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The country in which I live has lawsforbidding discrimination on the grounds of ethnicity, religion, sexuality orsex. We've come a long way since the days when the reverse was true – whenhomosexuality was illegal, for instance, or when women were barred from voting.But this doesn't mean that prejudice is over, of course. Nowadays we need to beas concerned about subtler strains of prejudice as the kind of loud-mouthedracism and sexism that makes us ashamed of the past.
在我所居住的国家中，法律明令禁止基于种族、宗教、性取向或性别的歧视行为。而跨越历史的长河，回望那些久远的时代，情况却正好相反：当时的法律禁止同性恋行为，禁止妇女投票，凡此种种，不一而足。但毫无疑问，回到今天来看，法律的保障并不意味着歧视就此终结消失。曾经，种族主义和男性至上主义甚嚣尘上，为我们留下了一段羞愧难当的过往；现在，我们不仅要重视这种招摇猖獗的歧视，也同样要警惕那些更加不易察觉的偏见。
Subtle prejudice is the domain ofunjustified assumptions, dog-whistles, and plain failure to make the effort toinclude people who are different from ourselves, or who don't fit ourexpectations. One word for the expressions of subtle prejudice is ‘microaggressions’. These arethings such as repeating a thoughtless stereotype, or too readily dismissingsomeone’s viewpoint –actions that may seem unworthy of comment, but can neverthelessmarginalise an individual.
在细微到几乎难以察觉的歧视中，充斥着毫无根据的臆断、双关语式的隐晦表达以及对异己者或不合心意者不加区别地盲目排挤。我们可以用“microaggression”（微歧视）这个单词来统称这些细微的歧视行为。不假思索地重复陈规旧习是微歧视，过于轻描淡写地驳回别人的观点是微歧视，这些看似不值一提、却能令单个个体遭受排挤的行为都是微歧视。
The people perpetrating thesemicroaggressions may be completely unaware that they hold a prejudiced view.Psychologists distinguish between our explicit attitudes – which are thebeliefs and feelings we'll admit to – and our implicit attitudes – which areour beliefs and feelings which are revealed by our actions. So, for example,you might say that you are not a sexist, you might even say that you areanti-sexist, but if you interrupt women more than men in meetings you would bedisplaying a sexist implicit attitude –one which is verydifferent from that non-sexist explicit attitude you profess.
那些做出微歧视行为的人，可能全然没有意识到自身观点中带有歧视的成分。心理学家将人的态度分为外显式和内隐式两种：同样是信念与感受，但人们会对前者供认不讳，对后者行而不言。因此，举例来说，你可能口口声声地说自己没有大男子主义倾向，甚至还声称自己反对大男子主义；但是，如果在会谈中，你打断女性发言者的次数多于打断男性发言者的次数，那么你就在表现一种性别歧视的内隐式态度——这种态度与无性别歧视倾向这个你所自诩的外显式态度相去甚远。
‘Culture of victimhood’
“受害者文化”
The thing about subtle prejudice is that itis by definition subtle – lots of small differences in how people are treated,small asides, little jibes, ambiguous differences in how we treat one personcompared to another. This makes it hard to measure, and hard to address, and –for somepeople –hard to take seriously.
顾名思义，微歧视的特别之处在于它细微到几乎难以察觉：它存在于轻声细语的悄悄话中，存在于小小的嘲弄中；不同的人所获得的待遇有诸多细枝末节的差别，这算是微歧视；对于不同的人，我们的对待方式有着含糊不清的区别，这也算微歧视。由此而来，微歧视难以衡量，而且难以解决，进而难以引起某些人的重视。
This is the skeptical line of thought: whenpeople complain about being treated differently in small ways they are beingoverly sensitive, trying to lay claim to a culture of victimhood. Smalldifferences are just that – small. They don't have large influences on lifeoutcomes and aren't where we should focus our attention.
我们经常会碰到这样一种怀疑论的观点：如果有人抱怨自己在细枝末节之处受到区别对待，那他们必定是心理过于敏感脆弱，并且试图要营造一种对自身有利的受害者氛围。毕竟，细节的差别只不过是琐碎而微不足道的，不会对人生境遇产生重大的影响，并且我们也不应该在这上面浪费大部分的注意力。
Now you will have your own intuitions aboutthat view, but my interest is in how you could test the idea that a thousandsmall cuts do add up. A classic experiment on the way race affects ourinteractions shows not only the myriad ways in which race can affect how wetreat people, but shows in a clever way that even the most privileged of uswould suffer if we were all subjected to subtle discrimination.
此刻，你应该对这种观点有了自己的直觉判断。而我感兴趣的是，大量微歧视的累加会对你产生什么样的影响。对此，有一项经典的实验，就种族如何影响人际互动这一问题展开研究。这个实验不仅指出种族问题会在各种不同的方面影响我们的待人方式，而且还以一种聪明巧妙的方式证明，假如我们全都遭受微歧视，即便是那些最有特权的人，也会备受折磨。
