社论转载：普林斯顿大学为何去掉威尔逊的名字？

没错，美国前总统威尔逊是种族主义者。但普林斯顿大学就该把他的名字摘掉？

Yes, Woodrow Wilson was racist. Should Princeton erase his name?

 

第一次世界大战后，美国前总统伍德罗•威尔逊首先创造了以民族自决、民主和法治，而不是以强权来治理国家的先例。遗憾的是，威尔逊也是一个彻头彻尾的种族主义者。他认为美国黑人就该被隔离，白人就是优越。

More than any one person, American president Woodrow Wilson invented the world that came after the First World War, with a plan for self-determination of nations, democracy and a planet governed by law and not force. Wilson was also an out-and-out racist. He believed in racial segregation of black Americans, and the racial superiority of whites.

 

普林斯顿大学的抗议者把矛头指向这位诺贝尔和平奖得主、从政前在这所常春藤盟校当过校长的美国前总统。他们要求把他的名字从各个学院机构，如伍德罗-威尔逊公共和国际事务学院中拿掉。该学院于1948年创立，以表彰这位前总统，因为他最出名的政绩是力促成立国际联盟，推动国际和平。

Protesters at Princeton University have targeted the Nobel Peace Prize winner, who headed the Ivy League school before entering politics. They want his name stripped from institutions such as the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, created in 1948 to honour the man best known for promoting international peace through his advocacy of the League of Nations.

 

威尔逊对种族的看法是令人震惊的 - 部分是因为当时并没有重视种族问题。作为总统，他的政府经常歧视黑人雇员。他掌管普林斯顿大学时也不收黑人学生。他不觉得种族隔离有啥不好。这显然是错误的做法。但这是他那个时代和当地的通病。虽然他没有反对种族隔离，但种族隔离也不是他的创造。他所领导的党-民主党直到20世纪60年代才让美国南部的黑人投票。

Wilson’s views on race are shocking – in part because they historically haven’t received much attention. As president, his administration actively discriminated against black employees, and no black students were let into Princeton during his tenure. Segregation suited him fine. This was wrong, but it was also a disease of his time and place. He did not fight it, but he hardly invented it. The party he led, the Democratic Party, was until the 1960s the party of Jim Crow, which worked to disenfranchise blacks in the U.S. South.

 

威尔逊再次成为故事人物。虽然固执，威尔逊也不是一成不变。他是一个生活在完全不同的旧世界的人，如今却要被当今世界不认可的行为而被审判。对于一个开明的现代大学所信奉的价值，这样的审判从来都不易，仅历史是否真实就是个问题。除非你感兴趣不只是通过批判威尔逊而达到缓和种族紧张的目的（他应该受到批判)，而且还要把他的名字从普林斯顿大学消掉。

But the story doesn’t end there. Wilson was bigoted and he was also progressive, a man from an all-too different past who is now being forced to face the judgment of the disapproving present. This can’t easily be done with any degree of historical accuracy or fidelity to the professed values of an open-minded modern university – unless all you’re interested in is defusing racial tensions not just by criticizing Wilson (and he deserves to be criticized), but by making his name disappear.

 

如果把一个人的价值与其他人相比，世上的每个人都有优点和缺点。同样，历史上许多象伍德罗•威尔逊的名人（比如乔治•华盛顿曾经是奴隶主 – 是否美国首都也该改名）的名字应该保留，以便提醒我们自己不要因为自己占了一点上风就沾沾自喜。威尔逊是伟大的，辉煌的，但也犯了许多大的错误。但他的错不全是他的错。随着时代的变化，历史也将对我们做出审判。难道他们那时只是把眼睛盯在我们今天的过错上？

All humans are mixtures of good and bad, if only relative to the values of others. Equally, the inconsistent greatness of history’s honorees like Woodrow Wilson (or slave-owner George Washington – should America’s capital city be renamed?) should be allowed to remain visible as a constant reminder not to be too smug about our own presumed superiority. Wilson was great and brilliant, and profoundly wrong about many things. But he was not uniquely wrong. We too will be judged some day, in a world very different from this one. Will they see only our faults?

 

编注：以上是加拿大全国发行的最大日报——《环球邮报》2015年11月25日发表的社论。大中报贾宁扬编译。

Note: The Editorial was published by The Globe and Mail on November 25, 2015. Translated by Jack Jia, Chinese News.