烟花正在轰鸣，比以往更早、更响

烟花正在轰鸣，比以往更早、更响

I will state this up front: I hate fireworks. They are loud and they are dangerous and they are polluting and they scare my dogs and my kids and me. This year, I hate them more than ever; for reasons nobody quite understands, they are ubiquitous weeks before the Fourth of July. According to Gothamist, noise complaints related to fireworks in New York City are up a crazy 4,000% over last year. But it’s not just New York; according to the Associated Press, “They’ve become a nightly nuisance ringing out from Connecticut to California, angering sleep-deprived residents and alarming elected officials.”

我先声明一点:我讨厌烟花。它们很吵，很危险，还会污染环境，吓到我的狗、我的孩子和我。今年，我比以往任何时候都更讨厌他们;出于没人能完全理解的原因，它们在7月4日之前的几个星期里无处不在。据Gothamist网站报道，纽约市与烟花爆竹有关的噪音投诉比去年激增了4000倍。但不仅仅是纽约;据美联社报道，“从康涅狄格到加州，它们已经成为每晚扰民的声音，激怒了睡眠不足的居民，也让民选官员感到不安。”

Setting off fireworks in New York.Stephanie Keith/ Getty Images

This is all after a dream-time when some urbanists fantasized that we would learn from the lockdown and appreciate the quiet streets and clean air. Instead, some say the boom in fireworks is all about making noise and blowing off steam after being locked inside. Kaitlyn Tiffany of the Atlantic writes about fireworks retailer Randall Horvath, who notes that his sales are up 60%:

这一切都是在一些城市规划专家幻想我们可以从封锁中学习，欣赏安静的街道和干净的空气之后发生的。相反，一些人说，燃放烟花爆竹是为了制造噪音，并在被锁在室内后释放蒸汽。《大西洋月刊》的凯特琳•蒂芙尼在文章中提到了烟花零售商兰德尔•霍瓦特，霍瓦特指出他的销售额增长了60%:

Horvath suspects that amateur pyrotechnics have become popular because fireworks shows have been canceled, vacations are off, and there’s nothing to do. People have been stuck inside. They want to set things on fire. He also suggested that the companies that make fireworks for professional displays—such as the shows put on by cities or amusement parks—have turned to the consumer market. “These people have to make money,” he said.

霍瓦特猜测，业余烟花表演之所以受欢迎，是因为烟花表演被取消了，假期也结束了，而且没有什么事情可做。人们被困在里面。他们想放火。他还建议那些为城市或游乐园举办的专业表演制作烟花的公司应该把目光转向消费市场。“这些人必须赚钱，”他说。

More fireworks in Brooklyn. Stephanie Keith/ Google images

Meanwhile, other theories abound. Author Robert Jones Jr. thinks it is a “false-flag” operation and explains on Facebook:

与此同时，其他理论也层出不穷。作家小罗伯特·琼斯认为这是一种“假旗”行为，并在Facebook上解释道:

The goal, we think, is multifaceted:

我们认为，目标是多方面的:

1. Sleep deprivation as a means to create confusion and stoke tensions between Black and Brown peoples.

剥夺睡眠是制造混乱和加剧黑人和棕色人种之间紧张关系的一种手段。

2. Desensitization as a means to get us so used to the sounds of firecrackers and other fireworks that when they start using their real artillery on us we won't know the difference. It's meant to sound like a war zone because a war zone is what it's about to become.

脱敏作为一种手段，让我们如此习惯于鞭炮声和其他烟花爆竹的声音，以至于当他们开始对我们使用真正的火炮时，我们将不知道区别。这听起来像是一个战区，因为它即将变成一个战区。

My colleague Russell McLendon has explained how fireworks are bad for the environment and I have previously listed nine reasons to rant about them. They have always been political; John Adams called for the celebration of Independence Day “with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more.”

我的同事拉塞尔·麦克伦登已经解释了烟花是如何对环境有害的，而我之前也列出了对它们咆哮的九个理由。它们一直都是政治性的;约翰·亚当斯呼吁庆祝独立日“从现在起，从美洲大陆的这一端到另一端，用盛大的仪式和游行、展示、游戏、运动、枪炮、钟声、篝火和彩灯，永远下去”。

But that was just one day, not a month, and now they are divisive and conspiratorial. A tenth reason to rant.

但那只是一天，而不是一个月，现在他们分裂和阴谋。这是咆哮的第10个理由。