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Death penalty in America is defined by error.
死刑在美国是常有差错的。
For every nine people who have been executed, we've actually identified one innocent person who's been exonerated and released from death row.
每九个被判死刑的人，有一个后来会被证明无罪被免死刑。
A kind of astonishing error rate -- one out of nine people innocent. I mean, it's fascinating.
这种错误率，九分之一的人完全无辜。我得说，非常震撼。
In aviation, we would never let people fly on airplanes if for every nine planes that took off one would crash.
学航空的人知道，如果每九架飞机里会有一架出事故，我们肯定是不会让这玩意儿载人飞的。
But somehow we can insulate ourselves from this problem.
但是莫名其妙地我们就能忽视死刑的问题。
It's not our problem. It's not our burden. It's not our struggle.
因为这不是我们自身的问题。这不是我们自身的麻烦。这不是我们自身的挣扎。
I talk a lot about these issues. I talk about race and this question of whether we deserve to kill.
我谈了很多问题。种族，还有我们配不配执行死刑。
And it's interesting, when I teach my students about African-American history, I tell them about slavery.
这很发人深省，当我教美国黑人历史的时候，我和学生讲奴隶制。
I tell them about terrorism, the era that began at the end of reconstruction that went on to World War II.
和他们讲恐怖主义，那个始于大复兴晚期，一直到二战时期的时代。
We don't really know very much about it. But for African-Americans in this country, that was an era defined by terror.
我们并不真的了解那段历史。但是对于这个国家的黑人来说，那是个白色恐怖时代。
In many communities, people had to worry about being lynched. They had to worry about being bombed.
在很多社区，人们害怕随时会被私刑处死。人们担心随时会被炸弹袭击。
It was the threat of terror that shaped their lives.
那个白色恐怖时代，改变了他们的生活。
And these older people come up to me now and they say, "Mr. Stevenson, you give talks, you make speeches,
那时的人现在上了年纪，来和我说，“史蒂文森先生，你到处演讲，
you tell people to stop saying we're dealing with terrorism for the first time in our nation's history after 9/11."
你得告诉大家，别说什么911以后是我们美国有史以来第一次对付恐怖主义。”
They tell me to say, "No, tell them that we grew up with that."
他们让我说：“我们就是在恐怖里长大的。”
And that era of terrorism, of course, was followed by segregation and decades of racial subordination and apartheid.
那个恐怖主义的时代，当然了，最后演变成了无法逾越的鸿沟，数十年的种族歧视和种族隔离。
