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Polish society is still liberal. Please do not think our current government and their actions are representative of what Poles think and support. Majority is at

by grzaks 8y ago

Polish society is still liberal. Please do not think our current government and their actions are representative of what Poles think and support. Majority is at the moment fighting our own government ...

imhoguy 8y ago
Somehow majority choses such goverment during democratic voting.
- ergo14 8y ago
  D'Hondt method led to this outcome.
- dvfjsdhgfv 8y ago
  Very far from majority. The right-wing party got 37.58% with the turnout of 50.92%. Their main argument, repeated and nauseam, was "We will gave 125€ a month per child to everyone". It turned out partially false afterwards, but a new tradition of buying votes for money has been born.
  - davchana 8y ago
    Literally same promise was made by Indian Prime Minister in 2014 elections, to give Rs 15,00,000 to each citizen from all the unaccounted black money stored in foreign countries by Indians. After he got elected, his party said it was just a saying, not an actual promise.
    - unmole 8y ago
      Nope, the two are not even remotely comparable.
      - davchana 8y ago
        I mean, the promise of paying money if elected; & later receding from that promise; is common in between both.
  - kingofhdds 8y ago
    That's how democracy works everywhere. Majority within voting part of society decides who will rule, and it's ok because non-voting part doesn't care. Also, every election is a fair of promises. This gov't at least partially fulfilled theirs, no wonder their voting base is the largest.
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
- ajuc 8y ago
  37% of people who bothered to vote. With about 50% not bothering to do so. After 8 years of "liberal" party ruling and some scandals. It's like calling USA conservative because they voted Trump.
HyperTalk2 8y ago
I like your sense of humor.
maze-le 8y ago
I am german and have some polish friends. They are among the most liberal people I know, sometimes a bit crazy, but always open for new developments and people. This is why I find it so strange, that all the Poles I know seem like a direct contradiction to the current government of Poland. I always supposed, that the liberals ind Poland are more open towards migration to Germany or the UK, so that the ones that are staying tend to be a bit more conservative. Do you think that has something to do with it, or are other factors more important (despite all the criticism, the PIS does seem to care more about families and general social security)?
- bitL 8y ago
  You are in touch with extreme part of their society, i.e. people adventurous enough to move abroad taking much higher risks; the comfortable ones likely stay at home and vote as their low-risk strategy leads them to. You probably also aren't interfacing with people that were literally pushed out of the country for survival reasons, forced to take menial jobs abroad and experience "2nd class citizen" at full scale either; those might vote against liberal values as well and would prefer stronger state to take care of them.
- tannhaeuser 8y ago
  I've got the same impression, but a Pole I'm currently working with told me that election results only represent about 30% of the electorate, and that things are complicated as far as societal groups go - more liberal groups would be associated with former-socialist parties, the church being seen as representing the (economic interest of the) "establishment"; things like that. Maybe a a Pole could explain it better.
- ajuc 8y ago
  Selection bias. Learn Polish and go talk to someone in small village in Podkarpacie to understand PIS. As for political explanation: basically, PIS is the only economically socialist party in Poland right now. They introduced social programs on unprecedented scale. The part of Poland that was mostly ignored by the transformation is voting them because of that. Think Trump and Rust Belt, but if Trump actually did something. There are some fringe leftist parties but they have like 1-3% support and aren't in the parliament. Also, because of forced communism in 1945-1989, and right-wing propaganda everywhere for the last 29 years - "left" is very bad political brand to associate with in Poland. People seriously criticize politicians and want to jail them for "propagating a totalitarian regime" (which is a crime in Poland) when they wear Karl Marx on a t-shirt, to give you an idea how bad it is :) So, PIS managed to persuade Poles that socialist economical policy is actually right-wing, because they associate with church and call everybody else leftists and communists. They are also anti-business, and anti-EU. And there is also a healthy dose of xenophoby (Muslim refuges will come if you vote PO and rape you or do terrorism), and conservatism (LGBT is relatively unpopular in Poland, even among young people, compared to the west). I try to avoid this label, because it stops all discussion, but they are basically national socialists (without the death camps).
jxub 8y ago
For the record, my submission of the article above doesn't mean that I think Poland is not liberal in any way (I'm Polish by the way). I just found the article pretty in-depth and interesting thus worthy of posting here.
- ajuc 8y ago
  It's interesting for me (as a Pole), but for the opposite reason to the author - I'm interested in the parables to Polish history he found looking from angolsaxon protestant POV. I was aware of some of them (Magna Carta, Habeas Corpus), but not all.
- VSerge 8y ago
  Thanks a lot for posting this, I had never encountered Poland in history classes (French edu system) except for the 20th century history parts, and had no idea about either the Union in itself or its political system. We heard a lot about the Italian quattrocento, as it lead up to the French Renaissance, but of what was happening in Poland, not a peep. In the same fashion, we didn't hear that much about even the holy German empire, as history in France is taught in a very French-centric way from the fall of the Roman Empire up to the 1st world war. I think it would do us a world of good to approach history in a more global fashion, paying less attention to rote learning of chronologies, and hearing more about the stories of ideas and peoples throughout the ages.
cube2222 8y ago
The main problem is, even though the government is fairly bad, the opposition is just as bad. Mainly, the PR and political agenda of the opposition just doesn't exist. The recent political ideas of the opposition are just the government's ideas with a small twist. So yea, we are fighting them, we're protesting, but we don't have seriously viable well organized alternatives, which is why they'll probably win again. Fortunately, they're becoming less anti-EU as time passes, which gives me hope, that at least we'll be heading in the overall EU-wide direction.
daliusd 8y ago
I spent a week in Poland and saw homosexual girls passionately kissing in the public and more burkas than I have expected. Overall more liberal than I have expected from the public image we see here in Lithuania.
- interfixus 8y ago
  Oh yes, that great beacon of liberality, the burka.
  - somebadguy 8y ago
    Oh do fuck off you ignorant little shit
  - daliusd 8y ago
    Having in mind how Christian and anti-migrant Poland looks like in our press it is surprisingly is. E.g. burqas are banned in France :)
    - mk89 8y ago
      Would you call France a non-liberal place?
      - daliusd 8y ago
        Surprisingly I was in Paris this year as well and... OK, jokes asides :-) France is liberal place. No discussion here. Burqas ban is not changing that. In my opinion, context is important. Poland being Islamophobic, while France is not.
    - kingofhdds 8y ago
      And press doesn't call France illiberal. So, either burqa is not the evidence, or press is not that correct. Or both.
      - daliusd 8y ago
zmix 8y ago
Then, who voted for them, if not the Polish?
- mk89 8y ago
  Probably postal voting. Or, wait, maybe they got hacked (if they use electronic voting)! These are the new excuses to "justify" the recent governments or anything else that people fail to accept or see around themselves.
kingofhdds 8y ago
This is weird statement. Majority doesn't care too much about political ideologies in Poland as in any other country. Meanwhile the ruling party still gets more voters than any other.
tasuki 8y ago
As a fairly liberal Czech spending a lot of time in Poland, I've got to disagree with Polish society being liberal. Obviously, there are lots of liberal Poles, but from my observations they are the minority. Wanted to write more, but perhaps I'll leave it at that...
ntlk 8y ago
It absolutely is not. As a queer person I had to emigrate to escape the living hell that was existence in Poland.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

by grzaks 8y ago

imhoguy 8y ago

Somehow majority choses such goverment during democratic voting.

ergo14 8y ago
D'Hondt method led to this outcome.
dvfjsdhgfv 8y ago
Very far from majority. The right-wing party got 37.58% with the turnout of 50.92%. Their main argument, repeated and nauseam, was "We will gave 125€ a month per child to everyone". It turned out partially false afterwards, but a new tradition of buying votes for money has been born.
- davchana 8y ago
  Literally same promise was made by Indian Prime Minister in 2014 elections, to give Rs 15,00,000 to each citizen from all the unaccounted black money stored in foreign countries by Indians. After he got elected, his party said it was just a saying, not an actual promise.
  - unmole 8y ago
    Nope, the two are not even remotely comparable.
    - davchana 8y ago
      I mean, the promise of paying money if elected; & later receding from that promise; is common in between both.
- kingofhdds 8y ago
  That's how democracy works everywhere. Majority within voting part of society decides who will rule, and it's ok because non-voting part doesn't care. Also, every election is a fair of promises. This gov't at least partially fulfilled theirs, no wonder their voting base is the largest.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
ajuc 8y ago
37% of people who bothered to vote. With about 50% not bothering to do so. After 8 years of "liberal" party ruling and some scandals. It's like calling USA conservative because they voted Trump.

HyperTalk2 8y ago

I like your sense of humor.

maze-le 8y ago

I am german and have some polish friends. They are among the most liberal people I know, sometimes a bit crazy, but always open for new developments and people. This is why I find it so strange, that all the Poles I know seem like a direct contradiction to the current government of Poland. I always supposed, that the liberals ind Poland are more open towards migration to Germany or the UK, so that the ones that are staying tend to be a bit more conservative. Do you think that has something to do with it, or are other factors more important (despite all the criticism, the PIS does seem to care more about families and general social security)?

bitL 8y ago
You are in touch with extreme part of their society, i.e. people adventurous enough to move abroad taking much higher risks; the comfortable ones likely stay at home and vote as their low-risk strategy leads them to. You probably also aren't interfacing with people that were literally pushed out of the country for survival reasons, forced to take menial jobs abroad and experience "2nd class citizen" at full scale either; those might vote against liberal values as well and would prefer stronger state to take care of them.
tannhaeuser 8y ago
I've got the same impression, but a Pole I'm currently working with told me that election results only represent about 30% of the electorate, and that things are complicated as far as societal groups go - more liberal groups would be associated with former-socialist parties, the church being seen as representing the (economic interest of the) "establishment"; things like that. Maybe a a Pole could explain it better.
ajuc 8y ago
Selection bias. Learn Polish and go talk to someone in small village in Podkarpacie to understand PIS. As for political explanation: basically, PIS is the only economically socialist party in Poland right now. They introduced social programs on unprecedented scale. The part of Poland that was mostly ignored by the transformation is voting them because of that. Think Trump and Rust Belt, but if Trump actually did something. There are some fringe leftist parties but they have like 1-3% support and aren't in the parliament. Also, because of forced communism in 1945-1989, and right-wing propaganda everywhere for the last 29 years - "left" is very bad political brand to associate with in Poland. People seriously criticize politicians and want to jail them for "propagating a totalitarian regime" (which is a crime in Poland) when they wear Karl Marx on a t-shirt, to give you an idea how bad it is :) So, PIS managed to persuade Poles that socialist economical policy is actually right-wing, because they associate with church and call everybody else leftists and communists. They are also anti-business, and anti-EU. And there is also a healthy dose of xenophoby (Muslim refuges will come if you vote PO and rape you or do terrorism), and conservatism (LGBT is relatively unpopular in Poland, even among young people, compared to the west). I try to avoid this label, because it stops all discussion, but they are basically national socialists (without the death camps).

jxub 8y ago

For the record, my submission of the article above doesn't mean that I think Poland is not liberal in any way (I'm Polish by the way). I just found the article pretty in-depth and interesting thus worthy of posting here.

ajuc 8y ago
It's interesting for me (as a Pole), but for the opposite reason to the author - I'm interested in the parables to Polish history he found looking from angolsaxon protestant POV. I was aware of some of them (Magna Carta, Habeas Corpus), but not all.
VSerge 8y ago
Thanks a lot for posting this, I had never encountered Poland in history classes (French edu system) except for the 20th century history parts, and had no idea about either the Union in itself or its political system. We heard a lot about the Italian quattrocento, as it lead up to the French Renaissance, but of what was happening in Poland, not a peep. In the same fashion, we didn't hear that much about even the holy German empire, as history in France is taught in a very French-centric way from the fall of the Roman Empire up to the 1st world war. I think it would do us a world of good to approach history in a more global fashion, paying less attention to rote learning of chronologies, and hearing more about the stories of ideas and peoples throughout the ages.

cube2222 8y ago

The main problem is, even though the government is fairly bad, the opposition is just as bad. Mainly, the PR and political agenda of the opposition just doesn't exist. The recent political ideas of the opposition are just the government's ideas with a small twist. So yea, we are fighting them, we're protesting, but we don't have seriously viable well organized alternatives, which is why they'll probably win again. Fortunately, they're becoming less anti-EU as time passes, which gives me hope, that at least we'll be heading in the overall EU-wide direction.

daliusd 8y ago

I spent a week in Poland and saw homosexual girls passionately kissing in the public and more burkas than I have expected. Overall more liberal than I have expected from the public image we see here in Lithuania.

interfixus 8y ago
Oh yes, that great beacon of liberality, the burka.
- somebadguy 8y ago
  Oh do fuck off you ignorant little shit
- daliusd 8y ago
  Having in mind how Christian and anti-migrant Poland looks like in our press it is surprisingly is. E.g. burqas are banned in France :)
  - mk89 8y ago
    Would you call France a non-liberal place?
    - daliusd 8y ago
      Surprisingly I was in Paris this year as well and... OK, jokes asides :-) France is liberal place. No discussion here. Burqas ban is not changing that. In my opinion, context is important. Poland being Islamophobic, while France is not.
  - kingofhdds 8y ago
    And press doesn't call France illiberal. So, either burqa is not the evidence, or press is not that correct. Or both.
    - daliusd 8y ago

zmix 8y ago

Then, who voted for them, if not the Polish?

mk89 8y ago
Probably postal voting. Or, wait, maybe they got hacked (if they use electronic voting)! These are the new excuses to "justify" the recent governments or anything else that people fail to accept or see around themselves.

kingofhdds 8y ago

This is weird statement. Majority doesn't care too much about political ideologies in Poland as in any other country. Meanwhile the ruling party still gets more voters than any other.

tasuki 8y ago

As a fairly liberal Czech spending a lot of time in Poland, I've got to disagree with Polish society being liberal. Obviously, there are lots of liberal Poles, but from my observations they are the minority. Wanted to write more, but perhaps I'll leave it at that...

ntlk 8y ago

It absolutely is not. As a queer person I had to emigrate to escape the living hell that was existence in Poland.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]