Saturday, June 10, 2006
POLITICS HEATING UP IN POLAND
Doug Ireland, a radical journalist and media critic, has a long article on the homosexual politics in Poland at the ZNet website. The article originaly appeared in Gay City News, a New York gay weekly.
Though it may be exaggerated, the article describes a political tinderbox with the potential to erupt into violence today as gay marches take place. The marches are a reaction to a government crackdown on homosexuality/pedophilia. The phrase "Catholic fundamentalist" appears in the article.
"The situation of sexual minorities in Poland is under a very serious attack," said Lisette Kampus of Poland's four-year-old Campaign Against Homophobia.
The state prosecutor's announcement of the investigation of gay groups came in response to a May 12 letter from Wojciech Wierzejski, a front-bench member of Parliament from the League of Polish Families Party, of which Wierzejski is a vice-president. Ultra-homophobic, anti-Semitic, and Catholic fundamentalist, the League recently became part of the hard-right national government led by the Kaczynski twins. A copy of Wierzejski's letter was attached to the state prosecutor's order.
Wierzejski, in his letter, formally demanded an investigation of Poland's LGBT organizations by the interior and justice ministers for "illegal financing," which Wierzejski claimed was from drug trafficking. Wierzejski -- a former leader of the League's violence-prone All Polish Youth -- also equated homosexuality and pedophilia.
That last sentence represents a connection I would not expect to see made in print.
Not long ago there was a report of a Catholic Polish radio station being reprimanded by the Vatican. There were not a lot of details. This article at ZNet sheds some light on what that reprimand was about.
The League's unofficial alliance with the popular and openly anti-Semitic Radio Maryja, the national Catholic radio station led by the demagogic and homophobic Father Tadeusz Rydzyk -- noted for his Jew-baiting and gay-hating discourse -- gives the party a high profile in national debates.
That quote brings up the secondary issue of anti-Semitism, which is dropped in the latter part of the article. Why are anti-Semitism and homosexuality linked in the politics of Poland?
Education plays a prominent role in whatever is taking place over there as well--specifically homosexual education in the schools--which sort of brings the disagreement home to roost, as we see the opposition here to the bishops' "Talking about Touching" sex ed. program. But ours is a war of words. I get the impression from this article that in Poland the words are about to cease and the weapons take over.
Is war being fomented in Europe? And if so, by whom? Or am I over reacting?
