[(Title)] The Guardian view on the fight against fake news: neutrality is not an option

House of Commons select committees often do useful work.

下议院选出的委员会常常做写有用的工作。

Yet very few of them produce reports with the potential to reshape the political landscape.

然而，他们当中很少有人提出能够重塑政治格局的报告。

The weekend report by the Commons digital, culture, media and sport committee on disinformation and “fake news” is one of these exceptions.

数字文化委员会、媒体和体育委员会有关虚假消息和“假新闻”的周末报告则是一个例外。

What started in 2017 as a herbivorous munch through some of the issues surrounding fake news, the future of journalism and digital advertising has evolved into part of the tooth-and-claw battle for power with the digital tech companies and partisan campaigners over the future of democracy.

从2017年开始，通过围绕假新闻的一些问题开始，新闻业和数字广告的未来已经发展成为与数字技术公司和党派活动家就未来民主争夺权力的一部分。

that deserves to be described as essential reading because it deals with issues demanding essential action.

其结果是一份值得一读的报告，因为它涉及需要采取基本行动的问题。

For this is subject-matter on which neutrality is not an option.

围绕这一主题，中立性不是一个选项。

The government’s reaction to it will be a defining statement of its own moral seriousness and worthiness to govern.

政府对此的反应将是其自身道德严肃性和治理价值的决定性陈述。

The issues raised  are existential for parliamentary democracy and for rational public policy-making.

这个问题对议会民主和理性的公共决策至关重要。

As the report confesses,  has learned a truth about which too much of the political and media class, as well as the public itself, remains in denial.

正如报告所承认的那样，已经了解了一个事实，即过多的政治和媒体阶层以及公众本身仍被无视。

“What became clear,” the report says, “is that, without the knowledge of most politicians and election regulators across the world, not to mention the wider public, a small group of individuals and businesses had been influencing elections across different jurisdictions in recent years.” As that implies, this is an internationally aware report about an international problem that ultimately will require an international solution.

报告说，“很明显的是，在世界上大多数政治家和选举监管者都不知道的情况下，更不用说广大公众了，近年来，一小撮个人和企业一直在影响不同司法管辖区的选举。“这意味着，这是一份关于国际问题的国际意识报告，最终需要国际解决方案。

Even so, there will only be any kind of international solution if national parliaments and governments grasp what is at stake first.

即便如此，只有国家议会和政府能够首先掌握利害攸关的东西，才可能找到国际解决方案。

What is at stake is the threat from unregulated social media monopolies and from bold and well-funded activist conspiracies.

这关系到来自不受监管的社会媒体垄断的威胁以及激进和资金充裕的活动分子的阴谋。

The report has many new and disturbing things to say about Russian dirty tricks and destabilisation, Facebook’s consistent refusals to acknowledge its practical, moral or legal responsibilities, and the reckless audacity and contempt with which groups like SCL Elections, , Global Science Research and Aggregate IQ – as well as the Vote Leave and Leave.EU campaigns – defied the regulatory authorities and the whole idea of the rule of law in politics.

这份报告有许多新的令人不安的事情要说，比如俄罗斯的肮脏伎俩和破坏稳定，Facebook一贯拒绝承认其实际、道德或法律责任，以及SCL选举、全球科学研究和总智商等团体的鲁莽大胆和蔑视，以及英国脱欧投票——无视监管当局和整个政治法治理念。

It is not impossible that this superior ruthlessness, audacity and defiance enabled the leave side to win the 2016 referendum with its anti-immigration messages.

这一卓越的冷酷、大胆和蔑视使得脱欧方能够以反移民信息赢得2016年全民公决，这不是不可能的。

If that isn’t shocking, then the word has no meaning.

如果这还不够令人震惊，那么震惊这个词就没有意义。

Yet what is ultimately at stake here  even more than the past.

然而,这里最终要处理的问题比过去更为严重.

The report is a wake-up call about the failures of traditional governance.

这份报告警醒地呼吁人们注意传统治理的失败。

The need for rules and enforcement cannot be tackled by what the committee calls “blunt, reactive and outmoded legislative instruments”.

委员会称之为"迟钝、被动和过时的立法文书"，无法解决规则和执法的需要。

But it can be tackled by absolute clarity about the threat and its impact in every future electoral contest.

但解决这一问题的办法可以是，绝对明确这一威胁及其在未来的每一个选举选举中产生的影响。

This will require not just modernised regulation but education – which the committee boldly says should be funded by a levy on the social media companies – about digitally literacy and truthfulness.

这不仅需要现代监管，还要求教育——委员会大胆地说，教育应该通过向社交媒体公司征收所得税来筹集——关于数字化的识字率和真实性。

Only government can ensure this.

只有政府才能保证这一点。

In his statement accompanying the launch of the report, the committee chair, Damian Collins, a populist Tory centrist, sets the bar high.

在报告发布的同时，委员会主席，民粹主义保守派中间派达米安·柯林斯（Damian Collins）设定了高标准。

“We are facing nothing less than a crisis in our democracy,” he says, “based on the systematic manipulation of data to support the relentless targeting of citizens, without their consent, by campaigns of disinformation and messages of hate.”

“我们所面临的不仅仅是一个民主危机，”他说，“基于系统操纵数据，支持未经公民同意，通过散布谣言和散布仇恨的信息而不懈地针对公民。

These are extraordinary words – yet every part of his statement should be taken seriously.

这些话是非同寻常——但他的发言的每个部分都应当认真对待。

The democratic crisis is all around us in the era of Trump and .

在特朗普时代，民主危机就在我们周围。

The systematic unaccountable manipulation of data is a sleepless reality of the digital era about which the public and public bodies remain naive.

对数据的系统的无名操纵是数字时代的一个令人不眠的现实，对此公众和公共机构仍然一无所知。

The lack of consent goes to the heart of an unequal relationship in which public control is lacking over a too-often lawless and amoral space in people’s lives.

缺乏共识是不平等关系的核心，这种关系缺乏公共控制，在人们生活中，这种关系常常是没有法律和道德空间的。

And the campaigns of disinformation and messages of hate – unchecked and uncontrolled – threaten the rational basis of discourse and policy-making without which mutual trust cannot function.

而不受约束和不受控制的造谣和传播仇恨的运动，进一步威胁着讨论和决策的合理基础，而没有这一基础，相互信任则无法发挥作用。