譯/莊蕙嘉
「芝麻街」一直都很政治
There's a rule in politics or at least there should be: Never get into a fight with Big Bird. You end up spitting out feathers, and the 8-foot fowl just strolls away singing about the alphabet.
政治有個規則，或至少應該有一個規則：永遠不要和「大鳥」吵架，否則最後你會一嘴羽毛，而這隻八呎高的鳥則是唱著字母歌踱步離開。
In the 2012 election, Mitt Romney repeatedly argued for cutting public-TV subsidies and having the beloved character share the screen with ads — "I'm afraid Big Bird is going to have to get used to Kellogg's Corn Flakes" — opening himself to attacks that he cared more about Wall Street than about "Sesame Street."
2012年總統大選時，羅姆尼頻頻主張要削減公共電視補助款，以及讓這個備受喜愛的角色出現的節目開始播廣告，「恐怕大鳥終究得習慣家樂氏玉米片」，羅姆尼因此遭到圍剿，批評他關心華爾街更勝「芝麻街」。
In November, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, became the latest pol to find the big yellow target irresistible. After the Twitter account for Big Bird announced that the character had gotten a COVID-19 vaccine, following a CNN and "Sesame Street" town hall on vaccines for kids, Cruz called the tweet "Government propaganda…for your 5 year old!"
11月時，共和黨德州聯邦參議員克魯茲成為最新一位忍不住去招惹這隻黃色大鳥的政客。美國有線電視新聞網和芝麻街合辦一場為兒童接種疫苗的市民大會，接著大鳥的推特帳號宣布，大鳥已接種新冠疫苗後，克魯茲稱這則推文是「政府針對你家五歲兒童的宣傳！」
Leave aside the dubious claim that promoting childhood vaccination, a cornerstone of public health and schools, is "propaganda." Disregard how Cruz ignores that Big Bird was promoting the measles vaccine a half-century ago. And forget that, for decades, liberal and conservative parents have loved "Sesame Street" for its noncommercial wholesomeness.
作為公衛和學校基石，姑且不論推廣兒童接種疫苗的是「宣傳」的說法很可疑。也不管克魯茲如何無視大鳥在半世紀之前就推廣過麻疹疫苗。而且也不管數十年來，自由派和保守派家長都愛芝麻街，因為它有益身心，且無廣告。
Cruz was at least on to one larger truth: "Sesame Street" is political, and it has been from the beginning.
至少，克魯茲說對了一項較重要的事實：芝麻街確實很政治，打從一開始就是如此。
It is political not in a partisan sense but because the way we teach and protect children — and choose which children to teach and protect — is inevitably bound up in politicized ideas.
它的政治性並非出自政黨，而是因為我們教育和保護兒童的方式，還有選擇教育和保護哪些兒童，皆無可避免的和政治化的想法密切相關。
"Sesame Street," which premiered in 1969, was the project of Joan Ganz Cooney, a TV executive who was originally more interested in the civil rights movement than in education but came to see the connection between the two. "The people who control the system read," she once said, "and the people who make it in the system read." And she believed that the best way to get the kids of the 1960s to read, paradoxically, was through TV.
1969年首播的芝麻街，是電視製作人瓊．甘茲．庫尼的企畫，比起教育，她原本對民權運動更感興趣，但發現兩者間的關聯。「控制這個體制的人會閱讀」，她曾經說過，「而且在這個體制內成功的人也會閱讀」。她相信，讓1960年代的孩童閱讀的最好方法，弔詭的是透過電視。
"I saw it as a political show," says Sonia Manzano, who played Maria, because of its casting and its determination to raise conversations that kids' TV wasn't used to having.
「我將它視為政治節目」，曾飾演瑪莉亞的桑妮亞．曼札諾說。因為節目的選角和促進對話的決心，都是以往的兒童節目未曾有過的。
