2. 外语
  3. Over the past century, all kinds of unfairness and discrimination have been condemned or made illegal. But one insidious form co

Over the past century, all kinds of unfairness and discrimination have been condemned or made illegal. But one insidious form co

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问题     Over the past century, all kinds of unfairness and discrimination have been condemned or made illegal. But one insidious form continues to thrive: alphabetism. This, for those as yet unaware of such a disadvantage, refers to discrimination against those whose surnames begin with a letter in the lower half of the alphabet.
    It has long been known that a taxi firm called AAAA cars has a big advantage over Zodiac cars when customers thumb through their phone directories. Less well known is the advantage that Adam Abbott has in life over Zoё Zysman. English names are fairly evenly spread between the halves of the alphabet. Yet a suspiciously large number of top people have surnames beginning with letters between A and K.
    Thus the American president and vice-president have surnames starting with B and C respectively; and 26 of George Bush’s predecessors (including his father) had surnames in the first half of the alphabet against just 16 in the second half. Even more striking, six of the seven heads of government of the G7 rich countries are alphabetically advantaged (Berlusconi, Blair, Bush, Chirac, Chrétien and Koizumi). The world’s three top central bankers (Greenspan, Duisenberg and Hayami) are all close to the top of the alphabet, even if one of them really uses Japanese characters. As are the world’s five richest men (Gates, Buffet, Allen, Ellison and Albrecht).
    Can this merely be coincidence? One theory, dreamt up in all the spare time enjoyed by the alphabetically disadvantaged, is that the rot sets in early. At the start of the first year in infant school, teachers seat pupils alphabetically from the front, to make it easier to remember their names. So short-sighted Zysman junior gets stuck in the back row, and is rarely asked the improving questions posed by those insensitive teachers. At the time the alphabetically disadvantaged may think they have had a lucky escape. Yet the result may be worse qualifications, because they get less individual attention, as well as less confidence in speaking publicly.
    The humiliation continues. At university graduation ceremonies, the ABCs proudly get their awards first; by the time they reach the Zysmans most people are literally having a ZZZ. Shortlists for job interviews, election ballot papers, lists of conference speakers and attendees, all tend to be drawn up alphabetically, and their recipients lose interest as they plough through them.
Which of the following is true according to the text?
选项 A、People with surnames beginning with N to Z are often ill-treated.
B、VIPs in the Western world gain a great deal from alphabetism.
C、The campaign to eliminate alphabetism still has a long way to go.
D、Putting things alphabetically may lead to unintentional bias.
答案D
解析 本题的四个选项中，只有D项为正确答案。这可从文中内容推知，即根据字母的先后排序的做法可能导致偏见。A项不正确，文章并没有说姓的打头字母从N到Z的人受到虐待这个意思，只是说他们遭受到不引人注意的不平等。对于B项，文章中也没有明确指出这样的意思。C项文章没有涉及。
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