2. 职称英语
  3. In a letter to a friend, George Orwell wrote, "It is impossible to mention Je

In a letter to a friend, George Orwell wrote, "It is impossible to mention Je

游客2025-03-30  14
问题    In a letter to a friend, George Orwell wrote, "It is impossible to mention Jews in print, either favorably or unfavorably, without getting into trouble." But there are times when trouble had better be got into before mere trouble turns into catastrophe. Jews, blacks, and homosexualists are despised by the majorities of East and West. Also, as a result of the invention of Israel, Jews can now count on the hatred of the Islamic world. Since [America’s] own Christian majority looks to be getting ready for great adventures at home and abroad, I would suggest that the three despised minorities join forces in order not to be destroyed. This seems an obvious thing to do. Unfortunately, most Jews refuse to see any similarity between their special situation and that of the same-sexers. At one level, the Jews are perfectly correct. A racial or religious or tribal identity is a kind of fact. Although sexual preference is an even more powerful fact, it is not one that creates any particular social or cultural or religious bond between those so-minded. Although Jews would doubtless be Jews if there was no anti-Semitism, same-sexers would think little or nothing at all about their preference if society ignored it. So there is a difference between the two estates. But there is no difference in the degree of hatred felt by the Christian majority for Christ-killers and Sodomites. In the German concentration camps, Jews wore yellow stars while homosexualists wore pink triangles. I was present when Christopher Isherwood tried to make this point to a young Jewish movie producer. "After all, " said Isherwood, "Hitler killed six hundred thousand homosexuals." The young man was not impressed. "But Hitler killed six million Jews, " he said sternly. "What are you?" asked Isherwood. "In real estate?"
   Like it or not, Jews and homosexualists are in the same fragile boat, and one would have to be pretty obtuse not to see the common danger. But obtuseness is the name of the game among New York’s new class. Harper’s Magazine and Commentary usually publish these pieces, though other periodicals are not above printing the odd expose of the latest homosexual conspiracy to turn the United States over to the Soviet Union or to structuralism or to Christian Dior. Although the new class’s thoughts are never much in themselves, and they themselves are no more than spear carriers in the political and cultural life of the West, their prejudices and superstitions do register in a subliminal way, making mephitic the air of Manhattan if not of the Republic.
   Although the kindness of strangers is much sought after, gay liberation has not got much support from anyone. Natural allies like the Jews are often virulent in their attacks. Blacks in their ghettos, Chicanos in their barrios, and rednecks in their pulpits also have been influenced by the same tribal taboos. That Jews and blacks and Chicanos and rednecks all contribute to the ranks of the same-sexers only increases the madness.
   Herewith the burden of The Boys on the Beach: since homosexualists choose to be the way they are out of idle hatefulness, it has been a mistake to allow them to come out of the closet to the extent that they have, but now that they are out (which most are not), they will have no choice but to face up to their essential hatefulness and abnormality and so be driven to kill themselves with promiscuity, drugs, and suicide. Not even the authors of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion ever suggested that the Jews, who were so hateful to them, were also hateful to themselves. So Decter has managed to go one step further than the Protocols’ authors; she is indeed a virtuoso of hate, and thus do pogroms begin. [br] In the second paragraph, obtuseness is used to mean______.
选项 A、being unwilling to understand or grasp new concepts
B、Jewish dislike of homosexuals
C、mental or emotional disability
D、deficit of understanding
答案 A
解析 根据第二段中的“Like it or not，Jews and homosexualists are in the same fragile boat，and one would have to be pretty obtuse not to see the common danger.”可知，不管是否喜欢，犹太人和同性恋者都在同一条脆弱的船上，而人们却不得不迟钝地对于这种众所周知的危险视而不见。因而，obtuseness表示“故意地拒绝接受”，因而A项“不愿意理解接受新观念”正确。
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