“911”事件揭开了美国文化的隐痛 - 小猫Shirley和拙尘共同翻译

作者:sujie_alex  于 2008-6-17 04:05 发表于 最热闹的华人社交网络--贝壳村

作者分类:忧天|通用分类:其它日志

简介

从\"双子大厦\"倒塌那刻起,人们就开始搜寻\"911\"事件的英雄人物。但看起来只有男人才有资格成为英雄。而死去的女人们却被人们忽视。人们鼓励那些幸存下来的女人们继续回去烘烤面包,养育孩子。苏珊•法露迪在她的新书《The  Terror  Dream(恐怖之梦)》之中这样说道。下面我们将登载记者迪卡·艾肯亥与作者会面后撰写的三段独家精选中的第一段。
由小猫Shirley和拙尘共同翻译

从“双子大厦”倒塌那刻起,人们就开始搜寻911事件的英雄人物。但看起来只有男人才有资格成为英雄。而死去的女人们却被人们忽视。人们鼓励那些幸存下来的女人们继续回去烘烤面包,养育孩子。苏珊•法露迪在她的新书《The Terror Dream(恐怖之梦)》之中这样说道。下面我们将登载记者迪卡·艾肯亥与作者会面后撰写的三段独家精选中的第一段。
在911事件发生几个月之后,英国一本女性杂志的编辑给我打来电话,想要我提供一篇特写,"内容是关于恐怖之性。"她说道。我完全不明白她在说些什么。"没错,恐怖之性!每个人都开始好似发疯般地日夜做爱,因为他们不知道自己在恐怖袭击来临前还有多少日子好活。"我之前从未听到过这回事,之后也再没有听说。但当我跟苏珊•法露迪提起这通电话时她点了点头----"啊,是的,恐怖之性。"----然后她大笑了起来。"不过至少,"她对我说:"恐怖之性还是有乐趣的,而不是让你出去买跟擀面杖。"

法露迪在袭击发生当天接到了一位正在撰写“911事件”“反应报道"的记者电话。她不知道为什么每个人都要征求她对国际恐怖主义的看法。不过在让人摸不着头绪地谈论了一番"社会结构"之后,这位记者的真正意图开始清楚地显露出来了:"我的意思是,"他高兴地说道:"这肯定会让女权运动毫无立足之地。"

电话接踵而来。"有一个记者打电话来,问我是否注意到妇女们怎么变得更加女人了,我反问她说:'有什么可以证明这点呢?'她说她的女朋友们都已经开始烘烤饼干了。"几周内这种趋势开始清晰可见。"男人气概和女性温柔的回归,成了流行趋势。"

在那时,法露迪正在为一位热心的环保人士撰写传记。"但我突然感到:'为什么我要远远地躲在丛林里呢?'此时的我觉得自己想要写一些与身边发生的事息息相关的东西。"她开始密切关注"911"事件后的媒体报道,发现它们都在争相报道女人们正在普遍回归她们的本职,以及硬汉约翰•韦恩[注 1]式的刚毅勇敢重新成为潮流。考虑到热心环保人士的传记和当下现实问题相去甚远,法露迪搁置了传记任务,开始着手分析这种奇怪的社会反应背后的动机和根据----或是是这是否有动机和根据。于是有了她的第三本书,《恐怖之梦:"911"事件所揭露的美国》。

我在别处曾读到介绍,这个两部
女权主义巨作《Backlash (震撼) 》和《Stiffed (强硬) 》的作者,其外表看起来却出乎意料的温顺。但首次照面还是让我大吃一惊。48岁的法露迪,单薄如纸,讲话轻声慢语,以至于看起来像个大小孩一般。她和她的同伴住在旧金山,我们就在那里见面。她的态度沉着亲切,但十分谨慎。我一开始的几个问题让她瞪大了双眼,仿佛照明灯光下惊慌的野兔或小鼠。

法露迪的谨慎也许是公众对她之前著作的强烈反应所导致的后遗症。从1992年《Backlash》出版后,这位作家兼新闻记者就发现她自己卷入了
美国文化战争之中--一个与她的敏感(而不是智力)格格不入的环境。"《Backlash》是一本激进的书,或者说至少人们是这样认为的。"她几乎是打着冷颤回忆着。相比较而言,她说道:《The Terror Dream》"措词并没有那么激烈,我觉得还好。"

尽管平和的文化批评的成分要大于战斗号召,它的论题仍然让美国主流思想权威们争论不休。当基地组织袭击他们的国家的时候,法露迪写道:无助地看着电视画面的美国男人们,感受到了一种潜意识里和性别有关的耻辱之感。"'911' 事件之后的评论普遍认为美国缺少男性阳刚之气。"一篇《华盛顿时报》评论文章对于被"咆哮的女人们"扭曲而成的"过于感性的男性"感到恐慌。它继而满怀希望地推测:"是不是大男子气概重归而来了呢?"一个"因为过于强大而受到袭击"的国家却通过"看到自己的弱点"来反省自己,这是有悖常理的。但具男子汉气概的男人却成了美国媒体的新宠----一个老式强壮的英雄人物,能够保卫他的祖国,拯救他的女人。

即使他并不存在,也会被创造出来。于是消防员都得是超级英雄;寡妇们都得软弱无助;未婚少女都得赶着结婚;工作的妈妈们都得想要待在家里。最关键的是,强壮的男人们都得保护手无缚鸡之力的女人们----兰博式 [注2] 地拯救被囚禁在伊拉克的女兵杰西卡•林奇,则是这一意愿生动的戏剧化表现。而这位女兵则发现自己被媒体重新定位为一个手无缚鸡之力的少女,而不是一位职业军人。

法露迪将这种"救赎说"追本溯源到美国早期的拓荒者们最初的羞辱感,他们的女人经常被印第安人绑走----并且更让他们蒙羞的是,她们并不都是想要被援救。 "这种在我们家乡土地上发生的'意想不到的'袭击,事实上决不是意想不到的。"她写道:"它唤醒了深埋在我们文化记忆之中的焦虑感。而我们处心积虑将焦虑深深埋藏----一个300多年以来我们一直在不断构建的误区。"

出乎她意料之外的是,《The Terror Dream》在美国获得了广泛好评。不过法露迪猜测这和它直到去年才得以出版有着密不可分的联系。

 "没错,"她面无表情地说道:"几年来你都没可能发表任何质疑这个国家的话题,直到卡特里娜飓风来临----"911"事件仍然让人噤若寒蝉。你当然不可能做出任何冷嘲热讽。你可以看到卡莎•波莉特的下场。"

波莉特是包括苏珊•桑塔格在内的女性作家群体中的一员,在"911" 事件后的几个月里,因一时对好战分子的高呼声持反对意见,而激起了针对她的冷言恶语。"波利特,亲爱的,是时候把你的脑袋干洗一下了。"一位专栏作家讥笑道。"我们正处于交战状态,甜心。"另一位写道。还有一个男人给波利特的家里打电话命令她"滚回阿富汗去吧,臭婊子。"

不过男性异议者也会在某些情况下招致这种侮辱,不是吗?"没错。"法露迪表示赞同。"但针对女人的批评并不是简单地认为这种言论很不爱国。这些批评的含义是:这么说很不爱国,而且你是一个坏母亲、一个精神错乱者、一个没头脑的白痴。这种语言已经成为女性专属,而且还愈演愈烈。我是说,有一些女人并没有说什么特别的话。"

她认为这种现象标明了嫌忌女性这种大气候的出现,而这个观点受到了某些批评家的反对。他们指出,时代见证了我们的首位女性晚间新闻主持者、哈佛的首位女校长,以及美国的首位女国务卿。反对者说,"她怎么居然没提到希拉里•克林顿是民主党首席总统候选人呢?"
 
 "我发现那的确让人十分恼火。"法露迪回答说。"这本书并不是描写"911"事件对女人造成的影响,或对男人的影响。这是一本关于 "911"剥下了层层叠叠的绷带,使我们可以看到潜藏着的驱动文化的体系。媒体和其他的通俗文化并没有在记录人们对"911"事件的真实反应;他们把一些捏造的反应强加于人们身上。所以不管凯蒂•库里克是不是坐在哥伦比亚电视广播公司的主播台上都不会和这个事实产生矛盾。

而且,她补充道:"虽然国务卿康多莉扎•赖斯众所周知身居高职,白宫里最有口皆碑的女人却是副国务卿卡伦•休斯。为什么?就是因为退守家中。"这位总统顾问在2002年为了能够和家人共度更多时光而辞去职务,这个决定得到了狂热的支持与肯定,被视为"英明的"和"无私的"举动,并被冠以《没有人像妈妈这样爱家》这样的大字标题进行报道。一位华尔街日报专栏作家甚至撰写了"'911'事件后一例",并凭空设想起了休斯未来幸福的家庭生活。"她可以用Dove 泡沫洗面奶洗脸,然后拍干,涂上好闻的保湿霜然后开始新一天的生活。她可以去逛街,逛街可是件超级棒的事情。"

《The Terror Dream》一书揭露了这种编造行为所暴露的重新抬头的性别歧视本性,而其程度更让人吃惊。现实和杜撰之间的界限模糊不可辨认,甚至变得不复存在。《时代》杂志称乔治•布什为"独行侠";一位政治分析家吹捧,布什对"邪恶势力"的一系列言行,让他联想起了蝙蝠侠的那些"砰"、"轰"、和 "啪"的侠行之举,结论是:"这就是美国现在所需要的英雄。"而《每日新闻》更是将这种自说自话的荒谬上升了一个高度,将下列说法视为"退居风"论调的证据:"有关已婚的全职妈妈们放弃工作抚养孩子的报道,铺天盖地的出现在杂志、脱口秀节目和书架上。"报道和实际如此相差甚远,这让"安全妈妈"[注 3]成了主流媒体和政治演说的主题。虽然《时报》的首席民意测验专家公开承认,尽管我们正在关注这种新的趋势,"但老实说我们找不到任何证据来支持这种说法。"

作为一本文化批评著作,《The Terror Dream》是一本彻头彻尾的惊人之作。但不正是这种报道与现实完全分裂的现象所暴露出的问题,才得以赐予了作者这样一个主题么?如果这个国家的文化叙事更多地被杜撰之言而非事实所主导,并且无法真实地反映"911"事件之后的美国,那么为什么要整本书建筑在这种将虚假材料之上呢?

 "因为我们生活这样一个文化背景之下,它是如此的......你没办法......"她无助地朝着旅馆的酒吧摊开手:"我是说,能坐在一个没有大屏幕电视对着我们吵闹的房间里,这真不可思议。这样连续不断的被编纂好的思想轰炸,几乎有点像科幻小说的感觉。"她强调说,它的影响并不是"见样学样"那么简单,"而是作用于我们的世界观和自我认知,使其走样。"报纸和杂志不再是叙事载体,而成为了指导性的规范教条----"从而对我们的政治生活、我们的政策、我们噩梦般的政策方针、我们可鄙的军事战略产生巨大影响。

一方面,她承认,文化批评日趋势微。"以前,文化的演化相对缓慢,所以你能够瞄准它。而今天,文化的变化非常之快、非常之模糊、非常之无意义,让你觉得甚至连抱怨这种情况都很愚蠢。"另一方面,她又说,"我认为,很多人觉得在政治上无能为力,其原因之一就在于以往我们非常清楚这种力量的运作方式,而现在却已经摸不找头脑。然而,那些能够决定大众文化方向的人在今天拥有非常强大的势力----但我们甚至连他们是谁都不知道。"他们在商业利益方面或许相当可靠,但是你不能在民主这种事上指望他们。

显然,文化批评的真正麻烦与所谓"女性回归"的社会趋势并非毫无关联。这种关联很难确定和量化,但确确实实存在于统计数据之外。从约翰•韦恩的复活,到 "孤独的骑警"式的牛仔总统,到无法无纪的西部蛮荒,联想起21世纪的美国是如何在与绑架、水牢、以及种种酷刑为伍,让人震惊。

 "在同恐怖分子的战斗中,我们必须抛开一切规则,"一位资深的《纽约时报》专栏作家这样宣称,那感觉,仿佛他正骑着高头大马步入一座小镇。"一枪正中眉心,让他们灰飞烟灭。" 另一位《纽约邮报》的作家写道。

对于今天这种将虚构与现实混为一谈的懦弱文化,究竟是美国媒体的长篇累牍和强词夺理难辞其咎,抑或是民族精神当中的某种东西使得美国人乐此不疲的沉浸在这种混淆中?我很谨慎地向法露迪提出了这个问题。我有些担心法露迪会认为这样的谈话会偏向反美国的方向。不过,她并没有像典型的做法那样言到即止,然后退回到一个爱国者的立场上。她的样子也许很柔弱,但她的回答却毫不退缩。

"我认为,"她直截了当地说,"这与美国人意识当中长久以来存在的一些因素有关----你知道,那种把自己看得很纯真,认为什么事情都可以从头来过的想法。明天是新的一天、世界因你而不同等等诸如此类的世界观,不仅与政治格格不入,也与历史背道而驰。这使得我们更容易沉浸在灰姑娘般的故事里,并且愿意相信它。美国人一贯愿意相信一些虚幻的注解,而无视他们所面对的事实。几乎所有的美国人都愿意说,来吧,让我们翻过这页,一切都会好起来。"

顾不上有可能被看作是一个满面堆笑的唯方案论的美国记者,我问她对处理《Terror Dream》中所阐述的问题是否有建设性的意见。她说:"我认为办法就是更多地谈论这个问题,而不是急着说,让我们来采取行动吧。像
9.11这样的危机发生后,通常会有5分钟左右的时间,人们体会到的是他们的真实感受:脆弱、无助、痛苦、悲哀。之后,这种感受就会被自欺欺人的信念所取代。如果我们真的想要摆脱这种条件反射,就必须了解这种条件反射----而这需要多于5分钟的时间。毕竟,培养和适应这种反应花费了我们几百年的时间。"

碰到一个比我还灰色调的美国人真是件稀奇的事。在大西洋的对面,人们正满怀兴奋地期待着一位新总统,而我对此却有些羞于启齿,生怕显得幼稚。法露迪不会透露她将把选票投给民主党的哪位候选人。那么,对即将到来的选举,她是否会感到乐观呢?

 "我经历的所有选举,都让我非常失望----从我第一次达到法定年龄投票开始----那次是罗纳德•里根当选。没错,民主党方面,我们有一位拒绝做一个柔弱的家庭主妇的女性候选人,我们还有一位不愿当粗犷硬汉的男性候选人。也许事情真的发生了转变。不过,那个秘密并没有离我们而去,它只是蛰伏下来,并且会在普选中卷土重来。你已经可以看到一些端倪了。"

我追问她所指为何。

 "让我们假定共和党的候选人是麦凯恩(McCain)。他会把自己描绘成丹尼尔•布恩,一个被印第安人抓住----或者,在麦凯恩的故事里是被越南人抓住,承受了种种折磨最终终于归来的汉子。这就是将要上演的一出大戏。人们已经开始在谈论所谓的'麦凯恩勇士'了。而民主党方面,不论候选人是谁,都将被攻击指责,因为他们没有这样的公式化故事。希拉里•克林顿会被批评为不足以坚强到应对恐怖分子的威胁,或被指责为过于冷静和精明的女人,也许还会二罪合一。而奥巴马将被描绘成一个瘦弱单薄的家伙,在敌人面前毫无英雄气概。"

"我不认为,"她苦笑着说,"我们已经看到了故事的终结。"

苏珊•法露迪的著作《恐怖之梦:"911"事件所揭露的美国》由 Atlantic Books出版发行,售价12.99英镑。请登陆guardian.co.uk/bookshop或拨打电话0870 836 0875,可以11.99英镑购买。

注释:

1. John Wayne:电影演员,西部片的代表人物,被认为是美国的象征,是那个时代所有美国人的化身。扮演的人物总是诚实,有男人气概,英雄主义。

2. Rambo-style:兰博是电影《第一滴血》中的男主人公,越战退役军人,由史泰龙饰演。影片以极度暴力著称。

3. SecurityMoms:2004年美国总统选举中的特殊选民群体,她们都是已经结婚的白人母亲。自从"911"恐怖袭击之后,她们就对恐怖威胁和安全问题格外关注。在这些"安全妈妈"中,布什的支持率要高于克里。
 
 
原文:
'9/11 ripped the bandage off US culture'

No sooner had the Twin Towers fallen than the search began for the heroes of 9/11. But only men seemed to be eligible. The women who died were ignored; those who survived were encouraged to get back to baking and child-rearing. So says Susan Faludi in her new book The Terror Dream. Decca Aitkenhead meets her and, overleaf, we print the first of three exclusive extracts

Monday February 18, 2008
The Guardian


Some months after 9/11, I received a call from a British women's magazine editor who wanted to commission a feature. "It's about terror sex," she said. I didn't know what she was talking about. "You know, terror sex! Everyone going out and having, like, crazy sex all the time, because they don't know how long they've got before a terrorist attack." I had never heard of this behaviour before, and nor for that matter since, but when I mention the call to Susan Faludi she nods - "Ah, yes, terror sex" - and laughs. "But at least," she points out, "terror sex was about fun. It didn't require going out and buying a rolling pin."
 
'9/11 ripped the bandage off US culture'

No sooner had the Twin Towers fallen than the search began for the heroes of 9/11. But only men seemed to be eligible. The women who died were ignored; those who survived were encouraged to get back to baking and child-rearing. So says Susan Faludi in her new book The Terror Dream. Decca Aitkenhead meets her and, overleaf, we print the first of three exclusive extracts

Monday February 18, 2008
The Guardian


Some months after 9/11, I received a call from a British women's magazine editor who wanted to commission a feature. "It's about terror sex," she said. I didn't know what she was talking about. "You know, terror sex! Everyone going out and having, like, crazy sex all the time, because they don't know how long they've got before a terrorist attack." I had never heard of this behaviour before, and nor for that matter since, but when I mention the call to Susan Faludi she nods - "Ah, yes, terror sex" - and laughs. "But at least," she points out, "terror sex was about fun. It didn't require going out and buying a rolling pin."
 
Faludi received her first call from a journalist writing a "reaction story" to 9/11 on the very day of the attacks. She wondered why anyone would solicit her opinion on international terrorism, but after some vague preambles about "the social fabric", the reporter's purpose became clear: "Well," he said gleefully, "this sure pushes feminism off the map!"

The calls kept coming. "When one journalist rang to ask if I had noticed how women were becoming more feminine, I asked her, 'What exactly is your evidence?' She said her girlfriends had started baking cookies." Within weeks the pattern was growing clear. "It was the idea of the return of the manly man, and of women becoming softer. That had become the trend story."

At the time, Faludi was working on a biography of an eco activist. "But I suddenly felt, 'Why am I off in the woods?' when I felt like I wanted to be writing something closer to what was happening." She began monitoring the post-9/11 media closely, and found them dominated by enthusiastic reports of a mass retreat by women into feminine domesticity, and a wholesale revival of John Wayne manliness. Concerned that this narrative bore little resemblance to reality, Faludi shelved the eco biography and set about analysing the motives and evidence - or lack of - for this curiously reactionary narrative. The result is her third book, The Terror Dream: What 9/11 Revealed About America.

I had read that the author of two feminist blockbusters, Backlash and Stiffed, was unexpectedly meek in person. But the first impression is still a surprise, for Faludi, 48, is so paper thin and softly spoken as to seem almost like a middle-aged child. We meet in San Francisco, where she lives with her partner, and her manner is calm and kind, but wary. My early questions widen her eyes, not so much like a rabbit in the headlights as a field mouse.

Faludi's caution may be a legacy from the ferocity of public reaction to her previous work. Ever since the publication of Backlash in 1992, the author and journalist has found herself caught up in America's culture wars, a combat zone to which her sensibility, though not her intellect, seems ill suited. "Backlash was an advocacy book - or at least it was perceived that way," she recalls, almost shuddering. By comparison, she says, The Terror Dream "is not such a barn burner, which is fine by me".

Less a call to arms than a piece of cultural criticism, its thesis is still highly contentious by the standards of mainstream American thinking. When al-Qaida attacked their country, Faludi writes, the humiliating shame felt by American men watching helplessly on TV was experienced, at a subliminal level, sexually. "The post-9/11 commentaries were riddled with apprehensions that America was lacking in masculine fortitude." A Washington comment article panicked about the "touchy-feely sensitive male" who had been "psychopathologised by howling fems", and speculated hopefully, "Is the alpha male making a comeback?" Despite the perversity of a nation "attacked precisely because of its imperial pre-eminence" reacting by "fixating on its weakness", America's media fell back in love with the manly man - an old-fashioned hero strong enough to defend his nation and rescue his womenfolk.

If he did not exist, he would have to be invented. So firemen had to be superheroes, widows had to be helpless, unmarried women had to be frantic to wed and working mums had to want to stay at home. Crucially, strong men had to protect weak women - a desire vividly dramatised by the Rambo-style rescue in Iraq of Private Jessica Lynch, who found herself reconfigured by the media from professional soldier to helpless damsel.

Faludi traces this "rescue narrative" right back to the original shame of America's frontiersmen, whose womenfolk were frequently kidnapped by Indians - and, more shaming still, did not always want to be rescued. "The 'unimaginable' assault on our home soil was, in fact, anything but unimaginable," she writes. "The anxieties it awakened reside deep in our cultural memory. And the myth we deployed to keep those anxieties buried is one we've been constructing for more than 300 years."

Somewhat to her surprise, The Terror Dream has received broadly good reviews in the US. But this, Faludi suspects, has a lot to do with the fact that it was not published until last year.

"You know," she says drily, "you really couldn't say anything questioning in this country for years, not until hurricane Katrina - 9/11 was still too much of a sacred cow. You certainly couldn't make a cynical remark. You saw what happened to Katha Pollitt."

Pollitt was one of a number of women writers, including Susan Sontag, whose tentative dissent from the jingoistic chorus in the months after 9/11 provoked peculiarly spiteful uproar. "Pollitt, honey, it's time to take your brain to the dry cleaners," one columnist sneered; "We're at war, sweetheart," wrote another. A man called Pollitt's home number and ordered her to "go back to Afghanistan, you bitch".

But surely male dissenters could - and in some cases did - incur outrage? "Yes," Faludi agrees, "but the criticism towards women wasn't just: that's an unpatriotic thing to say. It was: that's an unpatriotic thing to say, and you're a bad mother, and you're morally deranged, you're a ditzy idiot. The language was very much coded in female terms. And it was so way over the top. I mean, some of these women hadn't said very much of anything."

Her theory that this signalled the advent of a misogynistic climate has been challenged by some critics, who point out that the period saw the first female evening network-news anchor, Harvard's first female president and America's first female secretary of state. "I mean," objected one, "how can she not mention that Hillary Clinton is the leading Democratic contender for president?"

"I found that really exasperating," Faludi responds, "because this is not a book about what 9/11 did to women. Or to men, for that matter. It's a book about how 9/11 ripped the bandage off, so we could see the underlying machinery that makes the culture go. The media and the rest of popular culture weren't recording people's reactions to 9/11; they were forcing made-up reactions down people's throats. So whether Katie Couric's at the anchor desk on CBS, that doesn't contradict this."

Besides, she adds: "For all the talk of Condi Rice being in a high position, the woman who was most celebrated in the White House was Karen Hughes. And for what? For going back to the home." The presidential adviser stepped down in 2002 to spend more time with her family, a decision deliriously feted as "wise" and "unselfish", under headlines such as "There's no one like Mom for the home". A Wall Street Journal columnist diagnosed "a case of Sept 11", and speculated dreamily on the bliss of Hughes's new domestic future. "She can wash her face in Dove foamy cleanser, pat it dry, put on a nice-smelling moisturiser and walk onward into the day. She can shop. Shopping is a wonderful thing."

More startling even than the retro-sexist nature of the mythmaking exposed in The Terror Dream, though, is the sheer scale of it. Boundaries between fact and fiction appear blurred to the point of non-existence. Time magazine dubbed George Bush "the Lone Ranger", while one political analyst noted that his "evildoers" rhetoric reminded him of the "Whams", "Pows" and "Biffs" of Batman, concluding: "This is just the kind of hero America needs right now." Scaling new heights of self-referential absurdity, the Daily News offered, as evidence for a story about the "opt-out trend": "Talk of married, professional moms dropping out of the workforce to rear kids is all over magazines, talkshows and bookstore shelves." Reporting grew so detached from reality that "security mom" was allowed to become a staple of mainstream media and political discourse, even though Time's lead pollster confessed that, despite searching for this new demographic identity, "We honestly couldn't find much empirical evidence to support it."

As a work of cultural criticism, The Terror Dream is comprehensively shocking. But didn't the extreme disconnection between reporting and reality that it exposed present the author with a problem? If the country's cultural narrative was driven more by fiction than fact, and failed to reflect the truth of post-9/11 America, why base a whole book upon such spurious material?

"Because we live in a culture that's so . . . you can't . . ." She casts a hand around the hotel bar helplessly. "I mean, this is sort of miraculous, to be sitting in a room where there's not some massive flat-screen TV yelling at us. It's almost a sci-fi feeling, this kind of constant bombardment of programmed thought." Its effect is not as simple, she stresses, as "monkey see, monkey do". "But it certainly has a warping effect on how we think about the world, and how we think about ourselves." Journalism became not descriptive but prescriptive - "and that had an enormous effect on our political life, our policy, our nightmarish policy, our misbegotten military strategy".

In one respect, she concedes, cultural criticism today is less relevant than it used to be. "The culture used to move relatively slowly, so you could take aim. Now it moves so fast, and is so fluffy and meaningless, you feel like an idiot even complaining about it." But on the other hand, "I think a reason that a lot of people feel politically paralysed is that it used to be clear how power was organised. But those who have their hands on the levers of popular culture today have great power - and it isn't even clear who they are." They may be commercially accountable, in other words, but not democratically.

The real trouble with cultural criticism, of course, is not unlike the weakness of social "trend" stories extrapolated from catwalk fashions. Difficult to quantify or verify, its connections operate outside the calculus of statistical fact. But as an explanation for how 21st-century America found itself comfortable with rendition and waterboarding and torture, the link from a John Wayne fantasy revival to a "Lone Ranger" cowboy president, to the lawlessness of the wild west, is powerfully compelling.

"We have to fight the terrorists as if there were no rules," a senior New York Times columnist wrote, as if riding into town. "A gunshot between the eyes," advocated another in the New York Post. "Blow them to smithereens."

Does Faludi think, I ask cautiously, that this weakness for muddling up cultural fiction with reality is caused by the sheer volume and sophistication of America's media? Or does something in the national psyche render Americans uniquely susceptible to the confusion? I'm a bit worried that Faludi may feel the conversation is taking an anti-American turn. But she does not do that classic liberal sidestep of going only so far, before retreating into patriotic disclaimers. Her manner might be diffident, but her answer isn't.

"I think," she says bluntly, "it combines with a number of prevailing, longstanding dynamics in the American mindset. You know - the desire to be seen as innocent, that you can just hit the restart button. That tomorrow's a new day, one person can make a difference - all these apolitical, and even anti-political, or certainly anti-historical ways of looking at the world. That makes us more susceptible to Cinderella stories, and want to believe them. Americans have always wanted to believe in some dreamy notion that has nothing to do with the facts that are right before them. Americans are just so wedded to saying OK, let's just turn the page and everything's going to be fine."

At the risk of sounding like a smiley, solution-orientated American interviewer, I ask if she has any constructive suggestions as to how to address the problem articulated in Terror Dream. "I think the solution is actually to talk more about the problem, before saying let's move on. There is this five-minute window that happens after a crisis like 9/11, when people are actually grappling with real experience, and with real feelings of vulnerability and weakness and pain and sorrow. And that's immediately swept aside in favour of this make-believe story line. If we are really to free ourselves from that reflex, we have to understand the reflex - which is going to take more than five minutes. After all, it took us hundreds of years to create it and buy into it."

It's so rare to meet an American who seems gloomier than me, I feel slightly embarrassed to mention our excitement across the Atlantic at the prospect of a new president, for fear of sounding naive. Faludi won't say which way she voted in the Democratic primary - but doesn't she feel optimistic about the forthcoming election?

"Well, most of my voting life I've been painfully disappointed, starting with the first election I was old enough to vote in, which brought in Ronald Reagan. Yes, on the Democratic side we have a woman refusing to be a weak maiden, and we have a male candidate refusing to be the swaggering tough guy. So maybe things have really changed. But on the other hand, this myth never really goes away; it just goes underground, and it's going to come back with a vengeance in the general election. You can already see it."

I ask her what she means.

"Well, let's assume McCain is the Republican candidate. His story is going to be the story of Daniel Boone - the guy who was taken captive by Indians or, in his case, the North Vietnamese, and withstood torture and came back. That's the drama that's going to be trotted out. Already they're talking about 'McCain the Warrior'. And then on the Democratic side, whoever the candidate is they'll be attacked because they don't fit into that rescue formula. Clinton will either be accused of being not manly enough to withstand the terrorist threat, or accused of being too cold and calculating to be a woman. Or both. And Obama will be this scrawny guy who doesn't seem macho enough to stand up to the enemy.

"I don't think," she smiles sadly, "we've seen the last of the narrative"

· Susan Faludi's The Terror Dream: What 9/11 Revealed About America is published by Atlantic Books at £12.99. To order a copy for £11.99 with free UK p&p go to guardian.co.uk/bookshop or call 0870 836 0875.


高兴

感动

同情

搞笑

难过

拍砖

支持

鲜花

评论 (0 个评论)

facelist doodle 涂鸦板

您需要登录后才可以评论 登录 | 注册

关于本站 | 隐私政策 | 免责条款 | 版权声明 | 联络我们 | 刊登广告 | 转手机版 | APP下载

Copyright © 2001-2025 海外华人中文门户:倍可亲 (http://www.backchina.com) All Rights Reserved.

程序系统基于 Discuz! X3.1 商业版 优化 Discuz! © 2001-2013 Comsenz Inc. 更新:GMT+8, 2025-3-18 00:00

倍可亲服务器位于美国圣何塞、西雅图和达拉斯顶级数据中心,为更好服务全球网友特统一使用京港台时间

返回顶部