If you regularly watch TV，you’ve probablyseen a cartoon bear pitching you toilet paper，a gecko with a British accentselling you auto insurance and a bunny in sunglasses promoting batteries.

如果你经常看电视，你可能会看到一只卡通熊向你推荐厕纸，一只操英国口音的壁虎向你推销汽车保险，一只戴着太阳眼镜的兔子在推销电池。

This has always struck me as a bit odd.Sure，it makes sense to use cartoon characters to sell products to kids – aphenomenon that’s been well-documented.

这种情况一直都让我感觉有几分古怪。不错，使用卡通形象把商品卖给孩子确实讲得通，这种现象是有充分根据的。

But why are advertisers using the sametechniques on adults?

但为什么那些做广告的会把这种手法用在成人上？

To me，it’s just one symptom of a broadertrend of infantilization in Western culture. It began before the advent ofsmartphones and social media. But，as I argue in my book “The Terminal Self，”our everyday interactions with these computer technologies have accelerated andnormalized our culture’s infantile tendencies.

在我看来，这只是西方文化中更整体性的幼稚化倾向的其中一个表征。它在智能手机和社交媒体出现之前就发端了。但正如我在我的书《终端自我》中所主张的，我们和这些电脑技术的日常互动已经加速，并且正常化了我们文化中的幼稚化倾向。

Society-wide arrested development

全社会的发育停滞

The dictionary defines infantilizing astreating someone “as a child or in a way that denies their maturity in age orexperience.”

字典中对幼稚化的定义是：把某人“当成孩子，或是用某种方式否认他们年龄或经验上的成熟度。”

What’s considered age-appropriate or matureis obviously quite relative. But most societies and cultures will deembehaviors appropriate for some stages of life，but not others.

什么才算是适龄或是成熟，很明显是相对的。但大部分社群和文化认为，符合特定人生阶段的行为才是，而非其他。

As the Bible puts it in 1 Corinthians13:11，“When I was a child，I talked like a child，I thought like a child，Ireasoned like a child. When I became a man，I put childish ways behind me.”

如同圣经《哥林多前书》13:11中说到的，“我作孩子的时候，话语像孩子，心思像孩子，意念像孩子。既成了人，就把孩子的事丢弃了。”

Some psychologists will be quick to notethat not everyone puts their “childish ways” behind them. You can becomefixated at a particular stage of development and fail to reach anage-appropriate level of maturity. When facing unmanageable stress or trauma，you can even regress to a previous stage of development. And psychologistAbraham Maslow has suggested that spontaneous childlike behaviors in adultsaren’t inherently problematic.

有些心理学家很快就会注意到，并不是所有人都会把“孩子气”抛诸身后。你会变得固着在一个特定的发育阶段中，无法达到一个适龄的成熟水平。在面对无法控制的压力或创伤时，你甚至会退行到上一个发育阶段。而且心理学家亚伯拉罕·马斯洛已经指出过，成人自发的孩子气行为，本质上没有什么问题。

But some cultural practices today routinelyinfantilize large swaths of the population.

但是如今有些文化习俗，习惯性地把大量的人口幼稚化了。

We see it in our everyday speech，when werefer to grown women as “girls”; in how we treat senior citizens，when we placethem in adult care centers where they’re forced to surrender their autonomy andprivacy; and in the way school personnel and parents treat teenagers，refusingto acknowledge their intelligence and need for autonomy，restricting theirfreedom，and limiting their ability to enter the workforce.

我们可以在日常的讲话中发现它，我们用“女孩”来指代成年女人；我们对待老年人时，会把他们送进成人护理中心，在那里他们被迫放弃他们的自主权和隐私；学校教工和家长对待青少年时，拒绝承认他们的智力和对自主权的需求，束缚他们的自由，并限制他们参加工作的能力。

Can entire societies succumb toinfantilization?

幼稚化会压垮整个社会吗？

法兰克福学派的学者，诸如赫伯特·马尔库斯、埃里克·弗洛姆以及其他重量级理论家主张：就和个体一样，一个社会也会患上发育停滞之病。

In their view，adults’ failure to reachemotional，social or cognitive maturity is not due to individual shortcomings.

在他们的看法中，成年人达不到情绪、社会或是认知方面的成熟并非缘于个人缺陷。

Rather，it is socially engineered.

相反，是由社会操纵而成的。

A return to innocence

回归纯真

Visiting America in 1946，Frenchanthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss commented on the endearingly infantiletraits of American culture. He especially noted adults’ childish adulation ofbaseball，their passionate approach to toy-like cars and the amount of timethey invested in hobbies.

法国人类学家克洛德·列维-斯特劳斯1946年访问美国的时候，对美国文化讨喜的幼稚特征作出了评论。他特别指出了成人对棒球孩子气般的吹捧，对玩具车的热情，以及他们在兴趣爱好上投入的大量时间。

As contemporary scholars note，however，this “infantilist ethos” has become less charming – and more pervasive.

然而，正如当代学者们注意到的，这种“幼稚气质”已经慢慢失去了魅力，变得更加无处不在了。

Researchers on both sides of the Atlantichave observed how this ethos has now crept into a vast range of social spheres.

大西洋两岸的研究者们已经观察到，这种气质是如何蔓延到社会领域中的广阔范围的。

在很多工作场所，经理们现在可以用电子手段监控他们的雇员，他们中的很多人在开放空间里工作，没有什么个人隐私可言。如同社会学家盖瑞·T·马克思观察到的，这样会创造出一个情境，其中的工人们感觉到的是经理就等着他们去“行为不端，占便宜以及乱来，除非他们移除所有的诱惑，预防他们这么去做，或是用勾引、强迫来让他们不那么去做。”

Much has been written about highereducation’s tendency to infantilize its students，whether it’s throughmonitoring their social media accounts，guiding their every step，or promoting“safe spaces” on campus.

高等教育幼稚化学生的倾向已经有过很多著述了，可以是通过监视他们的社交媒体账户，扶助他们的每一步，或是在校园里推广“安全空间”。

Meanwhile，tourist destinations like LasVegas market excess，indulgence and freedom from responsibility in casinoenvironments that conjure memories of childhood fantasies: the Old West，medi castles and the circus. Scholars have also explored how this form ofLas Vegas-style “Disneyfication” has left its stamp on planned communities，architecture and contemporary art.

与此同时，诸如拉斯维加斯的旅游目的地市场过剩，在赌场的环境中放纵并从责任中解脱唤起的是童年的幻想：旧时代的西部、中世纪城堡和马戏团。学者们还探究了这种拉斯维加斯风格的“迪斯尼化”形式，是如何在规划社区、建筑和当代艺术上刻上印记的。

Then we’ve witnessed the rise of a “therapyculture，” which，as sociologist Frank Furedi warns，treats adults asvulnerable，weak and fragile，while implying that their troubles rooted inchildhood qualify them for a “permanent suspension of moral sense.” He arguesthat this absolves grown-ups from adult responsibilities and erodes their trustin their own experiences and insights.

我们已经见证了“治疗文化”的崛起，这正如社会学家弗兰克·富雷迪所警惕的那样，对待成年人如同对待那些易受伤、软弱、易碎的人，与此同时，去暗示他们的麻烦根源于童年，就能让他们有资格“永久性地搁置道德观念”。他认为这样就免除了成人身上的成人责任，并且还削弱了他们对自身经验和洞察力的信任。

Researchers in Russia and Spain have evenidentified infantilist trends in language，and French sociologist JacquelineBarus-Michel observes that we now communicate in “flashes，” rather than viathoughtful discourse – “poorer，binary，similar to computer language，andaiming to shock.”

俄罗斯和西班牙的研究者已经在语言中鉴识出了幼稚化倾向，而法国社会学家杰奎琳·巴拉斯-米歇尔观察到：如今我们是以“闪念”来交流的，而不是经由深思熟虑的谈话，“更贫乏，非黑即白，类似于电脑语言，而且追求的是震惊和刺激。”

Others have noted similar trends in popularculture – in the shorter sentences in contemporary novels，in the lack ofsophistication in political rhetoric and in sensationalist cable news coverage.

其他人已经在大众文化中注意到了类似的趋势，当代小说中的句子变短了，政治辞令和哗众取宠的有线新闻报道中缺乏深度和复杂性。

High-tech pacifiers

高科技奶嘴

While scholars such as James Côté and GaryCross remind us that infantilizing trends began well before our current moment，I believe our daily interactions with smartphones and social media are sopleasurable precisely because they normalize and gratify infantiledispositions.

尽管诸如詹姆斯·科特和加里·克罗斯的学者提醒我们幼稚化倾向远早于我们当下就已经开始了，而我认为，我们日常与智能手机和社交媒体的互动如此让人愉悦，恰恰是因为它们把幼稚的习气正常化了，并使其得到了满足。

They endorse self-centeredness and inflatedexhibitionism. They promote an orientation towards the present，rewardingimpulsivity and celebrating constant and instant gratification.

他们认同自我中心和膨胀的出风头癖。他们推动的是一种对当下的指向，奖励冲动并且庆祝持续和即时的满足。

They flatter our needs for visibility andprovide us with 24/7 personalized attention，while eroding our ability toempathize with others.

它们取悦了我们受关注的需求，给我们提供了全天候的个性化关注，同时削弱了我们同情他者的能力。

Whether we use them for work or pleasure，our devices also foster a submissive attitude. In order to take advantage ofall they offer，we have to surrender to their requirements，agreeing to “terms”we do not understand and handing over stores of personal data.

无论我们用它们来工作还是娱乐，我们的设备都培养出了一种顺从的态度。为了利用它们能提供的全部，我们不得不屈从于它们的要求，同意那些我们并不明白的“条款”，并交出存储的个人数据。

Indeed，the routine and aggressive ways ourdevices violate our privacy via surveillance automatically deprive us of thisfundamental adult right.

事实上，我们的设备通过监视侵犯我们隐私的常规手法和侵略性手法，自动剥夺了我们基本的成年人权利。

While we might find it trivial or amusing，the infantilist ethos becomes especially seductive in times of social crisesand fear. And its favoring of simple，easy and fast betrays natural affinitiesfor certain political solutions over others.

虽然我们可能会觉得它微不足道或是很好玩，但这种幼稚气质在社会危机和恐慌中，会变得格外蛊惑人。而且它对于单纯、简洁和快速的偏爱透露出对特定的政治解决方案相对于其他方式的天然吸引力。

And typically not intelligent ones.

而且通常不会是彰显智慧的方案。

Democratic policymaking requires debate，demands compromise and involves critical thinking. It entails consideringdifferent viewpoints，anticipating the future，and composing thoughtfullegislation.

民主制的政策制定是需要辩论的，要求妥协，而且牵涉批判性思维。它必须考虑不同的观点，预测未来，并制订出考虑周全的法律。

What’s a fast，easy and simple alternative tothis political process? It’s not difficult to imagine an infantile societybeing attracted to authoritarian rule.

对于这种政治进程，一种快速、简洁且单纯的替代选项是什么？不难想象一个幼稚的社会被吸引到极权统治那里去。

Unfortunately，our social institutions andtechnological devices seem to erode hallmarks of maturity: patience，empathy，solidarity，humility and commitment to a project greater than oneself.

不幸的是，我们的社会机构和技术设备似乎侵蚀了成熟的标志：耐心、同情、团结、谦逊，以及投身于比自我更宏大的事业。

All are qualities that have traditionallybeen considered essential for both healthy adulthood and for the properfunctioning of democracy.

所有这些品质，传统上一直被视为是健康的成年状态和民主制正常运行所必不可少的。

评论区：

1、Quite so. It seems that what used to be highereducation is now an attempt to leave graduates in a state of permanentchildhood. As the gadfly Milo said，themodern university graduate is stupider on leaving the institution than onentering.

的确如此。看起来，当初的高等教育如今却企图让毕业生永久处于孩童状态。正如讨厌鬼米洛所说的那样，现代的大学毕业生在毕业离开时，比入学时更蠢。

2、I wonder if some ofit stems from not having to work ourselves into an early grave.

我想知道，这是否部分源于我们不再需要辛苦工作到早死的地步。

It’s not that long ago that even if peoplewent to school，it was common to leave at 14 and go straight into some sort ofwork. For men，typically fairly hard manual labour. Women，working or not，hadno domestic appliances to speak of，so the washing，cleaning，cooking and childrearing took all day every day.

在不太久远的过去，哪怕人们入了学，在14岁时离开直接去从事某种工作也是很普遍的。对男性来说，很典型的就是重体力劳动。而女性无论出去工作与否，是没有家用电器的概念的，所以洗衣、清扫、做饭和育儿要占据一整天的时间，每天如此。

There was no time to devote to much elseother than just getting by.

除去勉强过活，不会有什么时间能拿去鼓捣别的。

If we examined the lives of the rich from100+ years ago we’d see much of the infantile behaviour mentioned in thearticle.

如果我们去检视百多年前富人的生活，我们会发现本文中提及的很多幼稚行为。

Living standards have risen，work is lessphysically demanding and we have the leisure time to be able to devote severalhours a day to doing nothing constructive if we choose. I may not like whatpeople do with this time，but I rejoice that so many of us have the option

生活水平已经提升了，工作不再要求那么多的体力付出，而且我们有了空闲时间，如果我们想，每天可以把若干个小时拿去做没什么建设性的事。也许我不喜欢人们使用这段时间的方式，但我很高兴我们中的许多人拥有这个选项。

3、The US has longpuzzled me. It’s like it has some sort of multiple personality disorder. Porncapital of the world，more guns than they know what to do with and yet，veryChristian compared with havens of secularism like the UK.

美国这个国家，长久以来都让我很困惑。仿佛它罹患着某种多重人格障碍。世界色情之都、枪支比他们懂得如何适当使用的数量还要多，然而相比于世俗主义的天堂英国，却笃信基督教。

Where else would you have films wherecouples almost always have sex in their underwear and women get out of bedholding a sheet to cover their breasts? Then，later on in the same film，peopleare killed in the most graphic fashion….

你还能从哪里找到这样的电影：夫妇几乎总是穿着内裤做爱，女人从床起来时只拿条床单挡着胸部？然后，在同一部电影之后的情节里，人们穿着最时髦的衣服被杀掉...

这是一个谜。我认为对此丘吉尔诠释得更好。我认为美国人没有意识到他们从外部观点看来有多古怪。

And then there are the cheerleaders -behaving as if they are offering sex to the returning warriors. But no it’s not the Stone Age - it’s the mosttechnologically advanced country on the planet!

然后还有拉拉队员，表现出来的状态俨然是给还乡的战士们提供性服务。然而不是的，这不是石器时代，而是这个星球上技术最先进的国家！

（回复2）They would see many aspects of our societies as wasteful of time，energy and resources and corrupt spiritually，morally and physically.

他们会认为我们社会的很多方面是在浪费时间、精力和资源，并且在精神、道德和身上是败坏的。

But then they (at least tacitly) approvedof slavery，racism，executed people for trivial crimes，thought the poor weredirty and ignorant because they wanted to be，and killed god knows how many forempires. I could go on…

然而，他们（至少是心照不宣地）认可奴隶制，种族主义，因微不足道的罪行处决人，认为穷人肮脏又愚昧是因为他们想要这样子，还为了帝国杀了天知道多少人。我可以继续说下去...

所以我真的不确定，有什么国家能有资格跳出来批评。

For all that’s wrong with the world，I’drather live now than at any other time in the history of humanity.Occasionally，I slide into pessimism，but mostly，I’m an optimist.

尽管这个世界有着种种荒唐和不堪，相比于人类历史中的任何其他时代，我还是宁可活在现在，我慢慢陷入了厌世主义，但总的来说我是一个乐观主义者。

4、It seems to me thatthe ascension of the Chinese is quite inevitable. The West will collapse well within thiscentury，it’s culture is senile and it’s economy dependent on debt. After the Islamic apocalypse has reducedEurope to ashes，who will step into the ruins but the Chinese? I don’t think there will be any bayonets，however，that will not be necessary.

在我看来，中国人的腾飞完全是不可避免的。西方会在这个世纪内崩溃，其文化是腐朽的，而且其经济依靠的是债务。在伊斯兰大灾难把欧洲变成灰烬之后，除了中国人还有谁能进驻这片废墟？我不认为会出现任何刺刀，然而，那是不必要的。

（回复1）Certainly they are buying influence in much the same way thatAmerica did in the 1950s and 1960s. But the Chinese have not begun to learnwhat the Americans learned: that the citizens of countries can get prettyprickly about perceived intrusions into their sovereignty. The USA learned tosteer a wide course around many aspects of other countries’ sovereignty，because they triggered ugly reactions. In the process，the USA learned to takea more hands-off approach and rely instead on more subtle，indirect，andslower-moving strategies to influence other nations.

无疑，他们收买影响力的方式和美国在五六十年代干的大致相同。但中国人还没有开始学到美国人学到的东西：各国公民感觉到主权被入侵的时候，是很容易动怒的。美国学会了在行事时规避他国主权的多个层面，因为他们曾经引发过不可收拾的反弹。在这个过程中，美国学会了去走不插手的路线，转而更多地依靠微妙的、间接的以及缓慢转圜的策略来影响其他国家。

The Chinese are still drenched in their ownself-importance，just as the Americans were sixty years ago，and they’ll makethe same mistakes the Americans made. It will be interesting to see how long ittakes them to learn the lessons that the Americans learned. My guess is thatthey’ll be slower to figure things out，because they have so little experiencein dealing with other nations and with diversity.

中国人仍然沉溺在他们的自我重要感中，就像六十年前的美国人那样，而且他们会犯下美国人犯过的同样的错误。看看他们要花多久才能学到这门美国人过去学到了的课会很有意思的。我的猜测是他们找到诀窍会更慢一些，因为他们在处理和别国的关系乃至多样性方面的经验是如此之少。

5、At a scriptwritngcourse a number of years ago I was told to be successful one’s writings shouldbe aimed at 14year old males or if you are doing a chick flick dumb blonds (forGermany and Japan have girls with big tits) . I think part of our problem hascome down to outsourcing our development and culture to Hollywood and the mediamogals who have dumbed down the reporting and expressions in what we see.

6、The last time I wasat the Lakeland Hospital (2016) here in Florida，me and a room full of patientswaited while the nurses/admin. played ‘Scavenger Hunt". Someone would hidea food product somewhere in the hospital，then post on Facebook a photo &clues to find it. SO the staff is running around and discussing and textingeach other while we sit in the waiting room with gaping mouths “watching thechildren play.”

上一次（2016年时）我在我们弗罗里达州这里的雷克兰医院，我和一屋子病人在候诊，与此同时护士和管理人员玩起了“寻宝游戏”。有的人会在医院某处藏起一样食物，然后在Facebook上给出照片和找到它的线索。于是这些医务人员就东跑西逛，还讨论，并给彼此发短信，而我们却坐在候诊室里，咧开嘴说“瞧这些小孩玩的”。

7、The fact that thetop grossing movies are based on what used to be considered children’sliterature，comic books is another prime example. Yes the story lines haveevolved and some of the themes dealt with are deep but the fact that they arebased on children’s literature instead of adult literature still makes theconnection to infantilization. It wouldbe as if the top movies suddenly became based on nursery rhymes.

事实是，最卖座的电影都是基于从前被视为儿童文学的东西，漫画书是另一个好例子。是的，故事线已经得到了发展，涉及的主题很深刻，但它们是由儿童文学而非成年人的文学改编来的事实仍能使其联系到幼稚化。这就好像那些票房冠军电影突然之间变成由儿歌改编而来的。

The biggest example is the turning the wordadult into a verb. On social mediapeople from 18-65 rail against “adulting”; that is living up to and taking onnormal adult responsibilities (paying bills，going to work，raising children，dealing with relationships，etc…). If there is a more glaring example of infantilismI have not seen it. It’s as if the normal task of being and adult are just toomuch. Vacations are the way in which weused to deal with normal life pressures. Once a year for a week or two we’dbreak the routine and possibly regress to fewer responsibilities. Of course anyone who has ever actuallyplanned a vacation knows that this can be one of the more challenging tasks ofadulthood.

最明显的一个例子是把成人这个词变成了动词。社交媒体上从18岁到65岁的人都在抱怨“成人化（adulting，即长大）”，即是说去承担正常成人的责任（支付账单，去工作，抚养孩子，处理各种关系等等）。如果还存在更显眼的幼稚病例子，那我还没有看到过。搞得好像成为成年人这个很正常的任务是过分的要求。度假是我们过去常用来处理正常生活压力的手段。每年一次，一次一到两周，我们打破常规，然后可能会退行到承担更少的责任。当然了，真正规划过度假的人会知道，这可能是更有挑战性的成年人任务之一。