又中又英 | Dead cat strategy | 褚簡寧

　　Imagine a group of people sitting at a dinner table discussing a scandal about a politician that continues to dominate the news. Then imagine the politician suddenly appearing to throw a dead cat on the dining table among the dishes of food. What would the people at the table do? They would be so shocked that they would forget about the scandal affecting the politician and discuss the dead cat instead. This is called the dead cat strategy, also known as deadcatting. 

　　The dead cat strategy is a political tactic to deliberately introduce a shocking or attention-grabbing event to shift media and public focus away from the original issue, such as a scandal. Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is said to have used the dead cat strategy several times after the media reported that he and his staff had parties at the garden of 10 Downing Street, the office and residence of British prime ministers, during the 2020 Covid lockdown. The media, opposition parties, and the public continued to focus on the scandal. Johnson unsuccessfully tried several dead cat strategies, including proposing to send asylum seekers to Rwanda.

　　But the lockdown parties and other scandals eventually forced him to resign. US President Donald Trump is also using dead cat strategies to divert continuous media attention on the scandal involving his past friendship with multimillionaire Jeffrey Epstein, a child sex offender who victimized numerous young girls. Epstein was found dead by hanging in prison in 2019 before his trial. Trump's unsuccessful dead cat strategies included accusing former President Barack Obama of treason to divert demands for him to release the Epstein files said to contain a list of powerful friends of Epstein who partied with underaged girls.

　　試想像一下，一群人正圍坐飯桌旁，討論着一個政客的相關醜聞，該醜聞一直霸佔新聞篇幅。再想像，該政客突然出現，向着滿桌食物的飯桌丟一隻死貓，那一桌人會怎樣做？他們會震驚得立時忘掉那樁影響政客的醜聞，轉為談論那隻死貓。這就叫作 dead cat strategy，或稱為deadcatting。

　　Dead cat strategy是一種刻意引入一項震驚或引人注意的事情，以從原有的議題例如醜聞上轉移傳媒與大眾的焦點。當傳媒報道，前英國首相鮑里斯．約翰遜和他的員工於2020年新冠肺炎封城抗疫期間，在唐寧街十號，就是英國首相官邸與辦公室的花園辧派對後，約翰遜就被認為曾數度使用死貓策略（dead cat strategies）。傳媒、反對黨及公眾卻仍繼續專注在醜聞之上。約翰遜幾度嘗試運用死貓策略（dead cat strategies）但不果，包括提議將尋求政治庇護者送往盧旺達。

　　然而，這個封城下的派對以及其他醜聞最終逼使他辭任。美國總統特朗普也有運用死貓策略（dead cat strategies），去引開傳媒對他過往與億萬富豪謝菲．愛潑斯坦情誼的關注，愛潑斯坦是個侵犯兒童的性罪犯，令無數年輕女孩受害。愛潑斯坦於2019年，在其審訊前被發現上吊死亡。特朗普不成功的死貓策略（dead cat strategies）包括指控前總統巴拉克．奧巴馬叛國，以轉移外界促他公開愛潑斯坦檔案的要求，而檔案是包含了愛潑斯坦那些找未成年少女尋歡、具勢力的朋友名單。

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Michael Chugani褚簡寧
中譯：七刻