碧昂斯南非世界杯主题曲(蒂芙尼携碧昂丝JAY-Z夫妇珍贵钻石致敬爱情)

本文选自The Washington Post 2021-08-27，约2500字

Diamonds, I’m sorry to say, aren’t Beyoncé’s best friend — even if the Grammy Awardwinning artist and her new corporate partner, Tiffany and Co., would like to make it so. On Monday, Tiffany released a new campaign featuring Beyoncé, husband Jay-Z — and the famed 128.54 carat yellow Tiffany diamond, discovered in South Africa in 1877 at the Kimberley Mine by Charles Lewis Tiffany. His iconic company gleefully lauded the fact that Beyoncé is only the fourth woman — and first Black woman — to wear the glamorous necklace; her predecessors include Audrey Hepburn, who wore the stone in publicity photos for her 1961 movie, “Breakfast at Tiffany’s.” Tiffany may be trying to rebrand, but it has badly misjudged the ethos of the moment.

我很抱歉地说，钻石并不是碧昂丝最好的朋友——即使这位格莱美获奖艺术家和她的新合作伙伴蒂芙尼公司（Tiffany and Co.）愿意这样做。周一，蒂芙尼发布了一项新的宣传活动，其中包括碧昂丝、丈夫杰伊·兹以及著名的128.54克拉黄色蒂芙尼钻石，该钻石于1877年在南非的金伯利矿山由查尔斯·刘易斯·蒂芙尼发现。该公司兴高采烈地称赞碧昂丝是第四位佩戴这条迷人项链的女性，也是第一位黑人女性；她的前任包括奥黛丽·赫本（Audrey Hepburn），她在1961年的电影《蒂芙尼早餐》的宣传照中佩戴了这块宝石。蒂芙尼可能试图重塑品牌，但它严重误判了现在的形势。

Its campaign does not celebrate Black liberation — it elevates a painful symbol of colonialism. It presents an ostentatious display of wealth as a sign of progress in an age when Black Americans possess just 4 percent of the United States’s total household wealth. If Black success is defined by being paid to wear White people’s large colonial diamonds, then we are truly still in the sunken place. As social media users were quick to point out, there is an ugly story — a tale of white supremacy and colonialism — behind the beautiful stone around Beyoncé’s neck.

这次活动并不庆祝黑人解放——它加深了殖民主义痛苦的象征。在美国黑人只拥有全国家庭总财富的4%的这个时代，它以炫耀财富作为进步的标志。如果黑人的成功是通过佩戴白人的大型殖民地钻石来定义的，那么我们真的仍然处于沉没的境地。正如社交媒体用户很快指出的那样，碧昂丝脖子上美丽的石头背后有一个丑陋的故事——白人至上和殖民主义的故事。

In South Africa in the 1870s, when the Tiffany diamond was found. British forces launched battles of conquest and harsh discriminatory practices against African tribes and laborers. South Africa’s conflict-ridden mining industry paved the way for apartheid. Tiffany labeled its new advertising campaign “About Love,” but there’s not much to love about that. Indeed, it’s time that we expand the definition of blood diamonds and conflict minerals. For years, blood diamonds and conflict minerals from Africa were defined narrowly, as resources used by dangerous militias and warlords to finance their operations. But thousands of African lives were lost and communities destroyed in the colonial quest to control the continent’s resources.

在19世纪70年代的南非，蒂芙尼钻石被发现。英国军队对非洲部落和劳工发动了征服战争和残酷的歧视行为。南非冲突不断的采矿业为种族隔离铺平了道路。蒂芙尼给自己的新广告打上了“关于爱”的标签，但这并不是什么值得爱的东西。事实上，是时候扩展血钻和冲突矿物的定义了。多年来，来自非洲的血钻和冲突矿物被狭义地定义为危险的民兵和军阀用来资助其行动的资源。但在殖民时期，为了控制非洲大陆的资源，成千上万的非洲人失去了生命，社区被摧毁。

And today, South Africa’s White minority continues to hold most of the country’s power and wealth. So, yes, it doesn’t go too far to say: Beyoncé is wearing a blood diamond. And she, too, bears responsibility for this tone-deaf misstep. Beyoncé and Jay-Z are entertainers and capitalists, not activists. But as stars who wield immense cultural power and enjoy a huge public platform, what they do matters. Beyoncé’s husband has been willing to partner with organizations that have harmed Black people.

今天，南非的少数白人继续掌握着这个国家的大部分权力和财富。所以，是的，可以这么说:Beyoncé戴着一颗血钻。她也要为这个失误负责。Beyoncé和Jay-Z是艺人和资本家，而不是活动家。但作为拥有巨大文化力量、享受巨大公共平台的明星，他们的所作所为很重要。Beyoncé的丈夫一直愿意与伤害黑人的组织合作。

Jay-Z controversially signed a deal with the NFL, which effectively blackballed Colin Kaepernick for protesting racism, and just recently admitted its practice of “race norming,” deeming that Black players had less cognitive brain function than White or other non-Black athletes for purposes of determining the damages they receive in the concussion litigation. For those of us with African heritage and familiar with the history of colonialism on the continent, what makes Beyoncé’s decision to wear a symbol of White plunder so jarring is that just last year, in the “Black Is King” visual album, she was proclaiming her love for the continent — its people, aesthetic and music.

Jay-Z与NFL签署了一份有争议的协议，该协议实际上是对科林·卡佩尼克（Colin Kaepernick）抗议种族主义的谴责，最近刚刚承认其“种族规范”的做法，“认为黑人运动员比白人或其他非黑人运动员具有更少的认知大脑功能，以确定他们在脑震荡诉讼中受到的损害。对于我们这些有非洲传统、熟悉非洲大陆殖民主义历史的人来说，碧昂斯决定佩戴白人掠夺象征的决定之所以如此刺耳，是因为就在去年，在“黑就是王”视觉专辑中，她宣布了她对非洲大陆的爱——它的人民、美学和音乐。

Then again, she was making that project for us. The Tiffany ad seems clearly aimed at impressing wealthy, Whiter consumers. Tiffany pledged that as part of its campaign it will give $2 million to Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Beyoncé, for her part, has been outspoken about her love for HBCUs and dedicated her live performance at Coachella, as the first Black woman to ever headline, to the culture and sound of HBCU band music and Greek life. But still, the Tiffany pledge is an awfully small drop in the bucket compared with the needs of under- resourced schools and the profit margins of a mega-corporation like Tiffany’s parent company, LVMH, worth more than $300 billion.

话说回来，她是在为我们做那个项目。蒂芙尼的广告显然是为了给富有的白人消费者留下深刻印象。蒂芙尼承诺，作为其活动的一部分，将向历史上的黑人学院和大学捐赠200万美元。至于Beyoncé，她一直直言不讳地表达自己对HBCU的热爱，并作为首位登上新闻头条的黑人女性，将她在科切拉音乐节的现场表演奉献给HBCU乐队音乐和希腊生活的文化和声音。但是，与资源不足的学校的需求相比，蒂芙尼的承诺只是杯水车薪，而蒂芙尼的母公司LVMH等大型企业的利润率则超过3000亿美元。

And, as a recent Post analysis shows, big corporations find it easier to donate to “safe” causes for Black people such as education, rather than controversial, but crucial issues such as police and criminal justice reform. And therein lies the fundamental lesson of the era of racial justice capitalism. Black liberation cannot come from the same institutions that engorged themselves for decades on exploited Black labor. Charity will not save us.

而且，正如《华盛顿邮报》最近的一项分析显示，大公司发现向教育等对黑人来说“安全”的事业捐款更容易，而不是向警察和刑事司法改革等有争议但至关重要的问题捐款。这就是种族公正资本主义时代的基本教训。黑人的解放不可能来自那些数十年来依靠剥削黑人劳工而膨胀的机构。施舍救不了我们。

Only a fundamental reimagining of our society and sincere efforts at reparations will do that. Companies cannot so easily #BlackGirlMagic their way into sudden social relevancy and supposed corporate responsibility. “I got diamonds on my neck / got diamonds on my records,” Beyoncé sings in her song “Kitty Kat.” Good for her. But the “About Love” campaign makes another line from that song come to mind, “I’m not feelin’ it.” The bad news for the singer and Tiffany: I’m probably not the only one.

只有从根本上重新审视我们的社会，并真诚地努力赔偿，才能做到这一点。企业不可能如此轻易地通过#黑女孩魔力来突然获得社会关联和理应承担的企业责任。Beyoncé在她的歌曲《Kitty Kat》中唱道:“我的脖子上有钻石/我的唱片上有钻石。”但“关于爱”活动让我想起了那首歌的另一句歌词:“我没有感觉。”对于这位歌手和蒂凡尼来说，坏消息是:我可能不是唯一一个这样做的人。