**Concept of Bisexual; Asexual; Heterosexual; Homosexual and Pansexual **
A tale of penguins and prejudice is a parable of modern America
When two male penguins hatched an egg in Central Park, they set off an enduring controversy
企鵝與偏見的故事是現代美國的寓言 當中央公園的兩隻雄性企鵝孵化了一顆蛋時，掀起了一場持久的爭議。
Once upon a time in America there lived a pair of penguins called Roy and Silo. They were just like the other penguin couples in their zoo, except that they were both boys. Together they sat on an egg until a chick popped out. Later two men wrote a story about them—igniting a controversy which, almost two decades later, is still blazing.
很久以前，在美國有一對叫做羅伊和希洛的企鵝。它們和動物園裡的其他企鵝夫婦一樣，唯一的不同是它們都是男孩。它們共同孵化一顆蛋，直到一隻小鳥破殼而出。後來，兩名男士為它們編寫了一個故事，引發了一場爭議，幾乎兩十年後仍在持續燃燒。
This is the story of that story, and it has many morals. It is a tale of parenting and devotion, and a fable of progress and the backlash it can provoke. It is a feathery parable of America’s divisions, in this case over freedom of speech and gay rights. An ongoing saga of politics and prejudice, in the beginning it was, first and foremost, a story about penguins.
這是那個故事的故事，而且它蘊含著許多寓意。這是一個關於父母和奉獻的故事，也是一個關於進步及其可能引發的反彈的寓言。這是一個羽毛般的美國分裂寓言，在這種情況下涉及言論自由和同性戀權利。這是一個關於政治和偏見的持續傳奇，在一開始，它首先是一個關於企鵝的故事。
Thronged with children, the penguin exhibit at Central Park Zoo in New York is an unlikely battleground in America’s culture wars. It is easy to see why the creatures are a hit. They wobble around their barren terrain like drunks trying to walk straight for a patrolman. Some engage in what seem to be lively conversations, flapping their wings for emphasis. (Others spend a lot of time staring at rocks.) Diving into their pool they become as lithe and dexterous as they are clumsy on land, rocketing out after their dips in gravity-defying bursts.
紐約中央公園動物園企鵝展覽彙聚著成群結隊的孩子，成為美國文化戰爭中不太可能的戰場。很容易理解為什麼這些生物如此受歡迎。它們在貧瘠的領地上搖搖晃晃，就像醉漢試圖直行一樣。一些進行似乎是生動的對話，揮動翅膀以強調。 （其他一些則花費很多時間盯著岩石看。）潛入水池後，它們變得像陸地上那樣笨拙的靈活和熟練，以違背重力的方式沖出水面。
Of the various species in the cold, smelly enclosure, the feistiest are the chinstrap penguins, so called because of the black markings below their beaks. For a novice they are hard to tell apart; but, says Rob Gramzay, who oversaw their care for 17 years, zookeepers come to know the penguins individually while hand-feeding them fish twice a day. Some are sweet, says Mr Gramzay, others “really ornery”. Between Silo and Roy, “Silo was definitely the one with more attitude.”
在這個寒冷而有臭味的圍場中，各種物種中最好鬥的是下喙企鵝，因為它們的嘴下有黑色斑紋而得名。對於新手來說，它們很難辨別；但是，負責它們護理17年的羅布·格拉姆澤說，動物園管理員在每天兩次餵食時會逐漸瞭解每只企鵝。格拉姆澤先生說，有些企鵝很溫順，而另一些“真的很刁鑽”。在希洛和羅伊之間，“希洛絕對是那個性格更強硬的。”
In 1998 Mr Gramzay noticed that these two males were spending most of their time together. They exhibited the same behaviours as male-female pairs, such as squawking at each other and showing off in courtship displays. When, a year later, Mr Gramzay saw Silo sitting on an egg-shaped rock in the nest the pair had built, he swapped in an egg made of plaster. In 2000 he gave them a real egg that two other chinstraps, Betty and Porkey, had discarded. His aim, he says, was purely to support the penguin colony, which had not raised many chicks.
1998年，格拉姆澤先生注意到這兩隻雄性企鵝大部分時間都在一起。它們表現出與雄雌配對相同的行為，例如相互嘎嘎叫和在求偶展示中炫耀。一年後，格拉姆澤先生看到希洛坐在它們建造的巢中一個形狀像鳥蛋的岩石上，他用石膏做的蛋替換了進去。2000年，他給它們一個兩隻其他下喙企鵝貝蒂和波爾基拋棄的真正的鳥蛋。他說，他的目的純粹是為了支援企鵝群體，因為它們沒有孵化出許多小企鵝。
Roy and Silo took turns incubating the egg for around 36 days. At the time Mr Gramzay was enjoying the tango music of Astor Piazzolla, an Argentine composer; when the egg hatched he called the new penguin Tango. She was “a very sturdy chick”, he recalls. He helped her learn to swim.
羅伊和希洛輪流孵化了大約36天的蛋。當時，格拉姆澤先生正在欣賞阿根廷作曲家阿斯托爾·皮亞左拉的探戈音樂；當蛋孵化出來時，他給新孵化的企鵝取名為探戈。他回憶說，她是“一個非常結實的小鳥”。他幫助她學會游泳。
That might have been that, had it not been for a double stroke of fate. In 2004 the New York Times ran an article about the penguins, headlined “Love That Dare Not Squeak Its Name”. And, in their kitchen in Greenwich Village, a particular human couple read it.
那本可能就這樣結束了，如果不是因為命運的雙重打擊。2004年，《紐約時報》發表了一篇關於企鵝的文章，標題是“不敢發出聲音的愛”。而在格林尼奇村的他們的廚房裡，一對特殊的人類夫婦讀到了這篇文章。
They were just the right pair to incubate the story. A psychiatrist and psychoanalyst who teaches at Columbia University, Justin Richardson had interests in sex education and gay and lesbian mental health. On a blind date almost a decade earlier he had met Peter Parnell, a playwright who worked on “The West Wing”. Lots of people, they knew, were squeamish about discussing homosexuality and gay parents with their children. Here was a tale of same-sex parenting from which everything that might cause discomfort—even the word “gay”—could be omitted. Two cute characters would overcome obstacles to reach their goal in a classic narrative arc. Unusually for the time, the children of same-sex couples would glimpse a version of their own experience.
他們正是適合醞釀這個故事的完美搭檔。賈斯汀·理查森是一位在哥倫比亞大學教授的精神科醫生和心理分析學家，對性教育和同性戀心理健康有濃厚興趣。差不多十年前的一次相親中，他遇到了彼得·帕內爾，一位在《西翼》工作的劇作家。他們知道，很多人對討論同性戀和同性戀父母與子女的話題感到尷尬。在這裡，是一個關於同性戀父母的故事，可以省略一切可能引起不適的元素，甚至包括“同性戀”這個詞。兩個可愛的角色將克服障礙，以經典的敘事弧線達到他們的目標。當時，同性戀夫婦的孩子們會在這個故事中窺見他們自己經歷的一種版本，這在當時是異常的。
They wrote fast. Mr Parnell quickly got out of his system a draft in which Roy and Silo loved Broadway musicals. Aided by a visit to the zoo, they stuck closely to the facts. “We got to hear them,” Dr Richardson says of the penguins, “and smell them.” An illustrator, Henry Cole, contributed dreamy yet realistic watercolours. Intended for four- to eight-year-olds, the book was published in 2005 as “And Tango Makes Three”.
他們寫得很快。帕內爾先生很快就完成了一份草稿，其中羅伊和希洛喜歡百老匯音樂劇。在參觀動物園的幫助下，他們緊密地圍繞事實展開。"我們有機會聽到它們，"理查森博士談到企鵝時說，"也能聞到它們的氣味。"插畫家亨利·科爾貢獻了夢幻而又逼真的水彩畫。這本書是為4到8歲的兒童出版的，於2005年以《探戈的誕生》為名出版。
It is a delight. “Every day”, it explains of Central Park Zoo, “families of all kinds go to visit the animals.” The animals have families too, mostly featuring male-female partnerships. Roy and Silo, however, were “a little bit different”. As in real life, Mr Gramzay gives them an egg, which they sit on until—“CRAAAACK!”—out comes Tango with “fuzzy white feathers and a funny black beak”.
這是一部令人愉悅的作品。它解釋說：“每天”，中央公園動物園都有“各種各樣的家庭來參觀動物。” 動物也有家庭，主要是由雄雌配對組成。然而，羅伊和希洛“有點不同”。就像在現實生活中一樣，格拉姆澤先生給了它們一個鳥蛋，它們孵化直到——“哢嚓！”——探戈出現，帶著“絨絨的白色羽毛和有趣的黑色喙”。
The story was well-received by reviewers and readers. “It’s a great feeling”, says Dr Richardson, “to hear a kid loves your book.” Then fate—or what you might call a penguin ex machina—intervened again.
這個故事得到了評論家和讀者的好評。“這感覺真好，”理查森博士說，“聽到一個孩子喜歡你的書。” 然後，命運——或者你可能稱之為企鵝的“神助攻”——再次介入。
Life imitates penguin
The authors expected objections to their fable of same-sex union; the first illustrator they approached had declined on religious grounds. But they could not have anticipated the way penguins came to be enlisted as political warriors. “The March of the Penguins”, a documentary about emperor penguins in Antarctica, was released later in 2005. Some conservatives saw those birds as exemplars of parental devotion and stable relationships. In response, some on the left invoked the non-traditional family in “And Tango Makes Three”.
生活仿佛在模仿企鵝 作者們預料到他們描繪同性聯姻的寓言會引起異議；他們最初聯繫的插畫家因宗教原因拒絕了。但他們無法預料企鵝會被捲入政治戰爭的方式。“企鵝的行軍”，一部關於南極皇帝企鵝的紀錄片，於2005年晚些時候上映。一些保守派視這些鳥類為父母的奉獻和穩定關係的典範。作為回應，一些左翼人士在《探戈的誕生》中引用了非傳統的家庭。
When, in 2006, two parents in Missouri complained about the book at a public library, it was reshelved in non-fiction. Stephen Colbert defended it satirically on “The Colbert Report” (“It’s all just another part of the homosexual flightless waterfowl agenda”). After that, the herring was in the penguin pool.
在2006年，密蘇里州的兩名家長在公共圖書館抱怨這本書後，它被重新分類到非小說類書籍。斯蒂芬·科爾伯特在他的節目《科爾伯特報告》中諷刺地為此辯護（“這只是同性戀不能飛的水禽議程的又一個部分”）。之後，鯡魚就成了企鵝池中的事。
The American Library Association (ala) tracks “challenges” to books in public and school libraries—ie, bids to have them removed or access to them restricted. By its count “And Tango Makes Three” was the most targeted book in America in 2006-08, and again in 2010. Complainants alleged that it is “anti-family” and “promotes the homosexual agenda”. Penguin skirmishes erupted overseas: Singapore’s authorities resolved to pulp library copies of the book until, amid an outcry, it was moved to the adult shelves instead.
美國圖書館協會（ALA）跟蹤公共圖書館和學校圖書館中對書籍提出的“挑戰”——即要求將它們撤下或限制對它們的訪問。根據它的統計，《探戈的誕生》在2006-08年和2010年再次成為美國被針對最多的圖書。投訴者聲稱這本書是“反家庭”和“宣傳同性戀議程”的。企鵝戰鬥也在海外爆發：新加坡當局決定銷毀圖書館中的這本書，直到在強烈抗議聲中，它被移至成人書架。
The attacks betray several misconceptions, the most elementary involving science. Same-sex attachments among penguins are not a pernicious invention but a fact of nature. Mr Gramzay saw other such pairs in Central Park; they have been sighted in captivity in Berlin, London and Sydney. As for animals in general, says Paul Vasey of the University of Lethbridge in Canada, incidents of same-sex courtship and bonding have to some extent “been observed in many, many species”. (Hardly any animals, cautions Dr Vasey, are exclusively homosexual. And since many creatures have nasty habits like infanticide, basing moral arguments on their behaviour is inadvisable.)
這些攻擊揭示了一些誤解，其中最基本的涉及科學。企鵝中的同性依附並非一種有害的虛構，而是自然界的事實。格拉姆澤先生在中央公園看到了其他類似的配對；在柏林、倫敦和雪梨的囚禁中也發現了它們。至於一般的動物，加拿大勒斯布里奇大學的保羅·瓦西表示，同性戀求偶和結合的事件在某種程度上“在很多很多物種中都被觀察到”。（瓦西博士警告說，幾乎沒有動物是純粹的同性戀者。而且由於許多生物有像殺嬰等惡劣習性，基於它們的行為來制定道德論點是不明智的。）
A second misconception concerns human sexuality. Whatever its mysteries, it is unlikely to be swayed by a picture book about penguins, a fear that seems to lurk behind many objections to “And Tango Makes Three”. As Dr Richardson puts it, wearing his psychiatrist’s hat: “There’s no reason to believe that reading a book about homosexual waterfowl makes a child more likely to be gay when they grow up.” Conversely, banning books with gay characters—or their avian avatars—won’t change the fact that “gay families exist”.
第二個誤解涉及人類的性取向。無論其神秘性如何，都不太可能被一本關於企鵝的圖畫書所左右，這似乎是許多反對《探戈的誕生》的異議背後潛在的擔憂。理查森博士戴上精神病醫生的帽子表示：“沒有理由相信，閱讀一本關於同性戀水禽的書會使一個孩子在長大後更有可能成為同性戀。” 相反，禁止具有同性戀人物或它們的鳥類化身的書籍並不會改變“同性家庭存在”的事實。
A final confusion is over children and reading. It is not a mechanistic process whereby a story propounds a message and a child absorbs it. To think it is, says Marah Gubar, an expert on children’s literature at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is to see young readers as defenceless blank slates, altogether inferior to grown-ups and worryingly impressionable. In reality they are, like adults, exposed to umpteen competing influences that they sift and process. As anyone who has read to a toddler knows, Dr Gubar notes, they already have tastes and ideas; they interpret books—which tend to have several possible meanings—in their own ways. The response to this one might be, “I wanna be a zookeeper!” In the encounter between child and book, “It takes two to tango.”
最後一個混淆涉及兒童和閱讀。這不是一個機械的過程，即一個故事提出一個資訊，而孩子吸收它。馬蘿·古巴是麻省理工學院兒童文學專家，她說認為是這樣的是把年輕讀者視為無防備的空白板，完全次於成年人且易受影響。實際上，他們和成年人一樣，暴露於無數競爭性的影響中，需要篩選和處理。正如任何給幼兒讀過書的人都知道的那樣，古巴博士指出，他們已經有了品味和想法；他們以自己的方式解釋書籍——通常有多種可能的含義。對這本書的回應可能是：“我想當動物園管理員！”在孩子和書的相遇中，“這需要兩個人共同跳探戈。
The real-life union of Roy and Silo did not, alas, end happily ever after. They “stayed together for a couple more years”, remembers Mr Gramzay. Then Silo had a fling with a female chinstrap named Spike, before forming a long-term partnership with another female, Scrappy. (News of his change of mate and taste was greeted by some as a triumph of heteronormativity.) For his part, Roy took up with a male named Blue. Tango found a female partner called Tazuni.
Roy和Silo的真實聯合，可悲的是，並沒有像童話一樣幸福地結束。格拉姆澤先生回憶道，它們“在一起多了幾年”。然後，Silo和一隻名叫Spike的雌性帶魚有了一段短暫的風流韻事，然後與另一隻雌性Scrappy形成了長期的夥伴關係。（有關他改變伴侶和品味的消息被一些人視為異性戀常態的勝利。）至於Roy，他與一隻名叫Blue的雄性成了夥伴。Tango找到了一位名叫Tazuni的雌性伴侶。
There was a happier sequel for the authors. Like Roy and Silo, when they wrote “And Tango Makes Three” the couple felt, in the words of the story, that “Their nest was nice, but it was a little empty.” In that line, confides Dr Richardson, “We were talking about our own lives, too.”
對於作者來說，有一個更幸福的續集。像Roy和Silo一樣，當他們寫下《探戈的誕生》時，這對夫婦感覺到，用故事中的話來說，“他們的巢很好，但有點空虛。”理查森博士坦言：“在這一句中，我們也在談論我們自己的生活。”
