ignorance about some of the main issues that impact migrant and undocumented farmworkers.
在一小时达订单和亚马逊全食超市无人零售盛行的年代，不难发现许多美国人越发不了解是谁在种植粮食，这种“不相识”无疑会孕育一个想法：从事这项工作的人不是自己社区的成员，而是一个不露面的陌生人。加上种族背景和移民身份的潜在差异，正如Zaki观点，我们之间的互动已越来越趋于小圈子化——这只能进一步加重某种“他者”感。
这也导致人们在影响移民和非法农场工人的一些议题上不为所动。
【今年九月，亚马逊在纽约布鲁克林开设了第一家“永久在线”的全食超市，旨在满足日益增长的杂货配送需求。十月，全美的全食超市支持到店自提服务，会员在网上购买食品杂货，1小时就可以从店铺取到货。亚马逊声称大多消费者只需要等一分钟就能取到货。】
"Many employers in this country benefit from the vulnerability that undocumented immigrants have, which causes them to be reluctant to ask for better wages and working conditions," Goldstein said. "They're often ineligible for basic services and benefits, like federally funded legal aid programs, so if they are ripped off by their employer, they often can't afford a lawyer and are not eligible for free legal services. Employers can also pay a poverty-level wage, but the workers can't get public benefits like food stamps."
Goldstein说：“非法移民生存环境脆弱，他们并不奢求更好的工资和工作条件，在我们的国家，许多雇主正是从中受益。非法农场工人通常没有资格享受基本的服务和福利，比如联邦政府资助的法律援助项目。所以如果他们被雇主敲诈剥削，他们往往负担不起律师的费用，也没有资格享受免费的法律服务。即使雇主可以支付最低水平的工资，工人也无法获得像食品券这样的公共福利。”
So how do we as a country bridge the empathy gap between many American consumers and the (to them) invisible masses who put food on their tables? Thankfully, empathy is a cultivatable skill.
身处同一个国家，美国消费者和被他们视而不见地把食物搬上餐桌的人们之间存在着共情鸿沟，我们又能如何消除这一鸿沟呢？谢天谢地，同理心是可以培养的。
走近他们
But Mel Schwartz, a therapist and author of "The Possibility Principle: How Quantum Physics Can Improve the Way You Think, Live, and Love," says creating a more empathetic country will require a seismic shift in how we think about otherness.
《可能性原理：量子物理学如何改善你的思考、生活和爱的方式》一书的作者Mel Schwartz认为，要建立一个更具同理心的国家，我们需要扭转自己看待他者的方式。
"Our worldviews, the way we see reality, particularly in our country, is so overly individualistic and self-interested," Schwartz said. "It's oriented toward greed — and not just financial greed. It's narcissism, it's 'all about me,' social media, how many 'likes' you have. When we live in a culture that is too focused on individualism, we lose the capacity to think about and feel the realities of others."
Schwartz表示：“尤其在美国，我们的世界观和看待现实的方式过于个人主义和自私自利。它面向贪婪，不仅仅是财务上的贪婪，更是自恋，是‘自私自利’，是在社交媒体上获得了多少‘赞’。当我们生活在一个过于注重个人主义的文化中时，我们就失去了思考和感受他人现实的能力。”
To change that would require individuals to start valuing caring for other people and tending to their communities above the individual self. In his book, Schwartz posits that quantum physics has "actually told us that all reality is actually inseparable."
要改变这种现状，就需要每个人开始重视关爱他人，并学会将社区利益置于个人之上。Schwartz在他的书中提出，量子物理学“已经告诉我们，所有的‘现实’事实上都是密不可分的”。
"It's all as one," he said. "And my point is that, from that vantage point, if everything's connected to everything else, then we should be caring for each other, because in my caring for you, I recognize that you're not separate from me. We need to introduce this new paradigm of oneness."
他说：“这一切如同一个整体。从有利的角度出发，如果一切都与其他事物息息相关，那么我们应该互相关心，因为在我关心你的过程中，我认识到你与我是不可分割的。我们需要引入这种‘人类一体性’的新思考范式。”
While that concept may sound spiritual or intangible, the pandemic and the subsequent disruptions of the food supply chain in the states — from COVID-19 outbreaks at meatpacking plants largely staffed by immigrant workers, to agricultural counties across the U.S. facing higher rates of infection — drive the point of oneness or connectedness home. The issues impacting a farmworker thousands of miles away can determine what's on your plate tomorrow night.
虽然这个概念可能听起来有点虚无缥缈，但疫情和随后各州食品供应链的中断——从由移民工人集中的肉类包装厂爆发新冠疫情，再到全美农业县面临更高的感染率——推动了“一体性”或“关联性”的概念“飞入寻常百姓家”。毕竟，千里之外的农场工人问题可以决定你明晚的菜单。
走进他们
For some, that may still be too abstract a reason to care deeply about the working conditions with which vulnerable farmworkers are faced, and that makes sense. Researchers have found that trying to imagine how someone feels is often not enough to elicit true empathy — you need to actually ask them.
对于某些人来说，这可能仍然是个太抽象的理由，让他们无法深入关心弱势农场工人所面临的工作条件，而这确实有道理。研究人员发现，仅仅试图想象某人的感受通常不足以引起真正的共情——你需要真正去问他们。
"For me, the core of empathy is curiosity," Jodi Halpern, a psychiatrist and bioethics professor at the University of California, Berkeley, told the New York Times. "It's what is another person's life actually like in its particulars?" Exchanging stories with other people, especially people whose realities look very different from your own, is a way to vicariously "try on" someone else's life.
“对我来说，同理心的核心是好奇心。”加州大学伯克利分校的精神病学和生物伦理学教授Jodi Halpern在接受《纽约时报》采访时表示：“别人的生活究竟是怎样的特殊情况？”与其他人交流故事——尤其是与你自己实际情况截然不同的人，是一种“代入式”体验他人生活的方法。
"There are people out there that know what it's like to have your electricity cut off, they're likely the same people out there that know exactly what it feels like to not have access to food," Martinez said. "So there's this feeling of moving people from isolation into community."
Martinez说：“一些人能够体会断电的感受，他们就能知道吃不上饭的人怀着怎样的心情。这种相连的情感帮助着人们从孤立走向集体。”
经历过没钱交电费而被断电的那群人，可能就是现在吃不上饭挨饿的那群人。
Once they've found community with people like them, they feel more empowered to share their personal experiences on a wider stage.
一旦人们处于一个有着无数“自己”的群体之中，他们就会更有勇气在一个更广阔的平台分享自己的个人经历。
"We found one another and we shared our stories, we shared our pain, we celebrated the things about our culture that made us resilient," Martinez said.
Martinez说：“我们找到了彼此，分享自己的故事和痛苦，共同欢庆让自己强韧的文化特质。”
"We then said, 'Why don't we do something together?' and we went after the DREAM Act in 2010, and failed, but because we found community we didn't let go. We came up with a strategy to win DACA and eventually persuaded the most powerful man in the world to use his executive power to grant protection for us and for our people."
“后来我们说，‘为什么不一起做点什么呢？’。于是我们在2010年密切追踪《梦想法案》的推进，只可惜它夭折了。但因为我们都没有放弃这一组织，并最终提出了一个策略，一个让世界上最有权势的人动用行政权力来保护我们和我们的人民，让DACA落地的策略。”
【DACA：Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals，“童年入境暂缓遣返”计划是美国的一项移民政策，允许16周岁以下且满足特定条件的非法移民申请合法留居并工作两年。奥巴马利用行政命令于2012年推出该政策，特朗普政府于2017年9月宣布废除。DREAM Act 与DACA有着相同的政策精神，但前者未获国会通过。】
Since then, United We Dream has launched a community-driven research initiative leading on topics of importance to the immigrant community. These publications help tell the story of the communities they represent in their own words — and hope that it's enough to spark some people to action, which is an important key to systemic change.
此后，United We Dream组织发起了一场由群体推动的研究倡议，旨在研究移民群体内的重要议题。出版的书籍帮助他们亲口讲述本群体的故事——他们希望，这一举措足以激励人们采取行动，而行动，对于引发一场社会整体变革来说尤其重要。
"It isn't enough to just feel what other people are feeling," said therapist and writer Dr. Mary Lamia, "Empathy can show up in a lot of different ways, it's what you do with it that matters."
心理诊疗师兼作家Mary Lamia认为：“仅仅体会他人的情感是远远不够的。很多方法都能激发同理心，关键是你如何利用和对待同理心。”
同理心可以表现在很多方面，关键是你怎么利用它去行动。
So, actively seek out the stories of farmworkers to listen to and read. If you live in or nearby an agricultural community, see what worker-led organizations exist close to you and get involved. Spend time elevating the voices of farmworkers sharing their concerns.
因此，我们需要主动地寻找农场工人们的故事，听他们所讲，读他们所写。如果你正位于或靠近一个农业社区，去看看身边有没有由农场工人牵头发起的组织。加入他们，花点时间重视他们的诉求，分担他们的担忧。
For advocates like Bruce Goldstein from Farmworkers Justice, they're hoping to capitalize on how the pandemic highlighted the conditions of farmworkers because their stories were told more frequently in these ways.
对像来自Farmworkers Justice的支持者Bruce Goldstein来说，由于他们的故事在传播时常常突出新冠肺炎疫情对农场工人生活状况影响，因此他们希望可以强调这一点，让更多人了解。
"We think that there's a greater awareness of the difficulties that farmworkers are experiencing, and the need to take action," Goldstein said. "So, I'm hopeful the empathy quotient went up. Then over the next couple of years, farmworker advocates can take advantage of that and motivate people to8 take action that results in the change in policy and in business practices."
Goldstein 认为：“人们正日益意识到农场工人所经历的困难，以及采取行动的必要性。所以我希望公众的共情能力能够上升。在未来的几年里，农场工人的支持者们可以利用这一点，激励大众采取行动，改变政策与商业实践。”
编译 | 曹金杰 高嘉忆 王兆隆 赵寒旭
排版 | 赵寒旭