为什么年轻人开始“摆烂”了？

近日，《卫报》（The Guardian）一篇讲述中国年轻人“摆烂”的文章引发关注。

今天，我们就一起来看看为什么年轻人开始“摆烂”了？

无注释原文：

The rise of ‘bai lan’: why China’s frustrated youth are ready to ‘let it rot’

The Guardian

Phrase bai lan gains popularity as severe competition and social expectations leave many young people despondent.

On China’s internet, some young people say their “ideals” simply cannot be achieved and many of them have given up on trying. Frustrated by the mounting uncertainties and lack of economic opportunities, they are resorting to a new buzzword – bai lan (摆烂, or let it rot in English) – to capture their attitude towards life.

The phrase, bai lan, which has its origin in NBA games, means a voluntary retreat from pursuing certain goals because one realises they are simply too difficult to achieve. In American basketball, it often refers to a player’s deliberate loss of a game in order to get a better draft pick.

On Weibo, the bai lan-related topics have generated hundreds of millions of reads and discussions since March. Netizens also created different variations of the bai lan attitude. “Properties in Shanghai too expensive? Fine, I’ll just rent all my life, as I can’t afford it if I only earn a monthly salary anyway,” one grumbled.

In recent days, this phrase – and more previously ‘tang ping’ (lying flat, 躺平), which means rejecting gruelling competition for a low desire life – gained popularity as severe competition and high social expectations prompted many young Chinese to give up on hard work.

But bai lan has a more worrying layer in the way it is being used by young people in China: to actively embrace a deteriorating situation, rather than trying to turn it around. It is close to other Chinese phrases, for example ‘to smash a cracked pot’ (破罐破摔) and ‘dead pigs are not afraid of boiling water’ (死猪不怕开水烫).

State media have taken note of this trend. “Why modern young Chinese like to ‘bai lan’?” one recent article in official media outlet asked. “In fact, this is as a result of negative auto suggestion, repeatedly telling oneself I cannot make it… And this kind of mentality often leads people to adopt the ‘bai lan’ attitude.”

But the reality is not quite as state media suggested, says Sal Hang, a 29-year-old creative industry professional in Beijing. He says that for his generation of young Chinese, this attitude of letting things rot is likely to be caused by a lack of social mobility and increased uncertainty in today’s China.

“Unlike my parents’ generation, young Chinese today have much bigger expectations, but there are many more uncertainties for us, too. For example, we cannot make any long-term plans for our lives any more, because we do not know what is going to happen to us even five years down the road.”

After working as a flight engineer in south-western China, Hang moved to Beijing three years ago to work in music, his passion. But the workplace reality changed his initial ambition.

“My boss often sets unrealistic targets for me. But however hard I try to meet his KPIs, I always fail. So in the end, I lose my motivation and just do my bare minimum.”

Prof Mary Gallagher, director of the Centre for Chinese Studies at the University of Michigan, says ‘bai lan’ is not necessarily a sentiment unique to China. “It is a bit like the ‘slacker’ generation in America in the 1990s. And like ‘tang ping’ last year, it is also a rejection against the ultra-competitiveness of today’s Chinese society.”

But in today’s China, the sense of hopelessness among the young is further exacerbated, she says.

“Fine, I’ll just bai lan – stay at home and watch TV all day,” wrote one netizen who struggled to find work.

“All these popular phrases reflect a shared social emotion of the day. When people use them, they are not just expressing themselves, but looking for a connection with those who have the same feeling,” Kecheng Fang, a media professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, says.

“In real life, we are all in the same situation, after all.”

- ◆ -

注：中文文本为机器翻译仅供参考，并非一一对应

含注释全文：

The rise of ‘bai lan’: why China’s frustrated youth are ready to ‘let it rot’

The Guardian

Phrase bai lan gains popularity as severe competition and social expectations leave many young people despondent.

激烈的竞争和社会期望让许多年轻人感到绝望，“摆烂”一词开始流行。

可以作名词，也可作动词，表示“（使）腐败；（使）腐烂；（使）腐朽”，英文解释为“to (cause something to) decay”举个🌰：

The fruit had been left to rot on the trees.

水果无人采摘，烂在了树上。

补充：

📍stop the rot表示“制止事态的恶化”，英文解释为“to take action against something bad, before it spreads and becomes worse”举个🌰：

We must try to stop the rot before the whole school is corrupted.

我们一定要在整个学校都被毁掉之前采取行动。

1）表示“短语”，英文解释为“a group of words that is part of, rather than the whole of, a sentence”。

2）表示“说法；用语；警句”，英文解释为“a short group of words that are often used together and have a particular meaning”

表示“郁闷的，沮丧的，消沉的”，英文解释为“unhappy and with no hope or enthusiasm”举个🌰：

He became/grew increasingly despondent when she failed to return his phone calls.

她没给他回电话让他感到越来越郁闷。

On China’s internet, some young people say their “ideals” simply cannot be achieved and many of them have given up on trying. Frustrated by the mounting uncertainties and lack of economic opportunities, they are resorting to a new buzzword – bai lan (摆烂, or let it rot in English) – to capture their attitude towards life.

在中国的互联网上，一些年轻人说他们的“理想”根本无法实现，他们中的许多人已经放弃了努力。由于对越来越多的不确定性和缺乏经济机会感到沮丧，他们正在使用一个新的流行语--摆烂（英文是let it rot，让它烂掉）--来表达他们的生活态度。

表示“增加的；加剧的”，英文解释为“gradually increasing”如：mounting anxiety/excitement 不断增长的焦虑/兴奋。

📺美剧《美国恐怖故事》（American Horror Story）中的台词提到：But there's mounting evidence that this man is a war criminal. 但是有大量的证据显示这人是个战犯。

表示“（别无办法的情况下）诉诸，依靠，采用”，英文解释为“to do something that you do not want to do because you cannot find any other way of achieving something”举个🌰：

I had to resort to violence/threats to get my money.

为了拿到我的钱，我被迫诉诸暴力/采取威胁的手段。

表示“流行语，热词，时髦用语，流行术语”，英文解释为“a word or phrase from one special area of knowledge that people suddenly think is very important”。

1）表示“赢得；获得，取得”，英文解释为“to succeed in getting something when you are competing with other people”举个🌰：

They captured 80 percent of the vote.

他们获得了80%的选票。

2）表示“（用文字或图象）表现，描绘，刻画”，英文解释为“to represent or describe something very accurately using words or images”举个🌰：

It would be impossible to capture her beauty in a painting.

她的美无法用画笔描绘。

The phrase, bai lan, which has its origin in NBA games, means a voluntary retreat from pursuing certain goals because one realises they are simply too difficult to achieve. In American basketball, it often refers to a player’s deliberate loss of a game in order to get a better draft pick.

摆烂这个词起源于NBA比赛，意味着自愿放弃追求某些目标，因为人们意识到这些目标太难实现了。在美国篮球比赛中，它通常指的是一个球员为了获得更好的选秀权而故意输掉比赛。

1）表示“（信仰的）改变；退缩；放弃”，英文解释为“a change from previous beliefs or behaviour”举个🌰：

The professor's speech marked/signalled a retreat from his usual extreme views.

教授的演讲标志着/表明他已经放弃了他一贯的极端观点。

2）表示“（士兵或军队的）撤退，退却，后退”，英文解释为“a move back by soldiers or an army, either because they have been defeated or in order to avoid fighting”如：the retreat from Dunkirk 敦刻尔克大撤退。

作动词，表示“仔细考虑；深思熟虑；反复思考”，英文解释为“to think very carefully about sth, usually before making a decision”举个🌰：

The jury deliberated for five days before finding him guilty.

陪审团认真讨论了五天才裁定他有罪。

作形容词，表示“（常指坏事）有意的，故意的，蓄意的”，英文解释为“(often of something bad) intentional or planned”如：a deliberate attack/insult/lie 蓄意攻击/侮辱/说谎。

1）作名词，表示“草案；草稿；草图”，英文解释为“a piece of text, a formal suggestion, or a drawing in its original state, often containing the main ideas and intentions but not the developed form”举个🌰：

This is only a rough draft - the finished article will have pictures too.

这只是一个粗略的草稿——定稿后的文章中还会有一些图片。

2）熟词僻义，表示“（美国职业球队在赛季之初选拔新队员的）选秀制度”，英文解释为“the system by which sports teams in the US choose new young players at the beginning of each season”如：the NBA draft，NBA选秀制。

3）作名词，表示“（钻进某处的）风”，英文解释为“A draft is a current of air that comes into a place in an undesirable way.”举个🌰：

Block drafts around doors and windows.

挡住门窗周围的风。

On Weibo, the bai lan-related topics have generated hundreds of millions of reads and discussions since March. Netizens also created different variations of the bai lan attitude. “Properties in Shanghai too expensive? Fine, I’ll just rent all my life, as I can’t afford it if I only earn a monthly salary anyway,” one grumbled.

在微博上，自3月以来，与摆烂有关的话题已经产生了数亿的阅读和讨论。网友们也对摆烂的态度产生了不同的变化。“上海的房子太贵了？行，我就一辈子租房吧，反正我只有月薪，也买不起。”有人抱怨道。

grumble /ˈɡrʌm.bəl/ 表示“发牢骚，抱怨，嘟囔”，英文解释为“to complain about someone or something in an annoyed way”举个🌰：

She spent the evening grumbling to me about her job.

她一晚上都在向我抱怨她的工作。

📍mustn't grumble表示“没有什么好抱怨的，日子过得还不错”，英文解释为“something you say to mean that your life is not bad and that you should not complain about it”举个🌰：

"How's it going then, LR?" "Oh, not too bad. Mustn't grumble."

“那么，一切还好吧，卤肉？”“哦，挺好，没有什么好抱怨的。”

🎬电影《老爸上战场》（Dad's Army）中的台词提到：But one mustn't grumble. 字幕组译为：差强人意啦。

In recent days, this phrase – and more previously ‘tang ping’ (lying flat, 躺平), which means rejecting gruelling competition for a low desire life – gained popularity as severe competition and high social expectations prompted many young Chinese to give up on hard work.

最近，这个词--以及之前的“躺平”，意味着拒绝艰苦的竞争而选择低欲望的生活--流行了起来，因为严峻的竞争和高社会期望促使许多中国年轻人放弃了努力工作。

gruelling /ˈgrʊəlɪŋ/ 表示“使人的精疲力尽的；艰辛的；让人受不了”，英文解释为“extremely tiring and difficult, and demanding great effort and determination”举个🌰：

Junior doctors often have to work a gruelling 100-hour week.

资历较浅的医生经常必须承受艰巨的工作量，一周工作100小时。

作动词，表示“促使；导致；激起”，英文解释为“to make sb decide to do sth; to cause sth to happen”举个🌰：

His speech prompted an angry outburst from a man in the crowd.

他的讲话激起了人群中一男子的愤怒。

📺美剧《斯巴达克斯：血与沙》（Spartacus: Blood and Sand）中的台词提到：One cannot but wonder what would prompt such an act 不知他们为何遭此不幸。

But bai lan has a more worrying layer in the way it is being used by young people in China: to actively embrace a deteriorating situation, rather than trying to turn it around. It is close to other Chinese phrases, for example ‘to smash a cracked pot’ (破罐破摔) and ‘dead pigs are not afraid of boiling water’ (死猪不怕开水烫).

但是“摆烂”在中国年轻人的使用方式上有更令人担忧的一层含义：接受拥抱不断恶化的局面，而不是试图扭转它。它与其他中文短语很接近，例如“破罐破摔”和“死猪不怕开水烫”。

表示“欣然接受；乐意采纳”，英文解释为“to accept something enthusiastically”举个🌰：

This was an opportunity that he would embrace.

这样的机会他是求之不得的。

deteriorate /dɪˈtɪə.ri.ə.reɪt/ 作动词，表示“恶化”，英文解释为“If something deteriorates, it becomes worse in some way.”举个🌰：

She was taken into hospital last week when her condition suddenly deteriorated.

她是在上周病情突然恶化时被送进医院的。

🎬电影《蝙蝠侠：黑暗骑士崛起》（The Dark Knight Rises）中的台词提到：As the device's fuel cells deteriorate, it becomes increasingly unstable to the point of detonation. 随着该装置的燃料电池情况变糟，它会变得越来越不稳定，直至引爆。

1）表示“打碎；破碎”，英文解释为“If you smash something or if it smashes, it breaks into many pieces, for example, when it is hit or dropped.”举个🌰：

Someone smashed a bottle.

有人打碎了一个瓶子。

2）表示“猛撞，猛冲，猛击（通常造成破坏或伤害）”，英文解释为“to cause something to move with great force against something hard, usually causing damage or injury”举个🌰：

He tried to smash the door down to get to me.

他试图将门撞倒来抓我。

表示“破裂的；有裂缝的”，英文解释为“If something is cracked, it is damaged with one or more thin lines on its surface.”如：a cracked mirror/window 有裂纹的镜子/窗户。

State media have taken note of this trend. “Why modern young Chinese like to ‘bai lan’?” one recent article in official media outlet asked. “In fact, this is as a result of negative auto suggestion, repeatedly telling oneself I cannot make it… And this kind of mentality often leads people to adopt the ‘bai lan’ attitude.”

国家媒体已经注意到了这一趋势，“为什么现代中国年轻人喜欢‘摆烂’？”最近发表的一篇文章问道。“事实上，这是由于消极的自我暗示，反复告诉自己我做不到......而这种心态往往导致人们采取‘摆烂’的态度。”

表示“关注，留意（尤指重要之事）”，英文解释为“to give attention to something, especially because it is important”举个🌰：

You should take careful note of what she tells you because she knows their strategy well.

你应该仔细留意她对你说的话，因为她对他们的策略了如指掌。

trend作动词，表示“（某一时刻在社交媒体或网站上）被提及最多的词语（主题或名字）”，英文解释为“to be one of the words, subjects, or names that is being mentioned most often on a social media website or a news website at a particular time”，举个🌰：

Within minutes of the incident her name was trending on Weibo.

事件发生几分钟后她的名字就在微博上传开了。

trend本身也可以直接作名词，原意有“趋势；趋向；倾向；动态；动向；热点”，英文解释为“a general direction in which a situation is changing or developing”。

📍trending hashtags或者说a trending topic，可以指微博上的“#热门话题#”；类似的，Youtube首页上的Trending对应的中文就处理为“时下流行”。

outlet/outlets一词经常出现，media outlet / news outlets 都可以表示媒体/新闻机构；

outlet本身表示“商店，商行；销售公司；专卖店；直销店”，英文解释为“An outlet is a shop or organization which sells the goods made by a particular manufacturer or at a discount price, often direct from the manufacturer.”如：a fast-food outlet 快餐店 a retail outlet 零售店，举个🌰：

At the factory outlet you'll find discounted items at up to 75% off regular prices. 

在工厂的直销店里，你会找到比常规价低75%的打折商品。

📍而我们日常生活中常见的“奥特莱斯”商场就是outlets的音译，指的就是品牌直销购物中心。

But the reality is not quite as state media suggested, says Sal Hang, a 29-year-old creative industry professional in Beijing. He says that for his generation of young Chinese, this attitude of letting things rot is likely to be caused by a lack of social mobility and increased uncertainty in today’s China.

但现实并不像媒体所说的那样，北京一位29岁的创意产业从业者康绍（Sal Hang，音译）说。他说，对他这一代中国年轻人来说，这种摆烂的态度很可能是当今缺乏社会流动性和不确定性增加造成的。

“Unlike my parents’ generation, young Chinese today have much bigger expectations, but there are many more uncertainties for us, too. For example, we cannot make any long-term plans for our lives any more, because we do not know what is going to happen to us even five years down the road.”

“与我父母那一代不同，今天的中国年轻人有更大的期望，但对我们来说也有更多的不确定因素。例如，我们不能再为自己的生活做任何长期计划，因为我们甚至不知道五年后我们会发生什么。”

down the road/line/track 表示“将来”，英文解释为“in the future”举个🌰：

Cars that drive themselves are in development now, but a marketable product is a long way down the line.

无人汽车正在开发中，但要拿出有销路的产品还有很长的路要走。

After working as a flight engineer in south-western China, Hang moved to Beijing three years ago to work in music, his passion. But the workplace reality changed his initial ambition.

三年前，他辞去在中国西南地区从事飞行工程师的工作，搬到了北京从事他热爱的音乐工作。但职场的现实改变了他最初的抱负。

“My boss often sets unrealistic targets for me. But however hard I try to meet his KPIs, I always fail. So in the end, I lose my motivation and just do my bare minimum.”

“我的老板经常为我设定不现实的目标。但无论我如何努力去达到他的KPI，我总是失败。所以最后，我失去了动力，只是做我最基本的工作。”

表示“企业关键业绩指标（衡量公司取得的业绩的一种指标，key performance indicator的缩写）”，英文解释为“abbreviation for key performance indicator: a way of measuring a company's progress towards the goals it is trying to achieve”

表示“最低限度的，最少量的”，英文解释为“the least possible amount”举个🌰：

She eats only the bare minimum to stay alive.

她吃得极少，仅够活下去而已。

Prof Mary Gallagher, director of the Centre for Chinese Studies at the University of Michigan, says ‘bai lan’ is not necessarily a sentiment unique to China. “It is a bit like the ‘slacker’ generation in America in the 1990s. And like ‘tang ping’ last year, it is also a rejection against the ultra-competitiveness of today’s Chinese society.”

密歇根大学中国研究中心主任玛丽·加拉格尔教授（Prof Mary Gallagher）说，“摆烂”不一定是中国特有的情绪。“这有点像20世纪90年代美国的‘懒人’一代。而且就像去年的‘躺平’一样，它也是对当今中国社会的过度竞争性的一种拒绝。”

表示“偷懒的人；磨洋工的人”，英文解释为“If you describe someone as a slacker, you mean that they are lazy and do less work than they should. ”举个🌰：

Those slackers have gone home early again.

那些懒家伙又提前回家了。

But in today’s China, the sense of hopelessness among the young is further exacerbated, she says.

但在今天的中国，年轻人的无望感进一步加剧，她说。

exacerbate /ɪɡˈzæsəˌbeɪt/ 表示“使恶化；使加重”，英文解释为“to make a bad situation worse”举个🌰：

She didn't want to exacerbate the situation.

她不想使情况变得更糟。

🎬电影《僵尸肖恩》（Shaun of the Dead）中的台词提到：And that will exacerbate things for all of us. 那会使我们事情恶化的。

“Fine, I’ll just bai lan – stay at home and watch TV all day,” wrote one netizen who struggled to find work.

“好吧，我就摆烂了--整天呆在家里看电视。”一位在努力找工作的网友写道。

“All these popular phrases reflect a shared social emotion of the day. When people use them, they are not just expressing themselves, but looking for a connection with those who have the same feeling,” Kecheng Fang, a media professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, says.

“所有这些流行的短语反映了当时共同的社会情绪。当人们使用它们时，他们不仅仅是在表达自己，而是在寻找与那些有相同感受的人的连接，”香港中文大学新闻学教授方可成（Kecheng Fang）说。

“In real life, we are all in the same situation, after all.”

“在现实生活中，我们毕竟都处于同样的境地。”

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