他们离开中国追逐美国梦，如今为何反对教育平权
加州欧文——乔治·李在中国社会长大，他觉得那里没有给人公平的对待。毛泽东政府认为他的家庭是走资派，监禁了他的父亲。
So when Mr. Li moved to California in 1999, he felt he had found his American dream. He worked hard and earned his rewards: a master’s degree, then a job that allowed him to live comfortably with his wife and two children.
因此，当乔治·李1999年搬到加州时，他觉得他已经找到了他的美国梦。他努力工作并获得了回报：一个硕士学位，然后一份让他与妻子及两个孩子能过上舒适生活的工作。
But four years ago, he became alarmed when a co-worker told him about a state measure that would allow California’s public universities to use affirmative action in their admissions. Fearing that this would hurt his children’s educational chances, Mr. Li for the first time in his life became politically active.
但在四年前，当一名同事告诉他，一项州措施将允许加州公立大学在招生中采用平权政策时，他开始警觉。由于担心这会损害他的孩子受教育的机会，乔治·李平生第一次在政治上变得活跃了起来。
He signed a petition and donated money to a campaign to stop the affirmative action measure. He sped up his timeline to become a citizen so that he could vote. He campaigned for Republican candidates for the State Legislature. More recently, he took the lead of a local Chinese-American political action committee, called The Orange Club, which is now focused on supporting California Republican candidates in the midterms.
他签署了一份请愿书，并向一项旨在停止平权行动措施的运动捐款。他加紧办理入籍事宜，以便能够投票。他参与了支持州议会选举共和党候选人的竞选活动。最近，他领导了一个名为金橙俱乐部(Orange Club)的当地美籍华人政治行动委员会，该俱乐部现在致力于在中期选举中支持加州的共和党候选人。
“We just realized if we’re not involved in this process, the political process in America, we would be forgotten,” Mr. Li said.
“我们刚刚意识到，如果我们不参与这个进程，美国的政治进程，我们就会被遗忘，”乔治·李说。
Mr. Li, 49, is among an increasingly vocal group of Chinese-Americans who were once politically dormant but have been galvanized by the fight over race-based school admissions.
49岁的乔治·李是越来越多曾对政治无动于衷，但却因基于种族的学校招生问题引发的斗争而受到激发的华裔美国人之一。
From Irvine to Houston to the Washington suburbs, Chinese activist groups like The Orange Club are beginning to capture the attention of lawmakers and influence policy debates. Much of their political activity can be found on the Chinese social media website WeChat, where the activists share articles and spread their message. And they have a clear litmus test for any politician seeking their support: opposition to affirmative action.
从欧文、休斯顿到华盛顿郊区，像金橙俱乐部这样的华人活动团体开始吸引立法者的注意并影响政策辩论。它们的大部分政治活动可以在中国社交媒体平台微信上找到，活动人士在微信上分享文章并传播信息。对于任何寻求支持的政界人士来说，它们都有一个明确的试金石：反对平权行动。
Their numbers are small compared with the overall population of China-born immigrants, which has exploded over recent decades, from about 472,000 in 1980 to more than 2.8 million in 2016, according to Andrew Beveridge, a professor at Queens College, based on census data.
皇后学院(Queens College)教授安德鲁·贝弗里奇(Andrew Beveridge)表示，根据人口普查数据，与在中国出生的移民总人数相比，他们的人数很少。近几十年来，中国出生的移民人数激增，从1980年的47.2万人增加到了2016年的280多万人。
But a number of recent fights over education have highlighted their growing political clout. Dozens of Chinese-American groups helped draft a complaint filed with the Justice Department in 2015 that accuses Harvard of discriminating against Asian-Americans in admissions. They were on the front lines of protests several weeks ago when Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York proposed changing the admissions criteria for his city’s specialized high schools, where Asian-Americans account for more than half the population.
但是最近一些关于教育的斗争凸显了他们日益增长的政治影响力。几十个美籍华人组织在2015年帮助起草了一份提交司法部的申诉，指控哈佛大学在招生中歧视亚裔美国人。几周前，当纽约市长白思豪(Bill de Blasio)提议改变该市特殊高中的招生标准时，他们站在了抗议的前线，在那些学校的学生中，亚裔美国人占一半以上。
The activists have yielded victories. In California, they helped defeat the affirmative action measure, known as S.C.A. 5. And in New York, the Brooklyn borough president, Eric Adams, initially supported Mr. de Blasio’s plan, only to backtrack after the uproar led by Chinese-Americans.
这些活动人士已经取得了胜利。在加州，他们帮助击败了平权行动措施，即《第五号加州宪法修正案》(S.C.A. 5.)。在纽约，布鲁克林区行政长官埃里克·亚当斯(Eric Adams)最初支持白思豪的计划，但在遭到华裔大举抗议之后，他放弃了。
The debate over race in education centers on how much schools should try to control their racial makeup. At many elite universities and specialized high schools, black and Hispanic students are underrepresented, while Asian and white students are overrepresented relative to their overall population.
关于教育中种族问题的争论集中在学校应该在多大程度上努力控制它们学生的种族构成。在许多精英大学和特殊高中，黑人和西语裔学生的比例偏低，而亚裔和白人学生的比例相对于他们的总人口来说偏高。
Activists like Mr. Li worry that if schools calibrate their student ratios around race, Asian students are most likely to lose out.
像乔治·李这样的活动人士担心，如果学校按照种族来调整学生比例，亚裔学生的利益会受损。
The Orange Club grew out of a group of mostly Chinese-American mothers in Orange County who helped new immigrants navigate the school system and the community. When the affirmative action measure emerged in 2014, several parents in the group began asking what they could do to stop it, said Sarah Yang, who was among those who then founded The Orange Club.
金橙俱乐部由奥兰治县(Orange County)的一群华裔母亲创办，她们帮助新来的移民适应学校系统和当地社区。俱乐部的发起者之一莎拉·杨说，当2014年平权行动措施出台时，该组织中的几位家长开始询问他们能做些什么来阻止这种情况。
Ms. Yang has a 19-year-old son who will be a sophomore at the University of Chicago, and a 16-year-old daughter who is entering 11th grade in high school.
莎拉·杨有一个19岁的儿子，他将进入芝加哥大学读大二，她还有一个16岁的女儿，正在读高中11年级。
While the University of Chicago was one of her son’s top choices, Ms. Yang said that there were other elite schools he did not get into.
虽然芝加哥大学是她儿子的首选之一，但莎拉·杨说，还有其他几个精英学校没有录取他。
“Nobody knows for sure what played a role in the decision making,” she said. “But I think in general, race is a part of the equation. How significant, we don’t know. We all understand for Asian kids you must do better in every way in order to get into college compared to other races.”
“没有人确切知道什么在录取决策中发挥了作用，”她说。“但我认为总的来说，种族是等式的一部分。有多重要，我们不知道。我们都明白，与其他种族相比，为了进入大学，亚洲孩子必须在各方面做得更好。”
Ms. Yang said her daughter is mindful of the high standards she faces as an Asian-American to get into elite colleges, and she places extra pressure on herself.
莎拉·说，她的女儿意识到她作为亚裔美国人进入精英大学所面对的高标准，她给了自己额外的压力。
“That’s something that I feel that’s not fair in a way,” Ms. Yang said. “They have to work extremely hard in order to get into their dream school.”
“这在某种程度上是不公平的，”她说。“为了进入他们梦想中的学校，他们必须非常非常努力。”
Ms. Yang said she was familiar with racial struggle. She had to overcome a lot of challenges to become the vice president of engineering at a technology company dominated by white men. Schools, she said, should be the great equalizer, a place where your race or gender should not give you an advantage.
莎拉·说她对种族斗争很熟悉。她克服许多挑战，才成为了一家由白人男性主导的科技公司的工程副总裁。她说，学校应该是一个伟大的、创造公平的地方，一个你的种族或性别不应该给你任何优势的地方。
But affirmative action turned that notion on its head, Ms. Yang said. Of S.C.A. 5, she said, “I didn’t think that the U.S. could have such an unfair bill.”
但她说，平权法案彻底颠覆了这个观念。关于第五号加州宪法修正案，她表示，“我没想到美国能有这么不公平的法案。”
During the fight over the measure, Ms. Yang and other Chinese-Americans in Orange County held meetings, handed out fliers and signed online petitions. They protested in front of the office of Assemblyman Ed Chau, who eventually broke with his fellow Democrats and came out against the bill.
为了抗争，萨拉·杨和奥兰治县的其他华裔美国人开会、发传单、在网上签名请愿。他们到州众议员周本立(Ed Chau)的办公室前举行抗议，他最终与民主党同僚决裂，并出来公开反对该法案。
In late 2014, the group interviewed and endorsed four Republican candidates for the State Legislature who opposed affirmative action. It enlisted dozens of volunteers to campaign for them. All four candidates, none of them incumbents, won.
2014年底，这个团体与四名反对平权行动的共和党州立法机构候选人举行了会面，并对他们表示支持。它招募了数十名志愿者，为他们助选。这四名非现任议员的候选人，都赢得了选举。
“They were a constant presence in my campaign office,” said Young Kim, a Republican who unseated an incumbent Democratic assemblywoman and is now running for Congress. “This was the first time that I knew that there were very active Chinese-American parents that were organizing this movement, specifically to fight against S.C.A. 5.”
“他们经常出现的我的竞选办公室，”共和党人金映玉(Young Kim)说。她取代了现任的民主党州众议院女议员，目前正在竞选国会席位。“这是我第一次知道，有非常活跃的华裔美国父母在组织这场运动，特别是为了奋力抵抗第五号加州宪法修正案。”
Even after winning the fight in California, Mr. Li and other activists remain wary. Mr. Li said it was important to prevent Democrats in the California Legislature from gaining a supermajority that could allow them to pass a bill reinstating affirmative action. He said he was still worried about what the future held for his 13-year-old son, despite his strong academic performance.
即使在加利福尼亚赢得斗争之后，乔治·李和其他活动人士仍然保持着警惕。他表示，重要的是，要防止民主党在加州的立法机构获得绝大多数席位，这可能会让他们得以通过恢复平权行动的法案。他说，他13岁的儿子尽管学习成绩优异，但还是担心他的前途。
“I think for him it’s going to be really, really tough if nothing is changed in current college admissions system policies and practice,” he said. “As an Asian male, it’s going to be very tough for him to get admitted to a top, elite school.”
“我认为，如果现行的大学招生政策和做法不改变的话，对他来说将会非常非常艰难，”他说。“作为亚洲男性，进入顶尖的精英学校将会非常难。”
His daughter is entering her senior year pursuing environmental studies at the University of California, Berkeley — a college Mr. Li said he did not think she would have gotten into if affirmative action had returned to California.
乔治·李的女儿在加州大学伯克利分校(University of California, Berkeley)攻读环境研究，即将念大四。他表示，如果平权行动重回加州，她恐怕是进不了这所大学的。
For many Chinese families, a focus on education is deeply rooted in the tradition they came from.
对于许多中国家庭来说，对教育的重视深深植根于他们的传统。
The civil service exam was a staple of Chinese governance for more than 1,000 years, leading to the rise of a gentry class of bureaucrats who supplanted aristocrats with inherited privileges. The test was a powerful engine of social mobility. The exam was abandoned in 1911, when the Qing imperial dynasty was overthrown.
在1000多年的时间里，科举制度一直是中国主要的统治方式，它导致了一个官僚士绅阶层的崛起，取代了继承特权的贵族。这个考试是社会流动性的强大引擎。随着清朝推翻，科举制度于1911年废除。
Later, under Mao and during the massive upheaval of the Cultural Revolution, schools were closed. When they reopened after the revolution ended in 1976, it was clear just how much the country yearned for education. More than 11 million students flocked to take the college entrance exams over the next two years.
后来，在毛泽东的领导下，以及文革动乱期间，学校停课。1976年文革结束后，它们才恢复招生，这个国家对教育的渴望显而易见，在接下来的两年时间里，有超过1100万的考生参加了高考。
Chinese-Americans, most of whom voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016, are split on whether to support affirmative action. Their support for it has fallen in recent years, from 78 percent in 2012 to 41 percent in 2016, according to the National Asian-American Survey. Among other Asian-Americans over that time, backing for affirmative action has remained consistent, at nearly three in four.
2016年的大选中，大多投票给希拉里·克林顿(Hillary Clinton)的华裔美国人在是否支持平权法案的问题上存在分歧。根据全美亚裔调查(National Asian-American Survey)的数据，他们对该政策的支持率下降，从2012年的78%降至2016年的41%。在同一时期的其他亚裔当中，支持平权行动的比例保持不变，接近四分之三。
Alex T. Tom, the executive director of the Chinese Progressive Association in San Francisco, said that he supports affirmative action because he believes that Asian-Americans, like others, benefit from learning in diverse environments.
旧金山进步华人协会(Chinese Progressive Association)会长亚历克斯·T·汤姆(Alex T. Tom)说，他支持平权行动，因为他相信，亚裔跟其他人一样，也能受益于在多元化的环境中学习。
The son of a Chinese father and Taiwanese mother, Mr. Tom, 42, said he did not get into his two top college choices — the University of California, Berkeley and the University of California, Los Angeles. But he did go to the University of California, San Diego, where he said he was exposed to racially diverse communities.
汤姆今年42岁，父亲是中国人，母亲是台湾人，他说他没有进入自己优先选择的两所大学——加州大学伯克利分校(University of California, Berkeley)和加州大学洛杉矶分校(University of California, Los Angeles)。但他上了加州大学圣地亚哥分校(University of California, San Diego)，他说，在那里，他接触了种族多元化社区。
“There are benefits of living in a pluralistic society,” he said. “And there’s benefits that I gained from being able to have a suite mate who was black, and also someone who was Latino and white.”
“生活在多元化的社会中是有好处的，”他说。“我有一个黑人室友，还有拉丁美洲和白人室友，他们都让我获益匪浅。”
And he said that while some Chinese immigrants may feel that they can overcome potential discrimination by having degrees from elite institutions, they would still face racism.
他说，一些中国移民可能认为他们可以通过获得精英机构的学位来克服潜在歧视，但他们仍然会面临种族主义。
“You’re still, no matter what, seen as kind of like an other in this country,” he said.
“无论如何，你仍然像是这个国家的异类，”他说。
One argument for affirmative action is that it would help correct for the harm done to generations of African-Americans who have faced systemic racism.
平权行动的一个论点是，它有助于纠正几代人都面临系统性种族主义的非裔美国人所受的伤害。
But a number of other Chinese-American activists said they believed that race-based admissions were one of the few things in the United States that represented true discrimination. Tony Xu, a member of the Silicon Valley Chinese Association, said he was not so sure about other allegations of racism.
但其他许多华裔活动人士表示，他们认为，以种族为基础的录取是美国为数不多的、代表着真正歧视的事物之一。硅谷华人协会成员托尼·许(Tony Xu)表示，他对其他种族主义指控就没那么确定了。
“Inside people’s minds, maybe there’s something still there,” he said. “Systematically there’s no discrimination. I don’t believe that; I don’t feel that.”
“在人们头脑里，也许还有一些东西依然存在，”他说。“没有什么系统性的歧视。我不相信;我没有感觉到。”
Instead, activists said the slights they experience — whether it’s someone mocking their accent or the shape of their eyes — are limited to personal interactions.
相反，活动人士说，他们所经历的琐事——无论是他人嘲弄他们的口音还是嘲笑他们眼睛的形状——仅限于个人互动。
“We never feel like this is something the whole society is doing,” Ms. Yang said. “You just more feel like this is just one person. We don’t really feel it is the system that created that discrimination.”
“我们从未觉得这是整个社会所做的事，”莎拉·杨说。“你会觉得这只是个人行为。我们并不真正觉得是体制在制造这种歧视。”
For some of the activists, their political work has led them to take up other issues. In Maryland, a sanctuary city measure proposed in 2017 failed after a Chinese activist group protested it. The law would have barred the use of state and local funds to aid federal immigration enforcement. The Chinese-Americans in opposition said that since they had followed this country’s immigration law and waited patiently for citizenship, others should, too.
一些活动人士的政治工作还导致他们面临其他问题。在马里兰州，一个中国激进组织提出抗议后，2017年提出的一项城市庇护措施没有获得通过。该法律如实施，将禁止使用州和地方资金来帮助联邦移民执法。反对该措施的华裔美国人说，既然他们遵守了这个国家的移民法，耐心等待获得公民身份，其他人也应该这样做。
The Orange Club is now focused on helping Republicans win in midterm races this fall. Orange County is host to a number of competitive House races, and the group is also supporting John Cox, the Republican candidate for governor of California.
金橙俱乐部现在专注于帮助共和党人在今年秋季的中期选举中获胜。奥兰治县有很多竞争激烈的众议院席位角逐，该俱乐部还支持共和党候选人约翰·考克斯(John Cox)竞选加州州长。
In June, a post on an Orange Club page sought to rally volunteers to help in the final days of the congressional primary campaign of Bob Huff, a Republican and former state senator. The article asked followers to add their names to the post if they could help. Twenty-eight people signed up for what was ultimately an unsuccessful campaign.
今年6月，金橙俱乐部页面上的一篇文章呼吁志愿者在共和党和前州参议员鲍勃·赫夫(Bob Huff)的国会初选活动的最后几天提供帮助。文章说，如果拥趸们可以提供帮助，请将自己的名字填写到帖子中。共有28人报名参加，竞选最后失败了。
“Let’s not forget that Bob Huff was alone fighting against S.C.A. 5 in the California Senate in 2014,” the post read, adding that it was time “to pay him back with tangible action. God helps those who help themselves. Helping Bob Huff is helping the Chinese people ourselves.”
“我们不要忘记，2014年，鲍勃·赫夫在加州参议院独自与第五号加州宪法修正案作斗争，”文章说，现在是时候“以实际行动报答他。上帝助自助者。帮助鲍勃·赫夫就是帮助我们华人。”
