巴菲特就可以取笑女性嗎？

When Warren Buffett was interviewed on CNBC last week about Unilever’s rejection of a bid from Kraft, he told a funny story. Or rather, he told a story he thought funny. He looked at the young woman doing the interview and asked if she knew the difference between a diplomat and a lady. No, Becky Quick replied.

不久前，聯(lián)合利華(Unilever)拒絕了卡夫(Kraft)的收購要約，沃倫•巴菲特(Warren Buffett)就此接受了美國財經(jīng)新聞頻道CNBC的采訪，其間巴菲特先生講了一個有趣的故事?；蛘哒f，是一個他覺得有趣的故事。他看著采訪他的年輕女士，問她知不知道一名外交官和一位女士的區(qū)別。不知道，貝基•奎克(Becky Quick)回答。

Eyes twinkling with amusement, Mr Buffett proceeded to tell her that if a diplomat says maybe, he means no. But “if a lady says no, she means maybe. And if she says maybe, she means yes. And if she says yes” — at this point Mr Buffett’s eyes disappeared into his grinning face — “she’s no lady!”

巴菲特先生高興得兩眼放光，他接著告訴對方，如果一個外交官說“也許”，那他的意思其實(shí)是“不”。但“如果一位女士說‘不’，那她的意思則是‘也許’。而如果她說‘也許’，那她其實(shí)是想說‘是’。如果她說‘是’”——說到這兒，巴菲特先生的眼睛笑成了一條縫——“那她就不是女人!”

The camera angle broadened to take in the face of the interviewer, who was staring at him in horror with her mouth locked into a smile. The joke was not funny. Even in the universe of unfunny sexist jokes this one was particularly crass.

這時鏡頭里也出現(xiàn)了采訪者的臉，她驚愕地盯著巴菲特先生，笑容僵在臉上。這個笑話并不好笑。即使在無聊的性別歧視笑話大全中，它也尤為拙劣。

Yet Mr Buffett got away with it. Most newspapers (including this one) did not see fit to mention his ill-advised pleasantry. Fortune magazine merely referred to the “strange analogy” that he had used to explain the response of Unilever to the bid. On Twitter, the global breeding ground for easy moral outrage, very few people seemed to care that the man who runs one of the largest and most respected companies in the world had just told a joke that could be construed as making light of rape. A couple of people tweeted that Warren Buffett was a chauvinist pig, but that was about it.

然而巴菲特先生卻并未因此受到指摘。多數(shù)媒體(包括本報)都認(rèn)為對他這個欠考慮的玩笑不宜再提?！敦敻弧?Fortune)雜志僅僅提到這是個“奇怪的比喻”，巴菲特只是想借此解釋聯(lián)合利華對收購的反應(yīng)。在Twitter上，全世界的人都能輕易地做出道德審判，但卻很少有人關(guān)注巴菲特先生不久前講的這個無異于不把強(qiáng)暴當(dāng)回事的笑話，而講這個笑話的人卻掌管著全世界最大、最令人尊崇的一家公司。倒是有幾個人在Twitter上說沃倫•巴菲特是大男子主義，但也僅此而已。

Five years ago Sebastián Piñera, then president of Chile, made the same unfunny joke — only then all hell broke loose. The story was picked up by the BBC. Politicians queued up to denounce him, calling the joke “sexist and prehistoric”. One of them said Mr Piñera had brought shame on the nation and put back the cause of women by two decades.

5年前，智利總統(tǒng)塞巴斯蒂安•皮涅拉(Sebastián Piñera)，也說過同樣無聊的笑話——那時候引起了軒然大波。BBC報道了這件事。政客們也競相譴責(zé)他，說他的笑話“既帶有性別歧視又泥古不化”。其中一位說皮涅拉先生使他們國家蒙羞還讓婦女事業(yè)倒退了20年。

Lesser transgressions have landed people in an even bigger pickle. When Sir Tim Hunt, the Nobel Prize-winning scientist, said the trouble with having girls in labs was that you fell in love with them and they cried when criticised, he was made to resign. As was Kevin Roberts of Saatchi& Saatchi when he said there was no longer a problem with gender diversity in advertising. So why was Mr Buffett allowed to get away with it?

有的人在言語上的過失還沒有這么嚴(yán)重，但卻由此身陷更棘手的窘境。獲得過諾貝爾獎的科學(xué)家蒂姆•亨特爵士(Sir Tim Hunt)曾說過，和女孩們共處實(shí)驗(yàn)室的麻煩就是你會愛上她們，以及她們受到批評時會哭哭啼啼，蒂姆•亨特因此被迫辭職。盛世長城(Saatchi & Saatchi)的凱文•羅伯茨(Kevin Roberts)也有同樣的遭遇，羅伯茨曾說，在廣告業(yè)中性別多樣性已不再是問題。所以為什么巴菲特先生可以安然無事?

It could be that the bar for unacceptable tastelessness in the US has just got a lot higher. By comparison with what other prominent old men have been saying recently, Mr Buffett’s joke looks tame. Set against Donald Trump’s assertion that “If Ivanka weren’t my daughter, perhaps I’d be dating her”, it hardly seems creepy at all.

或許，在美國，人們?nèi)缃駥τ诖炙椎难哉?，在接受程度上比以往高了許多。和另一些聲名顯赫的年長男士近來說的某些言論相比，巴菲特先生的笑話還算溫和。比起唐納德•特朗普(Donald Trump)所說的“如果伊萬卡(Ivanka)不是我女兒，也許我會和她約會”，巴菲特先生的玩笑看來一點(diǎn)兒也不值得大驚小怪。

Or it could be that we forgive the Sage of Omaha because he is 86. He grew up in a different time when sexism had not yet been invented. No doubt the young Buffett and his friends often innocently joked with one another that a “lady’s” no meant maybe — without anyone seeing any harm in it.

又或許，我們之所以不跟這位“奧馬哈圣人”(Sage of Omaha)計較是因?yàn)樗呀?jīng)86歲高齡了。他成長的年代和現(xiàn)在完全不同，那時還沒有性別歧視之說。年輕的巴菲特肯定經(jīng)常若無其事地和朋友們互相開著這樣的玩笑，一位“女士口中”的“不”其實(shí)是“也許”的意思——誰也沒覺得這當(dāng)中含有冒犯之意。

Yet this excuse will not do. Age is only a defence for oldies in their dotage. When your ancient uncle from the comfort of his Bath chair says something sexist or racist it is perfectly reasonable to let it go, on the grounds that he is out of the swing of it, that little is to be gained from correcting him, and often much to be lost from making him upset.

然而，這個借口爛極了。歲數(shù)只是老糊涂們的托辭。當(dāng)你年老的叔叔，舒舒服服地坐在帶篷的輪椅上，說了什么帶有性別歧視或種族歧視的話時，你大可以不理他，因?yàn)樗呀?jīng)和現(xiàn)實(shí)脫節(jié)了，糾正他不會有什么效果，而且把他惹毛了常常會得不償失。

But it is not like that with Mr Buffett. He is a public figure whose folksy language is often held up as an example. He controls an unconscionable amount of money — his Berkshire Hathaway fund is worth about $450bn. If he is out of touch with modern ways it matters very much indeed. Either he should get in touch, or he should retire.

但巴菲特先生不同。他是公眾人物，他那些接地氣的言論經(jīng)常被奉為榜樣。他掌管著巨額的資金——由他創(chuàng)立的伯克希爾•哈撒韋(Berkshire Hathaway)基金市值約有4500億美元。如果他與現(xiàn)代觀念隔絕，肯定會有很大的影響。他要么緊跟時代，要么退休。

But I suspect the true reason we forgive Mr Buffett is the most inexcusable of all. It is simply because he is Warren Buffett. I can think of no business leader who has been so worshipped for quite so long, ever, anywhere, with the possible exception of Joseph Rowntree and George Cadbury, both of whom went on being adored into their 80s.

然而我覺得，人們原諒巴菲特先生的真正原因其實(shí)才是最不可寬恕的一點(diǎn)。只是因?yàn)樗俏謧?bull;巴菲特。我想不出，何時何地，有哪位商業(yè)領(lǐng)袖被人們這般崇拜了如此之久，也許約瑟夫•朗特里(Joseph Rowntree)和喬治•卡德伯里(George Cadbury)是例外，他們兩位到80多歲依然深受愛戴。

People feel they need Mr Buffett, now more than ever. We are all so invested in his cuddly, homespun persona, and so revere his judgment that when he starts making hideous sexist jokes, there is only one thing for it. To pretend we have not heard.

人們覺得他們需要巴菲特先生，特別是現(xiàn)在。他可愛、樸素的形象在我們的腦海中根深蒂固，并且我們敬畏他的判斷，所以當(dāng)他說起低俗的、帶有性別歧視意味的笑話時，我們只有一個選擇。裝作沒聽見。