热搜：一个笑话

一个名叫Mia Brown的人在Quora发贴如下，讨论”西式民主“。原文引用如下：

Why do some mainland Chinese see the Western democratic system as a joke these days?

为什么现在一些中国大陆人把西方的民主制度看作是一个笑话？

Speaking of jokes, I have actually read a joke about the true meaning of western democracy: before dying, an American farmer asked his son, "The pigs complain about poor feed, the cows complain about too much work, and the chickens complain that the house is too dirty. What should you do? The son said: "feed the pigs good fodder, cattle do light work, clean the henhouse." The farmer shook his head and said, Don't do anything. Give them a vote and let them choose you or your wife rule them, and let them think they're the ones who call the shots in this house."

说到笑话，其实我看到过一个关于西方民主真正含义的笑话：一个美国农民临死前问他的儿子：“猪总抱怨饲料不好，牛抱怨工作太多，鸡抱怨鸡舍太脏。你应该怎么做？”儿子说：“给猪喂好饲料，牛干些轻活，同时打扫鸡舍。" 农夫摇摇头说：“什么都别做，让他们投票，让它们选择你或你的妻子来统治它们，让它们认为自己才是家里的主宰。”

In the eyes of American political elites, the separation of powers among executive, legislative and judicial powers is the panacea of "American democracy" -- it can not only effectively solve the problem of election legitimacy, achieve a smooth transition of power, but also avoid the fierce conflicts and civil wars caused by power struggle, so as to achieve long-term peace and stability. Not only that, but through tenure and checks and balances, major decision-making mistakes can be prevented. Yet, time and again, the harsh reality has shown us that the separation of powers is fraught with calculation, fraud and violence, manifested in racial divisions, political divisions and social rifts. From disastrous decisions like the Vietnam and Iraq wars to the botched response to the COVID-19 epidemic; From the Black Lives Matter anti-discrimination protests sweeping the country to the electoral "house of cards" of partisanship, scandal and black-box politics, American democracy seems to be on the verge of collapse.

在美国政治精英的眼中，行政、立法、司法三权分立是 “美式民主”的灵丹妙药——它不仅能有效解决选举合法性问题，实现权力的平稳过渡，还能避免因权力斗争而引发的激烈冲突和内战，从而实现长治久安。不仅如此，通过任期制和制衡，还可以防止重大决策失误。然而，残酷的现实一次又一次地告诉我们，分权制衡充满了算计、欺诈和暴力，表现为种族分裂、政治分裂和社会裂痕。从越南战争和伊拉克战争这样的灾难性决定，到对COVID-19疫情的拙劣反应；从席卷全国的 "黑命贵 "反歧视抗议活动，到党派之争、丑闻和黑箱政治选举的“纸牌屋”，美国民主似乎正处于崩溃的边缘。

I'm not saying that American democracy is a bad thing, but that its attempts to assert itself as a beacon of democracy and to gloss over its flaws are laughable. This is especially true for mainland Chinese, many of whom once worshipped American democracy but now see it for what it really is and believe that their own system is the best.

我并不是说美国的民主不好，而是说它试图掩盖其缺陷，宣称自己是民主的灯塔的可笑做法。这对中国大陆来说尤其如此，他们中的许多人曾经崇拜美国民主，但现在看到了它的真实面目，开始相信他们自己的制度是最好的。

以下为部分跟帖讨论：

Mr. Hide the Pain Harold

USA has no democracy but corporate republic two party system with rule of law . It once had but for a brief moment but ended long time ago.

美国没有民主，只是一个实行法制的企业共和两党制。它曾有过短暂的高辉煌时刻，但很久前就已结束。

Chris Todd

US and China is like PC vs Mac. With Windows PC you have complete freedom to do whatever you want. Install junks, malware, it’s all up to you. End result? End user get choices, but most user’s Windows becomes junk after a few years of use, full of security holes. Apple Mac tries to control everything, no you’re not allowed to download programs we don’t allow you to. For your own safety. Some people might label that as “authoritarian”End result? You get a better user experience overall 🙂 The same can be said for iOS vs Android.

美国和中国就像PC（个人电脑）对Mac（苹果电脑）。使用Windows系统的个人电脑，你可以完全自由地做你想做的事情。安装垃圾、恶意软件，一切都取决于你。最终的结果是什么？选择权在最终用户，但大多数用户的Windows在使用几年后就变成了垃圾，充满了安全漏洞。苹果Mac试则图控制一切，不允许你下载未经批准的程序，这是为了用户自身的安全。有些人可能会把这称为 “专制”。最终结果是什么？总体上用户有了更好的体验 🙂 这也可以说是iOS与安卓之间的区别。

Khengchat Ng

It is not only mainland Chinese who once worshiped US democracy. Those of us with minds formed in the 60s by Readers’ Digest also did so. Democracy has to be seen for what it is - a farcical pretense of Lincoln’s notion of a government for the people……etc. It never was, never is and never will be.

曾经崇拜过美式民主的不仅仅是中国大陆。我们这些因《读者文摘》成长起来的60后也是如此。我们必须看到民主的本质：民有，民治，民享——林肯关于政府的概念的滑稽伪装，......。美国过去、现在和将来都不会是一个民主国家。

Paul (Snoopie) Downey

It's not just the people of China; many, many people of my Nation of Canada, feel the very same.

不仅仅是中国人民；在我的国家加拿大，许多人也有同样的感受。

Victor Seng

It used to be a good thing. Face it the people whom came out with the US constitution were great minds. What they miss out is enthtophy and the human selfishness. For a system to stay efficient it have to change, evolves with time. Just like human life's and outlook changes as time goes by. For example, woman are treated as inferior compared to man in many fields. As time goes by, that changes.

美国曾经是一个不错的国家。面对现实，制定美国宪法的人很有头脑。但他们所忽略的是思想和人类的自私。一个系统要保持高效，必须随着时间的推移而改变和发展，如同人类的生活和观念随着时间的推移而改变。例如，在许多领域，女性被视为比男性低等。随着时间的推移，这种情况有所改变。

The US constitution did not changed or bother to keep up with time. Thus it allowed human selfishness to step in and corrode it. The modern day US democracy is just a product of human selfishness. Look at the result of what Trump have did during his 4 years term, especially when his losing his second term. The problem cannot be fix as they do not even want to admit there is a fault. The first step on solving any problems is to admit there is a problem.

美国的宪法没有改变，也不屑于与时俱进。因此，人类的自私自利开始介入、腐蚀。现代的美式民主只是人类自私的产物。看看特朗普4年任期内的所作所为，尤其是在他失去第二任期时。这个问题无法解决，因为他们甚至不想承认他们有错。解决任何问题的第一步是承认问题。

Romeel Davé

Lots of bad things happen under democracy in the US, but at least every few years we get a chance to change things… and often do. People in China do not get such a chance.

在美国的民主制度下，会发生许多不好的事情，但至少每隔几年，我们就有机会改变现状......而且情况往往如此。在中国，人们没有这样的机会。

Montcliffe Ekuban

Lol you get to “change things” just like the pigs and chickens in the anecdote above naively think they can change things by voting for the farmer’s son or his wife lmao. US democracy doesn’t change anything except for the faces and names of the elected representatives. The policies and living standards remain the same just like the living conditions of the cattle, pigs and chickens will remain the same regardless of whether they vote for the farmer’s son or the farmer’s son’s wife.

笑话，你可以 “改变现状”，就像上面故事中的猪和鸡天真地认为它们可以通过投票给农夫的儿子或妻子一样，真是笑死人了。除了当选代表的面孔和名字，美国的民主并没有改变什么。政策和生活标准也一成不变，就像牛、猪和鸡的生活条件维持原状一样，不管他们的标投给了谁。

John Wong

Well, In china we don’t think change of a regime or government figures a real change. When my life quality is improved we call it a change.

在中国，我们认为政权或政府的改变并非是真正的改变。当我的生活质量得到改善时，才是真正的改变。

选择有代表性的讨论时，刻意挑选了那些非中国人的发言（从网友名字猜测），尽量代表大多数的想法（最后一贴例外，明显是中国人，正好借此表达自己的观点）。看来，西式民主，尤其是美工民主有点日落西山，人人喝打的局面。