性,謊言和代溝

Students at Oxford university traditionally have tutorials in their tutors’ “rooms”. Sometimes that just means an office but often he (the tutor is usually a he) hangs out a lot there. In short, the teaching space is also a private space. Add on the power imbalance between tutor and student, and Oxford in my student days (1988-1992) might have been designed for sexual harassment.

牛津大學(Oxford university)的學生們以往都在導師“房間”裏接受輔導。有時房間就是一間辦公室，但導師（一般是男性）往往很多時間都在那裏呆着。總之，教學場所也是一種私密空間。另外，導師和學生之間的權力並不對等，而且我念書的時候（1988年—1992年），牛津也許就是爲性騷擾設計的。

Students swapped harassment stories. There was the tutor who emerged from his shower wearing only a towel to greet a female tutee. Another tutor, who often discussed his interest in young men, once (probably when fogged by his sherry) groped a female student’s knee. When someone overdid it at one Oxford college, he was usually quietly shunted to another. Written rules about sex would have been considered humourless, even “American”.

學生們交談着性騷擾的傳聞。有個導師只裹着一條毛巾就從浴室出來見一位女生。另一個經常說自己喜歡年輕小夥子的導師，有一次（大概因爲喝了點雪利酒）摸了一名女生的膝蓋。如果某人在牛津某個學院做得太過份，通常會被悄悄地調到另一個學院。有關性的成文規定會被認爲太一本正經，甚至有點“美國”。

It was a different world. But most of us who inhabited it — and grew up thinking its codes were normal — are still around today. The sexual revolution of 2013-17 — gay marriage, transgender rights, and now the uprising against harassment — has been a wonderful thing. But I fear that many men and even some women of my age and older will spend the rest of their lives fighting the new codes.

那會兒的情況跟現在完全不同。但我們這些從那時候過來的人大多數都還活着——並且我們在成長過程中都對那時候的行爲規範習以爲常了。2013年至2017年的性革命——同性婚姻、跨性別人士權益以及當下輿論對性騷擾的激烈聲討——令人拍手稱快。但我擔心很多與我年齡相仿、或稍年長於我的男性，甚至部分女性，都將用餘生與各種新的行爲規範作鬥爭。

My generation reached adulthood with scarcely even a concept of sexual harassment. During my last year at university, Anita Hill made her accusations against her former boss Clarence Thomas, who had been nominated for the US Supreme Court. I watched the hearings on TV, and remember fellow students mocking her, but I struggled to understand exactly what she was alleging. She wasn’t accusing Thomas of physical attack, so what did “harassment” mean? My ignorance wasn’t unique. A contemporary tells me that at the time she was trying to help write her college’s first-ever legal code on harassment.

我們這代人直到成年時對性騷擾都沒有一點概念。我大學畢業的前一年，安妮塔?希爾(Anita Hill)對其前上司克拉倫斯?托馬斯(Clarence Thomas)提出指控，那時托馬斯已被提名爲美國最高法院的法官。我在電視上觀看了聽證會，我還記得我的同學們嘲笑希爾，但我努力想弄明白她到底在控訴什麼。她並沒有指控托馬斯對她實施了身體攻擊，那麼“騷擾”指的是什麼呢？無知的並不止我一個人。一位同齡朋友告訴我，當時她正試着協助他們學院撰寫第一部關於騷擾的法律規則。

Over the next two decades, western countries progressed a bit. Codes got written. A new moral rule emerged: relationships ought to be equal. That meant that homosexuality was OK, whereas unequal relationships — such as paedophilia and sexual harassment — were taboo. Slowly, people’s behaviour changed. Harassment probably declined, from a very bad base. In 2002, 6.5 per cent of American respondents to the University of Chicago’s General Social Survey said they had been sexually harassed on the job in the previous 12 months. The figure fell to 3.6 per cent by 2014.

接下來的20年，西方國家進步了一點點。有了一些相關的成文法規。新的道德規範出現了：人與人之間的關係應當平等。這意味着同性戀也沒有問題，而不平等關係——如戀童癖及性騷擾——則是禁忌。慢慢地，人們的行爲發生了改變。相較於以往極其惡劣的情形，騷擾或許減少了。2002年，在芝加哥大學(University of Chicago)所做的《綜合社會調查》(General Social Survey)中，6.5%的美國受訪者表示在過去12個月他們曾在工作中遭到性騷擾。到了2014年，這個數字下降爲3.6%。

Meanwhile, a group of new movements bubbled up in the US, most of all on campuses. From Black Lives Matter, through transgender activists, to It’s On Us (“to stop sexual assault”), they had different origins but shared a basic idea: our group has always been violated by others. In particular, the white patriarchy has hurt us, and stamped on our identity. Our duty is to speak out. In this battle, it’s sometimes OK to deny the other side free speech.

與此同時，美國出現了一系列新的維權運動，其中大多數發生在校園裏。從“黑人的命也是命”(Black Lives Matter)，跨性別活動者，到It’s On Us （“抵制性侵”），這些活動有着不同的緣起，但都基於一種理念：我們的羣體總受到別人的侵犯。特別是，白人父權制傷害了我們，踐踏了我們的身份。我們的責任就是大膽發聲。在這場戰鬥中，有時可以否認對方言論的自由。

When these groups spoke out against violation, they were often mocked. However, they have been startlingly influential. The moment that their worldview went mainstream was in September, when the Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein was exposed as a sexual predator. Women the world over began speaking out against violation. That has changed gender relations.

當這些羣體高聲反抗侵犯時，常常遭到人們的嘲笑。然而，他們的影響力卻不容小覷。他們的世界觀成爲主流是在今年9月，其時好萊塢製片人哈維?韋恩斯坦(Harvey Weinstein)被曝性騷擾。世界各地的女性開始公開反對侵犯。這改變了性別關係。

This will infuriate lots of people. In male-dominated societies, rules against sexual harassment won’t easily triumph. Rebecca Traister, who is writing a book on female anger around politics, says in a podcast: “I fully believe that a backlash to this moment of exposure, and this conversation, is imminent.”

這會激怒很多人。在男性主導的社會中，反對性騷擾的規則不會輕易取勝。麗貝卡?特雷斯特(Rebecca Traister)正在寫一本書，講的是女性對權術的憤怒。特雷斯特在播客上說：“我完全相信，此次曝光和這場談話很快就會遭到強烈反彈。”

Most people now in middle age and older learnt to live their intimate lives by the old standards: gays were bad, transsexuals absurd, women should be seen not heard, and harassment was never discussed. Men policed the public space, through practices like wolf-whistling, “slut-shaming” or plain assault. Sexual codes existed chiefly to regiment women.

目前，大多數中年人及年紀更大點的人都學會了墨守成規地過自己的小日子：同性戀不好，變性更是荒謬，婦女應當噤聲，騷擾不應該被討論。男人掌管着公共空間，他們慣用的手段有吹狼哨、“羞辱蕩婦”或直白地侵犯。性守則主要是用來嚴格管制女性的。

Now those generations are being told they lived wrong. The two harassing tutors I mentioned are dead. But there’s another man I recall who made so many moves on his female students that the college finally did something: he was barred from tutoring women one-to-one. That man is now an emeritus professor. He won’t want new sexual codes to regiment him. When a single accusation of harassment anywhere is shown to be false, or an attempt at blackmail, he’ll be crying foul.

如今這些人被告知他們的活法不對。我在上文提到的兩個騷擾女學生的導師都已不在人世。但我記得還有另一個男導師多次對其女學生動手動腳，學院最後不得不採取措施：他被禁止一對一指導女生。此人現在是位名譽教授。他不歡迎新的性規範來約束自己。每當哪有一起性騷擾指控被證明是誣告，或企圖敲詐，一準兒會激起他的強烈抗議。

Even some older women have shown little enthusiasm for new sexual codes. It’s notable that weeks after Donald Trump was caught boasting about sexual assault, he beat Hillary Clinton by a double-digit landslide among white women aged 45 and over. The US now has a generational divide unprecedented since the 1960s sexual revolution.

甚至一些上年紀的女性也對新的性規範沒多大熱情。值得注意的是，就在唐納德?特朗普(Donald Trump)鼓吹性侵犯的幾周後，他在45歲以上的白人女性選民中，以兩位數的絕對優勢擊敗了希拉里?克林頓(Hillary Clinton)。目前美國存在着一條自上世紀60年代性革命以來未曾見過的代溝。

Both sides agree rape is criminal but, beyond that, there’s no consensus. What about a pass at a colleague after work? Or complimenting someone’s looks? Or a surreptitious ogle? Every organisation will now write strict codes, but what happens if these butt up against stubborn everyday practices? The genders and generations will be fighting about this for years to come.

雙方都承認強姦是犯罪，但對於除此之外的行爲，卻沒有任何共識。下班後撩一下同事可以嗎？或者恭維一下別人的長相行嗎？又或者偷偷拋個媚眼呢？每個組織現在都要編寫嚴格的行爲準則，但如果這些準則與頑固的日常習俗相牴觸又會怎樣？未來許多年裏，兩性、各代人都將爲此鬥爭不已。