悉尼的人质悲剧如何改变了澳大利亚
【中文标题】悉尼的人质悲剧如何改变了澳大利亚【原文标题】How Sydney hostage tragedy changes Australia【原文作者】Max Barry【原文链接】http://edition.cnn.com/2014/12/16/opinion/barry-sydney-australia-change/index.html?hpt=hp_c2【更新时间】December 17, 2014 -- Updated 0639 GMT (1439 HKT)【正文】Editor's note: Max Barry is an Australianwriter and the author of five novels, including the political satire"Jennifer Government" and the international thriller"Lexicon." He blogs at maxbarry.com. The views expressed are his own.编者按：Max Barry是一位澳大利亚作家，写了五部小说，包括讽刺政治的”Jennifer Government” 和国际惊悚片 ”Lincoln” 。他在maxbarry.com上有博客。以下所述均为他的观点。(CNN) -- On September 11, 2001,the city of Melbourne, Australia evacuated its World Trade Center.(CNN)—在2001年9月11日，澳大利亚墨尔本撤离在世贸中心的本部。
This is a modest building on the banks ofthe Yarra River, a short distance from the city's central business district, alittle over 10,000 miles from New York. It used to have a casino. Before that,it briefly hosted an exhibition of waxworks from Madam Tussaud's.如果一个位于耶拿河畔的一栋端庄的建筑，距离城市的中心区只有很短的一段距离，从纽约到这里也只有1万英里左右的路程。这里曾经有一个赌场。在此之前，它曾举办过Tussaud夫人的蜡像展览。
Indeed, Australia is, simply, a long wayfrom everywhere. A flight to Sydney takes 15 hours from Los Angeles, 21 hoursfrom London, 14 hours from Johannesburg, and 10 hours from Tokyo. There is nostopping off in Australia on the way to somewhere else, unless you're headed toAntarctica. This isolation is at the heart of Australia's identity: It is thereason the country has an aboriginal population that existed undisturbed for40,000 years, and some of the world's strangest and most inimitable flora andfauna.事实上，简单地来说，无论从世界的哪一个角度看，去澳大利亚都是很远的。从洛杉矶飞往悉尼需要15个小时，从伦敦飞往悉尼需要21个小时，从约翰内斯堡飞往悉尼需要14个小时，从东京飞往悉尼需要10个小时。在澳大利亚去其他地方都没有中途的停留，除非你前往南极洲。这种隔离是澳大利亚身份的核心：这就是这个国家不被打扰地生活着4万年的土著人口和一些世界上最奇怪以及最独特的动植物的原因。
It is why the country was chosen to be apenal colony by the British in 1788. It is a place you go to be removed fromthe world.这就是为什么这个国家在1788年被选为英国的一个罪犯流放地。澳大利亚是一个你远离世界的地方。
And yet on Monday, the world's eyes focusedon Sydney, as a man with a gun took hostages in what he claimed was an attackon Australia by the Islamic State. A self-described cleric with a history ofantagonism toward Australian military involvement in Afghanistan, reportssuggest he was probably a dangerously deluded loner rather than a member of anorganized terrorist group. But by the time the siege ended, two hostages were stilldead.然而，周一，全世界的目光都聚焦在了悉尼，原因是因为一名伊斯兰人用枪挟持人质，声称此次挟持是一次针对澳大利亚的攻击。一名自称教士的人士称其在阿富汗的时候与澳大利亚的军事介入对抗了很久，报道表明他很可能是一名危险的受蒙骗的不合群之人，而不是一名有组织的恐怖组织的成员。但是，当包围结束之后，两个人质还是死了。
This wasn't Australia's first brush withterrorism. As I said, on 9/11, terrorists were attacking World Trade Centers,so Melbourne evacuated hers. And this didn't seem silly at the time -- that daymade all horrors plausible. 这并不是澳大利亚经历的第一次恐怖主义。就像我所说的，在9·11事件中，恐怖分子袭击世贸中心，所以墨尔本才撤离的。当时这似乎不是一个愚蠢的做法——那一天使所有的恐惧貌似都是真实的。
So for a while, Australia forgot it wasn't part of the world."We are all Americans," Australians said on 9/11 -- September 12,actually, on antipodean time, since Australia is so far away, it is usually adifferent day altogether. And we meant it: We were deeply shocked to seeacts of foreign terrorism, always previously associated with unfamiliar peoplein unfamiliar places, happening somewhere "Over There," becomesuddenly intimate and recognizable.因此，澳大利亚忘记了这种恐怖主义并不是世界的一部分。“我们都是美国人，”澳大利亚在9月11日——12日这样说，实际上，在恰巧相反的时间里，正因为澳大利亚是如此的遥远，所以通常是完全不同的日子。我们的意思是：当我们看到外国恐怖主义的行为时我们十分震惊，以前我们总是在陌生的地方与陌生的人交往，“在那里”的某个地方，这些人和地方突然变得亲切以及容易辨认起来。
Over time, however, as the War on Terrorbecame the War on Iraq, and the American flags waved on TV, it became clearthat although 9/11 affected the Western world, it was an American story.Australia, as usual, was watching from afar. We sent troops to Afghanistan andto Iraq, maintaining solidarity with our American cousins, but ultimately, wesaw that the U.S. was "Over There," too.然而，随着时间的推移，随着反恐战争变成了伊拉克战争，美国国旗在电视上挥舞着，很明显地，尽管9·11事件影响了西方世界，但是这是一个美国的故事。澳大利亚，像往常一样，在远处看着这些新闻。我们派部队从阿富汗到伊拉克，维护美国表亲们的团结，但最终，我们看到美国也是依旧地“在那里”。
In 2002, 88 Australians were killed by aradical Islamist group bombing on the Indonesian island of Bali, a popularholiday destination. Bali is a mere 6 hours from Sydney, and only 2½ fromDarwin, the closest Australian city. It was a traumatic event, but again, itwasn't quite here.More recently, there were police terrorsweeps in Australian cities.Thefederal government warned us that groups had developed with the motivation andability to carry out local attacks.2002年，88名澳大利亚人被激进的伊斯兰组织在受欢迎的度假胜地印尼巴厘岛上用炸弹引爆。悉尼距离巴厘岛只有6个小时的路程，仅仅是从Darwin，一个最近的去悉尼的澳大利亚城市到悉尼的2½的路程。这个一个使人受创伤的事件，但是再一次地，澳大利亚不再安静。最近，警方在澳大利亚城市开展横扫恐怖主义活动。联邦政府警告我们，这个恐怖组织已经被动机和能力所激发，来实施此次地方袭击。
You live a charmed life in Australia. Thestreets are safe, the weather is terrific, the people are friendly. The oceankeeps everything out. Or, at least, slows it down.你在澳大利亚过着安逸的生活。街道是安全的，天气是极好的，人民是友好的。海洋把所有东西都隔开了，或者说，至少把所有事情都减缓了下来。
We complain when a car costs $30,000 or aTV show won't hit our screens right away, but it's the distance that hasallowed Australia to stay Australia in the face of relentless globalization. It's given us more than a decade inwhich to rethink our ideas on society and our way of life, and the trade-offsbetween freedom and security we're willing to make, without having to do so inthe immediate aftermath of a national tragedy.我们抱怨当汽车售价3万美元或者电视节目没有立刻出现在电视屏幕上，但是就是这个距离允许澳大利亚面对无情的全球化。它给了我们十多年的时间，让我们重新思考对于社会以及我们生活方式的想法，以及自由与安全之间的权衡，如果不这样做的话，直接结果就是一个国家的悲剧。
If this hostage taker in Sydney had claimedto be acting for some other cause -- disgruntlement at the tax code, or thehigh price of cars -- we wouldn't call it terrorism. We would call it what itis: a lunatic with a gun. But that would overlook the deeper trend, which isthat Australia's oceans are shrinking. Today technology allows a man to be moreconnected to militant extremists across the globe -- in spirit. He can find andlatch onto toxic ideas from the other side of the globe and bring them intoSydney.如果这个在悉尼挟持人质的歹徒自称是由于其他原因才做出此次行动的，是因为对税法的不满，或者是汽车的高价格致使他们这样做的话，那么我们就不会称之为恐怖主义。我们将称其为它本身：一个疯子拿着枪。但是那样将会忽略了更深层次的趋势，那就是澳大利亚的海洋正在萎缩。今天的技术允许一个男人在精神上与世界上激进的极端分子更加紧密地联系起来。他可以从世界的另一端找到并且领会罪恶的想法，并把他们带到悉尼去。
Whether we call it a siege or terrorism, itwas something that used to happen Over There. And now it's here. It wasn'tunexpected, and arrived more benignly than it could have, and today the countrywill get on with business as usual. But life is becoming a little less charmed.We are no longer so far away.无论我们称之为围攻或是恐怖主义，这是过去“在那里”发生的事情了。现在，这种事情发生在这里。这不是意外，并且比它本身还要更加亲切地到达悉尼，今天的国家将继续运行下去。但是生活不再是那么迷人了，因为我们彼此不再遥远。（A）
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