TED英語演講：我不是你的勵志榜樣

Stella Young是一位喜劇演員，也是一名新聞記者。她與其他人不同的僅僅是她是一名殘疾人。她始終在強調，這一點並不代表她理所當然就應該成為人們的勵志榜樣。在這個有趣的演講中，楊把社會將殘疾人當做勵志範本進行的宣傳描述成了“勵志情色片”。下面是小編為大家收集關於TED英語演講：我不是你的勵志榜樣，歡迎借鑑參考。

TED英語演講：我不是你的勵志榜樣

演講者：Stella Young

I grew up in a very small country town in Victoria. I had a very normal, low-key kind of upbringing. I went to school, I hung out with my friends, I fought with my younger sisters. It was all very normal. And when I was 15, a member of my local community approached my parents and wanted to nominate me for a community achievement award. And my parents said, "Hm, that's really nice, but there's kind of one glaring problem with that. She hasn't actually achieved anything."

我在維多利亞的一個小鄉鎮長大。我受的教育平凡而普通。我上學，跟朋友一起玩，跟妹妹們吵架。一切都再普通不過了。在我15歲的時候，一名社群的工作人員找到我的父母， 想要提名我一個社群成就獎。我的父母說：“嗯，這是件好事兒，不過有個比較明顯的問題。她從來也沒取得什麼成就啊。”

And they were right, you know. I went to school, I got good marks, I had a very low-key after school job in my mum's hairdressing salon, and I spent a lot of time watching "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and "Dawson's Creek." Yeah, I know. What a contradiction. But they were right, you know. I wasn't doing anything that was out of the ordinary at all. I wasn't doing anything that could be considered an achievement if you took disability out of the equation.

他們說的對。我上學，成績還不錯。畢業之後在媽媽的髮型設計沙龍有個很普通的工作， 我還花很多時間看各種肥皂劇，比如”吸血鬼獵人巴菲“和”戀愛時代“。沒錯，是有點矛盾。不過他們說得對，我壓根兒也沒有過任何不尋常的作為。我從來也沒做過任何可以被當做是成就的事情，如果不考慮身體有缺陷這一點的話。

Years later, I was on my second teaching round in a Melbourne high school, and I was about 20 minutes into a year 11 legal studies class when this boy put up his hand and said, "Hey miss, when are you going to start doing your speech?" And I said, "What speech?" You know, I'd been talking them about defamation law for a good 20 minutes. And he said, "You know, like, your motivational speaking. You know, when people in wheelchairs come to school, they usually say, like, inspirational stuff?" "It's usually in the big hall."

幾年以後，我再次回 一個墨爾本高中的教書，當我在20xx年級(相當於中國高中)的一堂法律課上剛講了大概20分鐘時，一個男孩舉手問道： “女士，你什麼時候才能開始演講?” 我說：“什麼演講?”事實上，我已經就誹謗法講了二十多分鐘了。

And that's when it dawned on me: This kid had only ever experienced disabled

people as objects of inspiration. We are not, to this kid -- and it's not his fault, I mean, that's true for many of us. For lots of us, disabled people are not our teachers or our doctors or our manicurists. We're not real people. We are there to inspire. And in fact, I am sitting on this stage looking like I do in this wheelchair, and you are probably kind of expecting me to inspire you. Right? (Laughter) Yeah.

就是在那個時候我開始意識到：這孩子一直把殘障人士當做一種勵志物件。對這個孩子來說，我們並不是什麼激勵物件，這也不是他的錯，很多人都有這種想法。對很多人來說，殘障人士並不是老師，醫生或者美甲師。我們不是真實的人，我們的存在只是為了激勵別人。現在，我在這個講臺上，坐著輪椅演講，你們可能多少也會期待我能對你們有所激勵，對吧?(觀眾笑聲)我說的沒錯吧。

Well, ladies and gentlemen, I'm afraid I'm going to disappoint you dramatically. I am not here to inspire you. I am here to tell you that we have been lied to about disability. Yeah, we've been sold the lie that disability is a Bad Thing, capital B, capital T. It's a bad thing, and to live with a disability makes you exceptional. It's not a bad thing, and it doesn't make you exceptional.

不過，女士們先生們，恐怕我要讓你們非常失望了。我在這裡不是為了激勵你們。我來這兒是想告訴你們我們對殘疾有錯誤的認識。沒錯，我們一直被錯誤的灌輸殘疾是件壞事，很——糟——糕的事。這是件壞事，帶著殘缺生活會讓你與眾不同。其實，這並不是件壞事，也不會讓你變得多出眾。

And in the past few years, we've been able to propagate this lie even further via social media. You may have seen images like this one: "The only disability in life is a bad attitude." Or this one: "Your excuse is invalid." Indeed. Or this one: "Before you quit, try!" These are just a couple of examples, but there are a lot of these images out there. You know, you might have seen the one, the little girl with no hands drawing a picture with a pencil held in her mouth. You might have seen a child running on carbon fiber prosthetic legs. And these images, there are lots of them out there, they are what we call inspiration porn. (Laughter)

在過去的幾年，這個謊言通過社交媒體被傳的更廣了。你們可能看過這樣的圖片：生活中唯一的殘缺就是消極的態度。“ 或者這個：”你的理由不成立。”亦或者：“不要輕易放棄，繼續嘗試!”這只是其中的幾個例子，這樣的圖片還有很多。你們還可能看到過這個，一個沒有手臂的小女孩兒把筆刁在嘴裡畫畫。你們可能也見過一個孩子藉助碳纖維義肢奔跑。類似這樣的圖片，太多了，我們管這些叫勵志情色片。(觀眾笑聲)

And I use the term porn deliberately, because they objectify one group of people for the benefit of another group of people. So in this case, we're objectifying disabled people for the benefit of nondisabled people. The purpose of these images is to inspire you, to motivate you, so that we can look at them and think, "Well, however bad my life is, it could be worse. I could be that person."

我故意用“情色片”這個詞的，因為他們為了另一群人的利益，而把一群人物化。現在，我們正在物化殘障人士，以滿足非殘障人士的利益。這些圖片是想要鼓舞你們，激勵你們， 這樣我們看到這些殘疾人的時候就會想：“哦，我的生活再糟，也還是有比我更糟的。還好我不是那個人。”

But what if you are that person? I've lost count of the number of times that I've been approached by strangers wanting to tell me that they think I'm brave or inspirational, and this was long before my work had any kind of public profile. They were just kind of congratulating me for managing to get up in the morning and remember my own name. (Laughter) And it is objectifying. These images,those images objectify disabled people for the benefit of nondisabled are there so that you can look at them and think that things aren't so bad for you, to put your worries into perspective.

但如果你就是那個人呢? 我已經記不清有幾次，有陌生人向我走過來，想要告訴我他們認為我很勇敢，很勵志，這還是在我沒有成為公眾人物之前的事。他們只是因為我早上能夠正常起床，還能記著我自己的名字而祝賀我。(觀眾笑聲) 這就是物化。這些圖片物化了殘障人士，好讓他們 能夠激勵非殘障人士。他們的存在，就在於能夠讓你們慶幸自己過的還不壞，把擔心拋在腦後。

And life as a disabled person is actually somewhat difficult. We do overcome some things. But the things that we're overcoming are not the things that you think they are. They are not things to do with our bodies. I use the term "disabled people" quite deliberately, because I subscribe to what's called the social model of disability, which tells us that we are more disabled by the society that we live in than by our bodies and our diagnoses.

不過殘障人士的生活的確有些挑戰。我們確實需要克服一些困難。不過我們需要克服的那些事跟你們想像的不一樣。這些事跟我們身體本身的缺陷沒什麼關係。我刻意使用“殘疾人”這個詞，因為我可以接受這種社會普遍認同的殘疾，這讓我們認識到，相比較我們身體本身的缺陷和病症，我們所居住的社會讓我們更覺得自己是殘疾人。

So I have lived in this body a long time. I'm quite fond of it. It does the things that I need it to do, and I've learned to use it to the best of its capacity just as you have, and that's the thing about those kids in those pictures as well. They're not doing anything out of the ordinary. They are just using their bodies to the best of their capacity. So is it really fair to objectify them in the way that we do, to share those images? People, when they say, "You're an inspiration," they mean it as a compliment. And I know why it happens. It's because of the lie, it's because we've been sold this lie that disability makes you exceptional. And it honestly doesn't.

其實我像現在這樣已經相當久了。感覺還挺不錯的。我想做什麼都能做，而且我也知道怎麼做那些力所能及的事兒，就跟你們一樣，圖片裡的那些孩子也是這樣。他們並沒做什麼不同尋常的事兒。他們只是最大程度的讓自己的身體發揮功能。那麼通過傳播這些圖片來物化他們真的公平嗎? 當人們說：”你真勵志，”他們以為這是一種讚美。我知道大家為什麼這麼做。是因為我們一直以來都被灌輸一種錯誤的思想：殘缺可以讓你變得出色。其實不是。

And I know what you're thinking. You know, I'm up here bagging out inspiration, and you're thinking, "Jeez, Stella, aren't you inspired sometimes by some things?" And the thing is, I am. I learn from other disabled people all the time. I'm learning not that I am luckier than them, though. I am learning that it's a genius idea to use a pair of barbecue tongs to pick up things that you dropped. (Laughter) I'm learning that nifty trick where you can charge your mobile phone battery from your chair battery. Genius. We are learning from each others' strength and endurance, not against our bodies and our diagnoses, but against a world that exceptionalizes and objectifies us.

我知道你們在想什麼。我在講臺上否認這種激勵作用，你們就會想：“天吶，史黛拉，難道你就不會受其他事物的激勵嗎?” 事實是，我會。我無時無刻不在從其他殘障人士身上學習。不過我學習，並不是我比他們幸運多少。我學到的是，用燒烤棍把你掉的東西撿起來是個相當不錯的主意。(觀眾笑聲)我覺得用電動輪椅的電池給手機充電也是個絕妙的點子。太有才了!我們互相學習彼此的堅強和隱忍，不是對抗身體缺陷和疾病的堅強，而是對抗整個社會區別對待我們，物化我們的這種風氣。

I really think that this lie that we've been sold about disability is the greatest injustice. It makes life hard for us. And that quote, "The only disability in life is a bad attitude," the reason that that's bullshit is because it's just not true, because of the social model of disability. No amount of smiling at a flight of stairs has ever made it turn into a ramp. Never. (Laughter) (Applause) Smiling at a television screen isn't going to make closed captions appear for people who are deaf. No amount of standing in the middle of a bookshop and radiating a positive attitude is going to turn all those books into braille. It's just not going to happen.

我真心認為這種針對我們殘障人士的謊言就是最大的不公。這讓我們的生活變得很困難。 還有那句名言：”生活中唯一的殘疾，就是消極的態度“， 這簡直就是胡說八道，因為事實根本不是這樣，這只是社會認同的殘疾。笑的再多也不會讓你費力攀爬的樓梯變成可以通過輪椅的斜坡。永遠都不會。(觀眾笑聲)(掌聲)對著電視機螢幕笑，也不能讓聾啞人聽懂沒有字幕的節目。在書店裡呆的再久，釋放再積極的正能量，也不能把這些書變成盲文。這都是不可能的事情。

I really want to live in a world where disability is not the exception, but the norm. I want to live in a world where a 15-year-old girl sitting in her bedroom watching "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" isn't referred to as achieving anything because she's doing it sitting down. I want to live in a world where we don't have such low expectations of disabled people that we are congratulated for getting out of bed and remembering our own names in the morning. I want to live in a world where we value genuine achievement for disabled people, and I want to live in a world where a kid in year 11 in a Melbourne high school is not one bit surprised that his new teacher is a wheelchair user. Disability doesn't make you exceptional, but questioning what you think you know about it does. Thank you.

我真心期待能活在這樣一個世界裡，殘疾不再是當成一種特殊，僅僅是普通現象。一個坐在臥室裡 看”吸血鬼獵人巴菲” 的15歲女孩，不會因為她能正常坐著就被提名什麼成就獎。在我期望的社會裡，人們不放低他們對殘障人士的期待，不會因為他們早上能正常起床，記得自己的名字就對他們大加讚賞。我期待的社會，人們會認可殘障人士 真正的成就，我期待的社會裡，一個墨爾本高中11歲的孩子不會因為他的新老師需要輪椅代步而感到吃驚。殘障不會讓你變得出色，但質疑你原本自以為了解的事物，可以讓你進步。謝謝。