Polonophobia
Encyclopedia
The terms Polonophobia, anti-Polonism, antipolonism and anti-Polish sentiment refer to a spectrum of hostile attitudes toward Polish people
and culture
. These terms apply to racial prejudice against Poles and people of Polish descent, including ethnicity-based discrimination
and state-sponsored mistreatment of Poles. This led to genocide
during World War II
, notably by the German Nazis
and Ukrainian nationalists
.
Anti-Polish sentiment often entails modern-day derogatory stereotyping.
from the ) was coined in Poland
before 1919. It was used by progressive Polish thinkers such as Jan Józef Lipski
during the Solidarity years in connection with allegations of Polish antisemitism. It reappeared in Polish nationalist circles in the 1990s and eventually entered mainstream use, reflected in leading Polish newspapers such as Gazeta Wyborcza
. In recent years, anti-Polonism, or Polonophobia, has been studied at length in scholarly works by Polish, German, American and Russian researchers.
A historic example of Polonophobia was polakożerstwo (in English, "the devouring of Poles") — a Polish term introduced during the 19th century in relation to the annexed areas of Poland
. It described the forcible suppression of Polish culture, education and religion, and the elimination of Poles from public life and from landed property in Eastern Germany under Otto von Bismarck
, especially during the Kulturkampf
and up to the end of World War I
. Similar policies were implemented, mainly under Tsar Nicholas II, in the Polish territories that had been annexed by the Russian Empire
.
Historic actions inspired by anti-Polonism ranged from felonious acts motivated by hatred, to physical extermination of the Polish nation, the goal of which was to eradicate the Polish state. During World War II, when most of Polish society became the object of Nazi genocidal
policies, German anti-Polonism led to a campaign of mass murder.
At present, among those who most often express their hostile attitude towards the Polish people are various Russia
n politicians and their far-right political parties who search for a new imperial identity.
during the partitions of Poland
. For instance Johann Georg Forster
, a German beneficiary of the Polish Commission of National Education at Vilnius University
, dismissed the idea that the Poles were a part of European culture, comparing them to primitive tribes in his "scandalized" writings, and portraying Poland as an underdeveloped, uncivilized land awaiting the importation of Kultur from "truly civilized countries". Such views were later repeated in the German ideas of Lebensraum
and exploited by the Nazis. German academics in the 18th – 20th century attempted to project, in the difference between Germany and Poland, a "boundary between civilization and barbarism; high German Kultur and primitive Slavdom" (1793 racist diatribe by J.C. Schulz republished by the Nazis in 1941). Prussian officials eager to secure Polish partition, encouraged the view that the Poles were culturally inferior and in need of Prussian tutelage. Not surprisingly, such racist texts published from 18th century on, were republished by the German Reich prior to and after its Invasion of Poland.
Frederick the Great nourished a particular hatred and contempt for Polish people. Following his conquest of Poland, he compared the Poles to "Iroquois" of Canada. His all-encompassing anti-Polish campaign was exemplified in that even the nobility of Polish background living in Prussia were obliged to pay higher taxes than that of German heritage. Polish monasteries were viewed as "lairs of idleness" and their property often seized by Prussian authorities. The prevalent Catholicism among Poles was stigmatized. The Polish language was persecuted on all levels.
When Poland lost the last vestiges of its independence in 1795 and remained partitioned for 123 years
, ethnic Poles were subjected to discrimination on two separate fronts: the Germanization under Prussia
n and later German rule, and Russification
in the territories annexed by the Imperial Russia.
Being a Polish person under the Russian occupation was in itself almost culpable – wrote Russian historian Liudmila Gatagova
. – "Practically all of the Russian government, bureaucracy, and society were united in one outburst against the Poles." – "Rumor mongers informed the population about an order that had supposedly been given to kill [...] and take away their land." Polish culture and religion were seen as threats to Russian imperial ambitions. Tsarist Namestniks suppressed them on Polish lands by force. Russian anti-Polish campaign, which included confiscation of Polish nobles' property, was being waged in the arenas of education, religion as well as language. Polish schools and universities were being closed in a stepped up campaign of russification. In addition to executions and mass deportations of Poles to Katorga
camps, Tsar Nicholas I established an occupation army at Poland's expense.
The fact that Poles – unlike the Russians – were overwhelmingly of Catholic faith, gave impetus to their religious persecution. At the same time, with the emergence of Panslavist ideology, Russian writers accused the Polish nation of betraying their "Slavic family" because of their armed efforts aimed at regaining independence. Hostility toward Poles was present in many of Russia's literary works and media of the time.
Pushkin, together with three other poets, published a pamphlet called "On the Taking of Warsaw" to celebrate the crushing of the revolt
. His contribution to the frenzy of anti-Polish writing was composed of poems in which he hailed the capitulation of Warsaw as a new "triumph" of imperial Russia.
In Prussia, and later in Germany, Poles were forbidden to build homes, and their properties were targeted for forced buy-outs financed by the Prussian and German governments. Otto von Bismarck described Poles, as animals (wolves), that "one shoots if one can" and implemented several harsh laws aiming at their expulsion from traditionally Polish lands. The Polish language was banned from public, and ethnically Polish children tortured at schools, just for speaking Polish (see: Września
). Poles were subjected to a wave of forceful evictions (Rugi Pruskie). The German government financed and encouraged settlement of ethnic Germans into those areas aiming at their geopolitical germanisation. The Prussian Landtag passed laws against Catholics.
Toward the end of World War I
during Poland's fight for independence, Imperial Germany made further attempts at taking control over the territories of Congress Poland
, aiming at a population transfer of Polish and Jewish people which was meant to be followed by a new wave of settlement by ethnic Germans. In August 1914 the German imperial army destroyed the city of Kalisz
, chasing out tens of thousands of its Polish citizens.
at the end of World War I, the question of new Polish borders could not have been easily settled against the will of her former long-term occupiers. Poles continued to be persecuted in the disputed territories, especially in Silesia
. The German campaign of discrimination contributed to the Silesian Uprisings
, with the Polish workers openly threatened with losing their jobs and pensions if they voted for Poland in the Upper Silesia plebiscite
.
In inter-war Germany, anti-Polish feelings ran high. The American historian Gerhard Weinberg
observed that for many Germans in the Weimar Republic, Poland was an abomination, whose people were seen as "an East European species of cockroach". Poland was usually described as a Saisonstaat (a state for a season). In inter-war Germany, the phrase polnische Wirtschaft (Polish economy) was the expression Germans used to describe any situation that was a hopeless muddle. Weinberg noted that in the 1920s–30s, every leading German politician refused to accept Poland as a legitimate nation, and hoped instead to partition Poland with the Soviet Union.
The British historian A. J. P. Taylor
wrote in 1945 that National Socialism was inevitable because the Germans wanted "to repudiate the equality with the peoples of eastern Europe which had then been forced upon them" after 1918. Taylor wrote that:
The largest ethnic shooting and deportation action during the Great Terror
in the Soviet Russia
, known as the Polish Genocide in the Soviet Union, occurred approximately from August 25, 1937 till November 15, 1938. According to archives of the Soviet NKVD
, 111,091 Poles, and people accused of ties with Poland, were executed, and 28,744 sentenced to death-ridden labor camp
s; amounting to 139,835 Polish victims in total. This number constitutes 10% of the officially persecuted persons during the entire Yezhovshchina period, with confirming NKVD documents. The coordinated actions of the Soviet NKVD and the Communist Party
in 1937-1938 against Polish minority living in the Soviet Union, representing only 0.4 percent of Soviet citizens, amounted to an ethnic genocide
as defined by the UN convention, concluded historian Michael Ellman
. His opinion is shared by Simon Sebag Montefiore
, Prof. Marek Jan Chodakiewicz
, and Dr Tomasz Sommer
among others. In a typical Stalinist fashion, the murdered Polish families were accused of "anti-Soviet" activities and state terrorism.
Hostility toward Polish people reached a particular peak during World War II
, when Poles became the subject of ethnic cleansing on an unprecedented scale, including: Nazi German genocide
in General Government
, Soviet executions and mass deportations to Siberia
from Kresy
, as well as massacres of Poles in Volhynia
, a campaign of ethnic cleansing carried out in today's western Ukraine by Ukrainian nationalists. Millions of citizens of Poland, both ethnic Poles and Jews, died in German concentration camps such as Auschwitz. Unknown numbers perished in Soviet "gulag
s" and political prisons.
Soviet policy following their 1939 invasion of Poland
in World War II was ruthless, and sometimes coordinated with the Nazis (see: Gestapo-NKVD Conferences
). Elements of ethnic cleansing
included Soviet mass executions of Polish prisoners of war in the Katyn Massacre
and at other sites, and the exile of up to 1.5 million Polish citizens
, including the intelligentsia
, academics and priests, to forced-labor camps in Siberia
.
In German and Soviet war propaganda, Poles were mocked as inept for their military techniques in fighting the war. Nazi fake newsreels and forged pseudo-documentaries claimed that the Polish cavalry
"bravely but futilely" charged German tanks in 1939, and that the Polish Air Force
was wiped out on the ground on the opening day of the war. Neither tale was true (see: Myths of the Polish September Campaign). German propaganda staged a Polish cavalry charge in their 1941 reel called "Geschwader Lützow".
Poland's relationship with the USSR during WWII was tricky. The main Western Powers, the US and UK, understood the importance of the USSR in defeating Germany, to the point of allowing Soviet propaganda to vilify their Polish ally. During World War II, E. H. Carr, the assistant editor of The Times
, was well known for his leaders (editorials) taking the Soviet side in Polish-Soviet disputes. In a leader of February 10, 1945, Carr questioned whether the Polish government in exile even had the right to speak on behalf of Poland. Carr wrote that it was extremely doubtful to him whether the Polish government had “an exclusive title to speak for the people of Poland, and a liberum veto on any move towards a settlement of Polish affairs” as well as that the “legal credentials of this Government are certainly not beyond challenge if it were relevant to examine them: the obscure and tenuous thread of continuity leads back at best to a constitution deriving from a quasi-Fascist coup de Etat”. Carr ended his leader with the claim that “What Marshal Stalin desires to see in Warsaw is not a puppet government acting under Russian orders, but a friendly government which fully conscious of the supreme impotence of Russo-Polish concord, will frame its independent policies in that context”. The western Allies were even willing to help cover up the Soviet massacre at Katyn. Even today Katyn is not accepted in the West as a war crime.
, thousands of soldiers of Poland's Home Army (Armia Krajowa
) and returning veterans of the Polish Armed Forces that had served with the Western Allies were imprisoned, tortured by NKWD agents (see: W. Pilecki
, Ł. Ciepliński) and murdered following staged trials like the infamous Trial of the Sixteen
in Moscow. A similar fate awaited the Cursed soldiers
. At least 40,000 members of Poland’s Home Army were deported to Russia.
In Britain after 1945, the British people initially accepted those Polish servicemen who chose not to return to a Poland ruled by the Communists. The Poles resident in Britain served under British command during the Battle of Britain, but as soon as the Soviets began to make gains on the Eastern Front both public opinion and the Government of the UK turned pro-Soviet and against the Poles. Supporters of the socialists made the Poles out to be “warmongers”, “anti-Semites” and “fascists”. After the war, the trade unions and Labour party played on the fears of there not being enough jobs, food and housing. There were even anti-Polish rallies.
In 1961, a book was published in Germany entitled Der Erzwungene Krieg (The Forced War) by the American historical writer and Holocaust denier
David Hoggan
, which argued that Germany did not commit aggression against Poland in 1939, but was instead the victim of an Anglo-Polish conspiracy against the Reich. Reviewers have often noted that Hoggan seems to have an obsessive hostility towards the Poles. His lies include claims such as that the Polish government treated Poland's German minority far worse than the German government under Adolf Hitler treated its Jewish minority. In 1964, much controversy was created when two German right-wing extremist groups awarded Hoggan prizes. In the 1980s, the German philosopher and historian Ernst Nolte
claimed that in 1939 Poland was engaged in a campaign of genocide against its ethnic German minority, and has strongly implied that the German invasion in 1939, and all of the subsequent German atrocities in Poland during World War II were in essence justified acts of retaliation. Critics, such as the British historian Richard J. Evans
, have accused Nolte of distorting the facts, and have argued that in no way was Poland committing genocide against its German minority.
During the political transformation of the Soviet-controlled Eastern bloc in the 1980s, the traditional German anti-Polish feeling was again blatantly exploited in the East Germany against Solidarność. This tactic had become especially apparent in the "rejuvenation of 'Polish jokes,' some of which reminded listeners of the spread of such jokes under the Nazis."
, the editor-in-chief of Gazeta Wyborcza
, has argued that the French Left has hypocritically condoned Soviet crimes against Polish citizens. In an essay on the French Left and its views on Katyn massacre
as well as Polish-Jewish relations, he wrote: "Katyn is the first film about the Soviet crimes and its aggression against Poland, committed in alliance with Hitler. This issue has been a taboo for the French Left. For years they were silent about the Soviet aggression against Poland..." Michnik condemned the French Marxist attraction to Stalin and their selective memory: "I learned from Le Monde that "Wajda presents a strange confusion of the Katyn crime with the extermination of the Jews," as if the massacre of Polish officers by the Soviets was a part of the Nazi German Holocaust.
to call on the Russian government to stop them. "In my capacity as president of the Polish Republic – Kwaśniewski said in an official statement – I address, to the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin, an appeal calling on the Russian authorities to undertake energetic action to identify and punish the organizers and perpetrators of the assaults." An employee with the Polish embassy in Moscow was hospitalized in serious condition after being beaten in broad daylight near the embassy by unidentified men. Three days later, another Polish diplomat was beaten up near the embassy. The following day the Moscow correspondent for the Polish daily Rzeczpospolita
was attacked and beaten by a group of Russians.
community has doubled in size since 2004. The process has been remarkably friendly and successful. However, there have been some instances of anti-Polish sentiment and hostility towards Polish immigrants. The far right
British National Party
argued for immigration from Eastern Europe to be stopped and for Poles to be deported.
In 2007 Polish people living in London reported 42 ethnically motivated attacks against them, compared with 28 in 2004. The Conservative
MP Daniel Kawczynski
said that the increase in violence towards Poles is in part "a result of the media coverage by the BBC
" whose reporters "won't dare refer to controversial immigration from other countries." Kawczynski voiced his criticism of the BBC in the House of Commons for "using the Polish community as a cat's paw to try to tackle the thorny issue of mass, unchecked immigration" only because against Poles "it's politically correct to do so."
In 2009 the Federation of Poles in Great Britain
and the Polish Embassy
in London with Barbara Tuge-Erecinska
, raised a number of formal complaints – including with the Press Complaints Commission – about news articles that defamed Poles. The PCC arranged a deal between the Federation and the Daily Mail
, which ran the articles. The Embassy also questioned the veracity of The Guardian
report by Kate Connolly about an alleged "storm of protest in Poland" in response to a film about a Jewish underground resistance movement. The Polish Embassy stated on March 11, 2009, disproving the claim: "This embassy has been in touch with [the film's] only distributor in Poland, Monolith Plus, and we have been told that this film has not experienced any form of booing, let alone been banned by any cinemas." The Guardian was also forced by PCC to publish an admission that another article by Simon Jenkins
, from September 1 – which accused Poles of wartime suicide – "repeated a myth fostered by Nazi propagandists, when it said that Polish lancers turned their horses to face Hitler's panzers. There is no evidence that this occurred."
The Guardian
has been noted for a number of other controversies. On October 14, 2009, Nazi-hunter Efraim Zuroff
vilified the Polish nation in World War II by alleging that: "the second world war narrative [...] has been distorted since independence and the transition to democracy to make it more palatable to their electorate and to minimize the role of local collaborators in Holocaust crimes." On October 20, 2009, The Guardian's Jonathan Freedland
said: "We are meant to be friendly towards the newest members of the European Union. But the truth is that several of these "emerging democracies" have reverted to a brand of ultra-nationalistic politics that would repel most voters in western Europe. It exists in Poland". In response to the above attacks Timothy Garton Ash
wrote in the same paper on 23 December: "In my experience, the automatic equation of Poland with Catholicism, nationalism and antisemitism – and thence a slide to guilt by association with the Holocaust – is still widespread. This collective stereotyping does no justice to the historical record."
Writing in The Guardian, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband
described Poland's conservative Law and Justice
party as "far right
". His language sparked a protest by Daniel Hannan
of The Daily Telegraph
, who said on October 29, 2009, that the British Foreign Secretary David Miliband should apologize to the people of Poland. Hannan wrote that Miliband's "increasingly unhinged allegations have been greeted with horror in Poland." However, more diatribes reminiscent of wartime propaganda included also The Daily Telegraph
's own article by Julian Kossoff who wrote on November 13, 2009, about the alleged "anti-Semitism embedded in Polish history," an "episode of Polish bloodlust and nightmarish slaughter" and "the unspeakable guilt of the Polish collaborators." The Daily Telegraph's Gerald Warner complained about Kossoff's "insulting attack on Catholics and Poles which grotesquely misrepresents historical fact and which, if leveled at almost any other targets, would probably be characterized as a 'hate crime
'."
Also in 2008 the Polish ambassador sent an official protest to the Press Complaints Commission
about The Times
. On July 26, 2008, columnist Giles Coren
had a comment piece published there with the racial slur 'Polack
' used to describe Polish immigrants. He accused Poland of complicity in the six million Jewish deaths of The Holocaust
, prompting not only an official letter of complaint to The Times, but also an early day motion
in the UK parliament, followed by an editorial in The Economist
. The ambassador, Tuge-Erecinska, explained that the article was "unsupported by any basic historic or geographic knowledge," and that "the issue of Polish-Jewish relations has been unfairly and deeply falsified" by Coren's "aggressive remarks" and "contempt". Coren reacted by telling The Jewish Chronicle
: "F*** the Poles". The case has been referred to the European Court of Human Rights
. The editor of The Jewish Chronicle, Stephen Pollard
, commented on August 6, 2009: "There are few things more despicable than anti-Semitism, but here's one of them: using a false charge of anti-Semitism for political gain."
On October 6, 2009, Stephen Fry
was interviewed by Jon Snow
on Channel 4 News
as a signatory of a letter to British Conservative Party
leader David Cameron
expressing concern about the party's relationship with the right-wing Polish Law and Justice
Party in the European Parliament
. During the interview, Fry stated: "There has been a history, let's face it, in Poland of a right-wing Catholicism which has been deeply disturbing for those of us who know a little history, and remember which side of the border Auschwitz was on..." The remark prompted a complaint from the Polish Embassy in London, as well as an editorial in The Economist
and criticism from British Jewish historian David Cesarani
. Fry has since posted an apology on his personal weblog, in which he stated: "It was a rubbishy, cheap and offensive remark that I have been regretting ever since... I take this opportunity to apologize now. On October 30, 2009, the Chief Rabbi of Poland, Michael Schudrich
, complained about this new British political row playing on a "'false and painful stereotype that all Poles are antisemitic', whereas the truth was that the problem was around the same there as elsewhere in Europe."
On November 14, 2007, Fox
aired the episode of Back to You, "Something's Up There
", which contained a controversial Polish
slur. The slur involved Marsh trying to convince the show's lone Polish-American character, Gary, to go bowling after work by saying: "Come on, it's in your blood, like kielbasa
and collaborating with the Nazis." Fox later apologized on November 20, 2007. They vowed never to air the line of dialogue again in repeats and/or syndicated broadcasts. Fox stated that, "The line was delivered by a character known for being ignorant, clueless, and for saying outlandish things. Allowing the line to remain in the show, however, demonstrated poor judgment, and we apologize to anyone who was offended."
Presumably the first Polish jokes by German displaced person
s fleeing war-torn Europe were brought to America in the late 1940s. These jokes were fueled by ethnic slurs disseminated by German National Socialist propaganda, which attempted to justify the Nazis' murdering of Poles by presenting them as "dreck"—dirty, stupid and inferior. It is also possible that some early American Polack
jokes from Germany were originally told before World War II in disputed border regions such as Silesia
.
There is debate as to whether the early "Polish jokes" brought to states such as Wisconsin
by German immigrants relate directly to the wave of American jokes of the early 1960s. A "provocative critique of previous scholarship on the subject" has been made by British writer Christie Davies
in The Mirth of Nations, which suggests that "Polish jokes" did not originate in Nazi Germany but much earlier, as an outgrowth of regional jokes rooted in "social class differences reaching back to the nineteenth century." According to Davies, American versions of Polish jokes are an unrelated "purely American phenomenon" and do not express the "historical Old World hatreds of the Germans for the Poles. However Hollywood in the 1960s and 1970s imported the subhuman-intelligence jokes about Poles from old Nazi propaganda."
For decades, Polish Americans have been the subject of derogatory jokes originating in anti-immigrant stereotypes that had developed in the U.S. before the 1920s. During the Partitions of Poland
, Polish immigrants came to America in considerable numbers, fleeing mass persecution at home. They were taking the only jobs available to them, usually requiring physical labor. The same ethnic and job-related stereotypes persisted even as Polish Americans joined the middle class in the mid-20th century. "These degrading stereotypes were far from harmless. The constant derision, often publicly disseminated through the mass media, caused serious identity crises, feeling of inadequacy, and low self-esteem for many Polish Americans." In spite of the plight of Polish people under Cold War communism, negative stereotypes about Polish Americans endured.
Since the late 1960s, Polish American
organizations have made continuous effort to challenge the negative stereotyping of the Polish people once prevalent in American media. The Polish American Guardian Society has argued that NBC-TV used the tremendous power of TV to introduce and push subhuman intelligence jokes about Poles (that were worse than prior simple anti-immigrant jokes) using the repetitive big lie technique to degrade Poles. The play called “Polish Joke” by David Ives
has resulted in a number of complaints by the Polonia in the US. The "Polish jokes" heard in the 1970s were particularly offensive, so much so that the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs approached the U.S. State Department about that, however unsuccessfully. The syndrome receded only after Cardinal Karol Wojtyła was elected pope, and Polish jokes became passé. Gradually, Americans have developed a more positive image of their Polish neighbors in the following decades.
In 2010, a documentary film, Polack, explores the source of the Polish joke in America, tracing it through history and into contemporary politics (see the Polack webpage for this film about Polish jokes.)
or Self-Defense of the Republic of Poland
as well as by Polish far-right organizations such as Association against Anti-Polonism led by former presidential candidate and leader of extremist Polish National Party
Leszek Bubel. Bubel was taken to court by a group of ten well-known Polish intellectuals who filed a lawsuit against him for "violating the public good". Among the signatories were: former Foreign Minister Władysław Bartoszewski and filmmaker Kazimierz Kutz
.
According to writer Joanna Michlic the term is used in Poland also as an argument against the self-critical intellectuals who discuss Polish-Jewish relations, accusing them of "anti-Polish positions and interests." For example, historian Jan T. Gross
has been accused of being anti-Polish when he wrote about crimes such as the Jedwabne massacre. In her view, the charge is "not limited to arguments that can objectively be classified as anti-Polish—such as equating the Poles with the Nazis—but rather applied to any critical inquiry into the collective past. Moreover, anti-Polonism is equated with anti-Semitism." Publisher Adam Michnik wrote for the New York Times that "almost all Poles react very sharply when confronted with the charge that Poles get their anti-Semitism 'with their mothers' milk'." (see: Yitzhak Shamir
's outburst in an interview with Jerusalem Post, 1989-9-08.) Such verbal attacks – according to Michnik – are interpreted by anti-Semites as "proof of the international anti-Polish Jewish conspiracy". For the 1994 anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising
, a Polish Gazeta Wyborcza journalist, Michał Cichy, wrote a review of a collection of 1943 memoirs entitled Czy ja jestem mordercą? (Am I a murderer?) by Calel Perechodnik
, a Jewish ghetto policeman
from Otwock and member of the "Chrobry II Battalion
", alleging (as hearsay) that about 40 Jews were killed by a group of Polish insurgents during the 1944 Uprising. Unlike the book (later reprinted with factual corrections), the actual review by Cichy elicited a fury of protests, while selected fragments of his article were confirmed by three Polish historians. Prof. Tomasz Strzembosz
accused Cichy of practicing a 'distinct type of racism,' and charged Gazeta Wyborcza editor Adam Michnik
with 'cultivating a species of tolerance that is absolutely intolerant of antisemitism yet regards anti-Polonism and anti-goyism as something altogether natural'." Michnik responded to the controversy by praising the heroism of the AK, while asking "Is it an attack on Polish people when the past is being explored to seek the truth?" Cichy later apologized for the tone of his article, but not for the erroneous facts.
The notion of anti-Polonism has been used in some instances as a justification for Polish antisemitism. Cardinal Józef Glemp in his controversial and widely criticized speech delivered on August 26, 1989 (and retracted in 1991) argued that the outbursts of antisemitism are a "legitimate form of national self-defence against Jewish 'Anti-Polonism'." He "asked Jews who 'have great power over the mass media in many countries' to rein in their anti-Polonism because 'if there won't be anti-Polonism, there won't be such antisemitism among us'." Similar concerns, but with less display, were echoed in Rethinking Poles and Jews by Robert Cherry and Annamaria Orla-Bukowska who noted that anti-Polonism and anti-Semitism remain "grotesquely twinned into our own time. We cannot combat the one without combating the other."
Poles
thumb|right|180px|The state flag of [[Poland]] as used by Polish government and diplomatic authoritiesThe Polish people, or Poles , are a nation indigenous to Poland. They are united by the Polish language, which belongs to the historical Lechitic subgroup of West Slavic languages of Central Europe...
and culture
Culture of Poland
The culture of Poland is closely connected with its intricate 1000 year history Its unique character developed as a result of its geography at the confluence of various European regions...
. These terms apply to racial prejudice against Poles and people of Polish descent, including ethnicity-based discrimination
Discrimination
Discrimination is the prejudicial treatment of an individual based on their membership in a certain group or category. It involves the actual behaviors towards groups such as excluding or restricting members of one group from opportunities that are available to another group. The term began to be...
and state-sponsored mistreatment of Poles. This led to genocide
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, notably by the German Nazis
Nazi crimes against ethnic Poles
In addition to about 2.9 million Polish Jews , about 2.8 million non-Jewish Polish citizens perished during the course of the war...
and Ukrainian nationalists
Massacres of Poles in Volhynia
The Massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia were part of an ethnic cleansing operation carried out by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army West in the Nazi occupied regions of the Eastern Galicia , and UPA North in Volhynia , beginning in March 1943 and lasting until the end of...
.
Anti-Polish sentiment often entails modern-day derogatory stereotyping.
Use of the term in scientific writing
The term "anti-Polonism" (a loanwordLoanword
A loanword is a word borrowed from a donor language and incorporated into a recipient language. By contrast, a calque or loan translation is a related concept where the meaning or idiom is borrowed rather than the lexical item itself. The word loanword is itself a calque of the German Lehnwort,...
from the ) was coined in Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
before 1919. It was used by progressive Polish thinkers such as Jan Józef Lipski
Jan Józef Lipski
Jan Józef Lipski was a Polish critic and literature historian, socialist politician, and notable Freemason . As a soldier of the Home Army , he fought in the Warsaw Uprising...
during the Solidarity years in connection with allegations of Polish antisemitism. It reappeared in Polish nationalist circles in the 1990s and eventually entered mainstream use, reflected in leading Polish newspapers such as Gazeta Wyborcza
Gazeta Wyborcza
Gazeta Wyborcza is a leading Polish newspaper. It covers the gamut of political, international and general news. Like all the Polish newspapers, it is printed on compact-sized paper, and is published by the multimedia corporation Agora SA...
. In recent years, anti-Polonism, or Polonophobia, has been studied at length in scholarly works by Polish, German, American and Russian researchers.
Features
Forms of hostility toward Poles and Polish culture include:- organized persecution of the Poles as a nation or as an ethnic group, often based on the belief that Polish interests are a threat to one's own national aspirations;
- racistRacismRacism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...
anti-Polonism, a variety of xenophobiaXenophobiaXenophobia is defined as "an unreasonable fear of foreigners or strangers or of that which is foreign or strange". It comes from the Greek words ξένος , meaning "stranger," "foreigner" and φόβος , meaning "fear."...
; - cultural anti-Polonism: a prejudice against Poles and Polish-speaking persons—their customs, language and education;
- stereotypes about Poland and Polish people in the media and popular culture.
A historic example of Polonophobia was polakożerstwo (in English, "the devouring of Poles") — a Polish term introduced during the 19th century in relation to the annexed areas of Poland
Partitions of Poland
The Partitions of Poland or Partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth took place in the second half of the 18th century and ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, resulting in the elimination of sovereign Poland for 123 years...
. It described the forcible suppression of Polish culture, education and religion, and the elimination of Poles from public life and from landed property in Eastern Germany under Otto von Bismarck
Otto von Bismarck
Otto Eduard Leopold, Prince of Bismarck, Duke of Lauenburg , simply known as Otto von Bismarck, was a Prussian-German statesman whose actions unified Germany, made it a major player in world affairs, and created a balance of power that kept Europe at peace after 1871.As Minister President of...
, especially during the Kulturkampf
Kulturkampf
The German term refers to German policies in relation to secularity and the influence of the Roman Catholic Church, enacted from 1871 to 1878 by the Prime Minister of Prussia, Otto von Bismarck. The Kulturkampf did not extend to the other German states such as Bavaria...
and up to the end of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
. Similar policies were implemented, mainly under Tsar Nicholas II, in the Polish territories that had been annexed by the Russian Empire
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
.
Historic actions inspired by anti-Polonism ranged from felonious acts motivated by hatred, to physical extermination of the Polish nation, the goal of which was to eradicate the Polish state. During World War II, when most of Polish society became the object of Nazi genocidal
Genocide
Genocide is defined as "the deliberate and systematic destruction, in whole or in part, of an ethnic, racial, religious, or national group", though what constitutes enough of a "part" to qualify as genocide has been subject to much debate by legal scholars...
policies, German anti-Polonism led to a campaign of mass murder.
At present, among those who most often express their hostile attitude towards the Polish people are various Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
n politicians and their far-right political parties who search for a new imperial identity.
The persecution of Poles (to 1918)
Anti-Polish rhetoric combined with the condemnation of Polish culture was most prominent in the 18th century PrussiaKingdom of Prussia
The Kingdom of Prussia was a German kingdom from 1701 to 1918. Until the defeat of Germany in World War I, it comprised almost two-thirds of the area of the German Empire...
during the partitions of Poland
Partitions of Poland
The Partitions of Poland or Partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth took place in the second half of the 18th century and ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, resulting in the elimination of sovereign Poland for 123 years...
. For instance Johann Georg Forster
Georg Forster
Johann Georg Adam Forster was a German naturalist, ethnologist, travel writer, journalist, and revolutionary. At an early age, he accompanied his father on several scientific expeditions, including James Cook's second voyage to the Pacific...
, a German beneficiary of the Polish Commission of National Education at Vilnius University
Vilnius University
Vilnius University is the oldest university in the Baltic states and one of the oldest in Eastern Europe. It is also the largest university in Lithuania....
, dismissed the idea that the Poles were a part of European culture, comparing them to primitive tribes in his "scandalized" writings, and portraying Poland as an underdeveloped, uncivilized land awaiting the importation of Kultur from "truly civilized countries". Such views were later repeated in the German ideas of Lebensraum
Lebensraum
was one of the major political ideas of Adolf Hitler, and an important component of Nazi ideology. It served as the motivation for the expansionist policies of Nazi Germany, aiming to provide extra space for the growth of the German population, for a Greater Germany...
and exploited by the Nazis. German academics in the 18th – 20th century attempted to project, in the difference between Germany and Poland, a "boundary between civilization and barbarism; high German Kultur and primitive Slavdom" (1793 racist diatribe by J.C. Schulz republished by the Nazis in 1941). Prussian officials eager to secure Polish partition, encouraged the view that the Poles were culturally inferior and in need of Prussian tutelage. Not surprisingly, such racist texts published from 18th century on, were republished by the German Reich prior to and after its Invasion of Poland.
Frederick the Great nourished a particular hatred and contempt for Polish people. Following his conquest of Poland, he compared the Poles to "Iroquois" of Canada. His all-encompassing anti-Polish campaign was exemplified in that even the nobility of Polish background living in Prussia were obliged to pay higher taxes than that of German heritage. Polish monasteries were viewed as "lairs of idleness" and their property often seized by Prussian authorities. The prevalent Catholicism among Poles was stigmatized. The Polish language was persecuted on all levels.
When Poland lost the last vestiges of its independence in 1795 and remained partitioned for 123 years
Partitions of Poland
The Partitions of Poland or Partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth took place in the second half of the 18th century and ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, resulting in the elimination of sovereign Poland for 123 years...
, ethnic Poles were subjected to discrimination on two separate fronts: the Germanization under Prussia
Prussia
Prussia was a German kingdom and historic state originating out of the Duchy of Prussia and the Margraviate of Brandenburg. For centuries, the House of Hohenzollern ruled Prussia, successfully expanding its size by way of an unusually well-organized and effective army. Prussia shaped the history...
n and later German rule, and Russification
Russification
Russification is an adoption of the Russian language or some other Russian attributes by non-Russian communities...
in the territories annexed by the Imperial Russia.
Being a Polish person under the Russian occupation was in itself almost culpable – wrote Russian historian Liudmila Gatagova
Liudmila Gatagova
Liudmila Sultanovna Gatagova is a Russian historian, essayst, and the Research Fellow at the Institute of History of the Russian Academy of Sciences, specializing in the international relations and history of the Russian Empire and the Caucasus until the Revolution of 1917, including the...
. – "Practically all of the Russian government, bureaucracy, and society were united in one outburst against the Poles." – "Rumor mongers informed the population about an order that had supposedly been given to kill [...] and take away their land." Polish culture and religion were seen as threats to Russian imperial ambitions. Tsarist Namestniks suppressed them on Polish lands by force. Russian anti-Polish campaign, which included confiscation of Polish nobles' property, was being waged in the arenas of education, religion as well as language. Polish schools and universities were being closed in a stepped up campaign of russification. In addition to executions and mass deportations of Poles to Katorga
Katorga
Katorga was a system of penal servitude of the prison farm type in Tsarist Russia...
camps, Tsar Nicholas I established an occupation army at Poland's expense.
The fact that Poles – unlike the Russians – were overwhelmingly of Catholic faith, gave impetus to their religious persecution. At the same time, with the emergence of Panslavist ideology, Russian writers accused the Polish nation of betraying their "Slavic family" because of their armed efforts aimed at regaining independence. Hostility toward Poles was present in many of Russia's literary works and media of the time.
Pushkin, together with three other poets, published a pamphlet called "On the Taking of Warsaw" to celebrate the crushing of the revolt
November Uprising
The November Uprising , Polish–Russian War 1830–31 also known as the Cadet Revolution, was an armed rebellion in the heartland of partitioned Poland against the Russian Empire. The uprising began on 29 November 1830 in Warsaw when the young Polish officers from the local Army of the Congress...
. His contribution to the frenzy of anti-Polish writing was composed of poems in which he hailed the capitulation of Warsaw as a new "triumph" of imperial Russia.
In Prussia, and later in Germany, Poles were forbidden to build homes, and their properties were targeted for forced buy-outs financed by the Prussian and German governments. Otto von Bismarck described Poles, as animals (wolves), that "one shoots if one can" and implemented several harsh laws aiming at their expulsion from traditionally Polish lands. The Polish language was banned from public, and ethnically Polish children tortured at schools, just for speaking Polish (see: Września
Wrzesnia
Września is a town in central Poland with 28,600 inhabitants . It is situated in the Września County, Greater Poland Voivodeship , previously in Poznań Voivodeship , on the Wrzesnica River.- History :...
). Poles were subjected to a wave of forceful evictions (Rugi Pruskie). The German government financed and encouraged settlement of ethnic Germans into those areas aiming at their geopolitical germanisation. The Prussian Landtag passed laws against Catholics.
Toward the end of World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
during Poland's fight for independence, Imperial Germany made further attempts at taking control over the territories of Congress Poland
Congress Poland
The Kingdom of Poland , informally known as Congress Poland , created in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna, was a personal union of the Russian parcel of Poland with the Russian Empire...
, aiming at a population transfer of Polish and Jewish people which was meant to be followed by a new wave of settlement by ethnic Germans. In August 1914 the German imperial army destroyed the city of Kalisz
Destruction of Kalisz
The destruction and sacking of the city of Kalisz occurred in August 1914. It was perpetrated by the German Empire troops. From August 2 until August 22, 1914 at the beginning of World War I, one of the oldest towns in Poland , was shelled, bombed and burned down...
, chasing out tens of thousands of its Polish citizens.
The persecution of Poles (1918–39)
After Poland regained its independence as the Second RepublicSecond Polish Republic
The Second Polish Republic, Second Commonwealth of Poland or interwar Poland refers to Poland between the two world wars; a period in Polish history in which Poland was restored as an independent state. Officially known as the Republic of Poland or the Commonwealth of Poland , the Polish state was...
at the end of World War I, the question of new Polish borders could not have been easily settled against the will of her former long-term occupiers. Poles continued to be persecuted in the disputed territories, especially in Silesia
Silesia
Silesia is a historical region of Central Europe located mostly in Poland, with smaller parts also in the Czech Republic, and Germany.Silesia is rich in mineral and natural resources, and includes several important industrial areas. Silesia's largest city and historical capital is Wrocław...
. The German campaign of discrimination contributed to the Silesian Uprisings
Silesian Uprisings
The Silesian Uprisings were a series of three armed uprisings of the Poles and Polish Silesians of Upper Silesia, from 1919–1921, against German rule; the resistance hoped to break away from Germany in order to join the Second Polish Republic, which had been established in the wake of World War I...
, with the Polish workers openly threatened with losing their jobs and pensions if they voted for Poland in the Upper Silesia plebiscite
Upper Silesia plebiscite
The Upper Silesia plebiscite was a border referendum mandated by the Versailles Treaty and carried out in March 1921 to determine a section of the border between Weimar Germany and Poland. The region was ethnically mixed, chiefly among Germans, Poles and Silesians. According to prewar statistics,...
.
In inter-war Germany, anti-Polish feelings ran high. The American historian Gerhard Weinberg
Gerhard Weinberg
Gerhard Ludwig Weinberg is a German-born American diplomatic and military historian noted for his studies in the history of World War II. Weinberg currently is the William Rand Kenan, Jr. Professor Emeritus of History at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He has been a member of the...
observed that for many Germans in the Weimar Republic, Poland was an abomination, whose people were seen as "an East European species of cockroach". Poland was usually described as a Saisonstaat (a state for a season). In inter-war Germany, the phrase polnische Wirtschaft (Polish economy) was the expression Germans used to describe any situation that was a hopeless muddle. Weinberg noted that in the 1920s–30s, every leading German politician refused to accept Poland as a legitimate nation, and hoped instead to partition Poland with the Soviet Union.
The British historian A. J. P. Taylor
A. J. P. Taylor
Alan John Percivale Taylor, FBA was a British historian of the 20th century and renowned academic who became well known to millions through his popular television lectures.-Early life:...
wrote in 1945 that National Socialism was inevitable because the Germans wanted "to repudiate the equality with the peoples of eastern Europe which had then been forced upon them" after 1918. Taylor wrote that:
"During the preceding eighty years the Germans had sacrificed to the Reich all their liberties; they demanded as a reward the enslavement of others. No German recognized the Czechs or Poles as equals. Therefore, every German desired the achievement which only total war could give. By no other means could the Reich be held together. It had been made by conquest and for conquest; if it ever gave up its career of conquest, it would dissolve."
The largest ethnic shooting and deportation action during the Great Terror
Great Purge
The Great Purge was a series of campaigns of political repression and persecution in the Soviet Union orchestrated by Joseph Stalin from 1936 to 1938...
in the Soviet Russia
Soviet Russia
Soviet Russia usually refers to the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, one of the fifteen republics of the Soviet Union. It may also denote:* Soviet Russia , magazine of the Friends of Soviet Russia in the United States...
, known as the Polish Genocide in the Soviet Union, occurred approximately from August 25, 1937 till November 15, 1938. According to archives of the Soviet NKVD
NKVD
The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs was the public and secret police organization of the Soviet Union that directly executed the rule of power of the Soviets, including political repression, during the era of Joseph Stalin....
, 111,091 Poles, and people accused of ties with Poland, were executed, and 28,744 sentenced to death-ridden labor camp
Labor camp
A labor camp is a simplified detention facility where inmates are forced to engage in penal labor. Labor camps have many common aspects with slavery and with prisons...
s; amounting to 139,835 Polish victims in total. This number constitutes 10% of the officially persecuted persons during the entire Yezhovshchina period, with confirming NKVD documents. The coordinated actions of the Soviet NKVD and the Communist Party
Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union was the only legal, ruling political party in the Soviet Union and one of the largest communist organizations in the world...
in 1937-1938 against Polish minority living in the Soviet Union, representing only 0.4 percent of Soviet citizens, amounted to an ethnic genocide
Genocide definitions
This is a list of scholarly and international legal definitions of genocide, a word coined by Raphael Lemkin in 1944. While there are various definitions of the term, almost all international bodies of law officially adjudicate the crime of genocide pursuant to the Convention on the Prevention and...
as defined by the UN convention, concluded historian Michael Ellman
Michael Ellman
Michael Ellman has been a professor of economics at the University of Amsterdam since 1978. He has written extensively on the economics of the Soviet Union, transition economics, Russia and comparative economic systems.- Prizes and honours :* Foreign member of the Russian Academy of Economic...
. His opinion is shared by Simon Sebag Montefiore
Simon Sebag Montefiore
Simon Jonathan Sebag Montefiore is a British historian and writer.-Family history:Simon's father, a doctor, is descended from a famous line of wealthy Sephardic Jews who became diplomats and bankers all over Europe...
, Prof. Marek Jan Chodakiewicz
Marek Jan Chodakiewicz
Marek Jan Chodakiewicz is a Polish-American historian specializing in East Central European history of the 19th and 20th century. His historical works include: After the Holocaust: Polish-Jewish Relations in the Wake of World War II, and Between Nazis and Soviets: Occupation Politics in Poland...
, and Dr Tomasz Sommer
Tomasz Sommer
Tomasz Krzysztof Sommer is a Polish writer, journalist and publisher, Editor-in-chief of weekly magazine Najwyższy CZAS. Sommer graduated from the University of Warsaw Department of Journalism and Political Science, and received his Ph.D...
among others. In a typical Stalinist fashion, the murdered Polish families were accused of "anti-Soviet" activities and state terrorism.
World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, when Poles became the subject of ethnic cleansing on an unprecedented scale, including: Nazi German genocide
Nazi crimes against ethnic Poles
In addition to about 2.9 million Polish Jews , about 2.8 million non-Jewish Polish citizens perished during the course of the war...
in General Government
General Government
The General Government was an area of Second Republic of Poland under Nazi German rule during World War II; designated as a separate region of the Third Reich between 1939–1945...
, Soviet executions and mass deportations to Siberia
Siberia
Siberia is an extensive region constituting almost all of Northern Asia. Comprising the central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, it was part of the Soviet Union from its beginning, as its predecessor states, the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, conquered it during the 16th...
from Kresy
Kresy
The Polish term Kresy refers to a land considered by Poles as historical eastern provinces of their country. Today, it makes western Ukraine, western Belarus, as well as eastern Lithuania, with such major cities, as Lviv, Vilnius, and Hrodna. This territory belonged to the Polish-Lithuanian...
, as well as massacres of Poles in Volhynia
Massacres of Poles in Volhynia
The Massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia were part of an ethnic cleansing operation carried out by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army West in the Nazi occupied regions of the Eastern Galicia , and UPA North in Volhynia , beginning in March 1943 and lasting until the end of...
, a campaign of ethnic cleansing carried out in today's western Ukraine by Ukrainian nationalists. Millions of citizens of Poland, both ethnic Poles and Jews, died in German concentration camps such as Auschwitz. Unknown numbers perished in Soviet "gulag
Gulag
The Gulag was the government agency that administered the main Soviet forced labor camp systems. While the camps housed a wide range of convicts, from petty criminals to political prisoners, large numbers were convicted by simplified procedures, such as NKVD troikas and other instruments of...
s" and political prisons.
Soviet policy following their 1939 invasion of Poland
Soviet invasion of Poland (1939)
The 1939 Soviet invasion of Poland was a Soviet military operation that started without a formal declaration of war on 17 September 1939, during the early stages of World War II. Sixteen days after Nazi Germany invaded Poland from the west, the Soviet Union did so from the east...
in World War II was ruthless, and sometimes coordinated with the Nazis (see: Gestapo-NKVD Conferences
Gestapo-NKVD Conferences
The Gestapo–NKVD conferences were a series of meetings organized in late 1939 and early 1940, whose purpose was the mutual cooperation between Nazi Germany and Soviet Union...
). Elements of ethnic cleansing
Ethnic cleansing
Ethnic cleansing is a purposeful policy designed by one ethnic or religious group to remove by violent and terror-inspiring means the civilian population of another ethnic orreligious group from certain geographic areas....
included Soviet mass executions of Polish prisoners of war in the Katyn Massacre
Katyn massacre
The Katyn massacre, also known as the Katyn Forest massacre , was a mass execution of Polish nationals carried out by the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs , the Soviet secret police, in April and May 1940. The massacre was prompted by Lavrentiy Beria's proposal to execute all members of...
and at other sites, and the exile of up to 1.5 million Polish citizens
Soviet repressions of Polish citizens (1939-1946)
In the aftermath of the German and Soviet invasion of Poland, which took place in September 1939, the territory of Poland was divided between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union . Both powers were hostile to Poland's sovereignty, the Polish culture and the Polish people, aiming at their destruction...
, including the intelligentsia
Intelligentsia
The intelligentsia is a social class of people engaged in complex, mental and creative labor directed to the development and dissemination of culture, encompassing intellectuals and social groups close to them...
, academics and priests, to forced-labor camps in Siberia
Siberia
Siberia is an extensive region constituting almost all of Northern Asia. Comprising the central and eastern portion of the Russian Federation, it was part of the Soviet Union from its beginning, as its predecessor states, the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, conquered it during the 16th...
.
In German and Soviet war propaganda, Poles were mocked as inept for their military techniques in fighting the war. Nazi fake newsreels and forged pseudo-documentaries claimed that the Polish cavalry
Polish cavalry
The Polish cavalry can trace its origins back to the days of Medieval mounted knights. Poland had always been a country of flatlands and fields and mounted forces operate well in this environment...
"bravely but futilely" charged German tanks in 1939, and that the Polish Air Force
Polish Air Force
The Polish Air Force is the military Air Force wing of the Polish Armed Forces. Until July 2004 it was officially known as Wojska Lotnicze i Obrony Powietrznej...
was wiped out on the ground on the opening day of the war. Neither tale was true (see: Myths of the Polish September Campaign). German propaganda staged a Polish cavalry charge in their 1941 reel called "Geschwader Lützow".
Poland's relationship with the USSR during WWII was tricky. The main Western Powers, the US and UK, understood the importance of the USSR in defeating Germany, to the point of allowing Soviet propaganda to vilify their Polish ally. During World War II, E. H. Carr, the assistant editor of The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
, was well known for his leaders (editorials) taking the Soviet side in Polish-Soviet disputes. In a leader of February 10, 1945, Carr questioned whether the Polish government in exile even had the right to speak on behalf of Poland. Carr wrote that it was extremely doubtful to him whether the Polish government had “an exclusive title to speak for the people of Poland, and a liberum veto on any move towards a settlement of Polish affairs” as well as that the “legal credentials of this Government are certainly not beyond challenge if it were relevant to examine them: the obscure and tenuous thread of continuity leads back at best to a constitution deriving from a quasi-Fascist coup de Etat”. Carr ended his leader with the claim that “What Marshal Stalin desires to see in Warsaw is not a puppet government acting under Russian orders, but a friendly government which fully conscious of the supreme impotence of Russo-Polish concord, will frame its independent policies in that context”. The western Allies were even willing to help cover up the Soviet massacre at Katyn. Even today Katyn is not accepted in the West as a war crime.
Postwar era
With the conclusion of the Second World War, Nazi atrocities perforce ended. However, Soviet oppression of the Poles continued. Under Joseph StalinJoseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
, thousands of soldiers of Poland's Home Army (Armia Krajowa
Armia Krajowa
The Armia Krajowa , or Home Army, was the dominant Polish resistance movement in World War II German-occupied Poland. It was formed in February 1942 from the Związek Walki Zbrojnej . Over the next two years, it absorbed most other Polish underground forces...
) and returning veterans of the Polish Armed Forces that had served with the Western Allies were imprisoned, tortured by NKWD agents (see: W. Pilecki
Witold Pilecki
Witold Pilecki was a soldier of the Second Polish Republic, the founder of the Secret Polish Army resistance group and a member of the Home Army...
, Ł. Ciepliński) and murdered following staged trials like the infamous Trial of the Sixteen
Trial of the Sixteen
The Trial of the Sixteen was a staged trial of 16 leaders of the Polish Underground State held by the Soviet Union in Moscow in 1945.-History:Some accounts say approaches were made in February with others saying March 1945...
in Moscow. A similar fate awaited the Cursed soldiers
Cursed soldiers
The cursed soldiers is a name applied to a variety of Polish resistance movements formed in the later stages of World War II and afterwards. Created by some members of the Polish Secret State, these clandestine organizations continued their armed struggle against the Stalinist government of Poland...
. At least 40,000 members of Poland’s Home Army were deported to Russia.
In Britain after 1945, the British people initially accepted those Polish servicemen who chose not to return to a Poland ruled by the Communists. The Poles resident in Britain served under British command during the Battle of Britain, but as soon as the Soviets began to make gains on the Eastern Front both public opinion and the Government of the UK turned pro-Soviet and against the Poles. Supporters of the socialists made the Poles out to be “warmongers”, “anti-Semites” and “fascists”. After the war, the trade unions and Labour party played on the fears of there not being enough jobs, food and housing. There were even anti-Polish rallies.
In 1961, a book was published in Germany entitled Der Erzwungene Krieg (The Forced War) by the American historical writer and Holocaust denier
Holocaust denial
Holocaust denial is the act of denying the genocide of Jews in World War II, usually referred to as the Holocaust. The key claims of Holocaust denial are: the German Nazi government had no official policy or intention of exterminating Jews, Nazi authorities did not use extermination camps and gas...
David Hoggan
David Hoggan
David Leslie Hoggan was an American historical writer, author of The Forced War: When Peaceful Revision Failed and other works in the German and English languages.-Early life:...
, which argued that Germany did not commit aggression against Poland in 1939, but was instead the victim of an Anglo-Polish conspiracy against the Reich. Reviewers have often noted that Hoggan seems to have an obsessive hostility towards the Poles. His lies include claims such as that the Polish government treated Poland's German minority far worse than the German government under Adolf Hitler treated its Jewish minority. In 1964, much controversy was created when two German right-wing extremist groups awarded Hoggan prizes. In the 1980s, the German philosopher and historian Ernst Nolte
Ernst Nolte
Ernst Nolte is a German historian and philosopher. Nolte’s major interest is the comparative studies of Fascism and Communism. He is Professor Emeritus of Modern History at the Free University of Berlin, where he taught from 1973 to 1991. He was previously a Professor at the University of Marburg...
claimed that in 1939 Poland was engaged in a campaign of genocide against its ethnic German minority, and has strongly implied that the German invasion in 1939, and all of the subsequent German atrocities in Poland during World War II were in essence justified acts of retaliation. Critics, such as the British historian Richard J. Evans
Richard J. Evans
Richard John Evans is a British academic and historian, prominently known for his history of Germany.-Life:Evans was born in London, of Welsh parentage, and is now Regius Professor of Modern History at the University of Cambridge and President of Wolfson College...
, have accused Nolte of distorting the facts, and have argued that in no way was Poland committing genocide against its German minority.
During the political transformation of the Soviet-controlled Eastern bloc in the 1980s, the traditional German anti-Polish feeling was again blatantly exploited in the East Germany against Solidarność. This tactic had become especially apparent in the "rejuvenation of 'Polish jokes,' some of which reminded listeners of the spread of such jokes under the Nazis."
France
Adam MichnikAdam Michnik
Adam Michnik is the editor-in-chief of Gazeta Wyborcza, where he sometimes writes under the pen-names of Andrzej Zagozda or Andrzej Jagodziński. In 1966–1989 he was one of the leading organizers of the illegal, democratic opposition in Poland...
, the editor-in-chief of Gazeta Wyborcza
Gazeta Wyborcza
Gazeta Wyborcza is a leading Polish newspaper. It covers the gamut of political, international and general news. Like all the Polish newspapers, it is printed on compact-sized paper, and is published by the multimedia corporation Agora SA...
, has argued that the French Left has hypocritically condoned Soviet crimes against Polish citizens. In an essay on the French Left and its views on Katyn massacre
Katyn massacre
The Katyn massacre, also known as the Katyn Forest massacre , was a mass execution of Polish nationals carried out by the People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs , the Soviet secret police, in April and May 1940. The massacre was prompted by Lavrentiy Beria's proposal to execute all members of...
as well as Polish-Jewish relations, he wrote: "Katyn is the first film about the Soviet crimes and its aggression against Poland, committed in alliance with Hitler. This issue has been a taboo for the French Left. For years they were silent about the Soviet aggression against Poland..." Michnik condemned the French Marxist attraction to Stalin and their selective memory: "I learned from Le Monde that "Wajda presents a strange confusion of the Katyn crime with the extermination of the Jews," as if the massacre of Polish officers by the Soviets was a part of the Nazi German Holocaust.
Russia
In 2005, continued attacks on Poles in Moscow prompted the then Polish President Aleksander KwaśniewskiAleksander Kwasniewski
Aleksander Kwaśniewski is a Polish politician who served as the President of Poland from 1995 to 2005. He was born in Białogard, and during communist rule he was active in the Socialist Union of Polish Students and was the Minister for Sport in the communist government in the 1980s...
to call on the Russian government to stop them. "In my capacity as president of the Polish Republic – Kwaśniewski said in an official statement – I address, to the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin, an appeal calling on the Russian authorities to undertake energetic action to identify and punish the organizers and perpetrators of the assaults." An employee with the Polish embassy in Moscow was hospitalized in serious condition after being beaten in broad daylight near the embassy by unidentified men. Three days later, another Polish diplomat was beaten up near the embassy. The following day the Moscow correspondent for the Polish daily Rzeczpospolita
Rzeczpospolita (newspaper)
Rzeczpospolita is a Polish national daily newspaper, with a circulation around of 160,000. Issued every day except Sunday. Rzeczpospolita was printed in broadsheet format, then switched to compact at October 16, 2007...
was attacked and beaten by a group of Russians.
United Kingdom
Since EU enlargement in 2004, the UK has experienced mass immigration from Poland (see Poles in the United Kingdom). It is estimated that the Polish BritishPolish British
Polish migration to the United Kingdom describes the temporary or permanent migration of Poles to the United Kingdom . Most Polish migrants to the UK emigrated after two major events, the Polish Resettlement Act 1947 and the 2004 enlargement of the European Union...
community has doubled in size since 2004. The process has been remarkably friendly and successful. However, there have been some instances of anti-Polish sentiment and hostility towards Polish immigrants. The far right
Far right
Far-right, extreme right, hard right, radical right, and ultra-right are terms used to discuss the qualitative or quantitative position a group or person occupies within right-wing politics. Far-right politics may involve anti-immigration and anti-integration stances towards groups that are...
British National Party
British National Party
The British National Party is a British far-right political party formed as a splinter group from the National Front by John Tyndall in 1982...
argued for immigration from Eastern Europe to be stopped and for Poles to be deported.
In 2007 Polish people living in London reported 42 ethnically motivated attacks against them, compared with 28 in 2004. The Conservative
Conservative Party (UK)
The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
MP Daniel Kawczynski
Daniel Kawczynski
Daniel Robert Kawczynski is the Conservative Party Member for Parliament for Shrewsbury and Atcham in Shropshire, England.-Biography:...
said that the increase in violence towards Poles is in part "a result of the media coverage by the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
" whose reporters "won't dare refer to controversial immigration from other countries." Kawczynski voiced his criticism of the BBC in the House of Commons for "using the Polish community as a cat's paw to try to tackle the thorny issue of mass, unchecked immigration" only because against Poles "it's politically correct to do so."
In 2009 the Federation of Poles in Great Britain
Federation of Poles in Great Britain
The Federation of Poles in Great Britain is an organisation established to promote the interests of the Polish ethnic minority in Great Britain, and to promote Polish history and culture among the British people....
and the Polish Embassy
Foreign relations of Poland
The Republic of Poland is a Central European country and member of the European Union and NATO, among others. In recent years, Poland has extended its responsibilities and position in European and Western affairs, supporting and establishing friendly foreign relations with both the West and with...
in London with Barbara Tuge-Erecinska
Barbara Tuge-Erecinska
Barbara Krystyna Tuge-Erecińska is the Ambassador of the Republic of Poland to the United Kingdom, appointed by President Lech Kaczyński on 24 October 2006....
, raised a number of formal complaints – including with the Press Complaints Commission – about news articles that defamed Poles. The PCC arranged a deal between the Federation and the Daily Mail
Daily Mail
The Daily Mail is a British daily middle-market tabloid newspaper owned by the Daily Mail and General Trust. First published in 1896 by Lord Northcliffe, it is the United Kingdom's second biggest-selling daily newspaper after The Sun. Its sister paper The Mail on Sunday was launched in 1982...
, which ran the articles. The Embassy also questioned the veracity of The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
report by Kate Connolly about an alleged "storm of protest in Poland" in response to a film about a Jewish underground resistance movement. The Polish Embassy stated on March 11, 2009, disproving the claim: "This embassy has been in touch with [the film's] only distributor in Poland, Monolith Plus, and we have been told that this film has not experienced any form of booing, let alone been banned by any cinemas." The Guardian was also forced by PCC to publish an admission that another article by Simon Jenkins
Simon Jenkins
Sir Simon David Jenkins is a British newspaper columnist and author, and since November 2008 has been chairman of the National Trust. He currently writes columns for both The Guardian and London's Evening Standard, and was previously a commentator for The Times, which he edited from 1990 to 1992...
, from September 1 – which accused Poles of wartime suicide – "repeated a myth fostered by Nazi propagandists, when it said that Polish lancers turned their horses to face Hitler's panzers. There is no evidence that this occurred."
The Guardian
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
has been noted for a number of other controversies. On October 14, 2009, Nazi-hunter Efraim Zuroff
Efraim Zuroff
Efraim Zuroff is an Israeli historian of American origin, who has played a role in bringing Nazis indicted for war crimes to trial...
vilified the Polish nation in World War II by alleging that: "the second world war narrative [...] has been distorted since independence and the transition to democracy to make it more palatable to their electorate and to minimize the role of local collaborators in Holocaust crimes." On October 20, 2009, The Guardian's Jonathan Freedland
Jonathan Freedland
Jonathan Saul Freedland is a British journalist, who writes a weekly column for The Guardian and a monthly piece for the Jewish Chronicle. He is also a regular contributor to The New York Times and The New York Review of Books, and presents BBC Radio 4’s contemporary history series,...
said: "We are meant to be friendly towards the newest members of the European Union. But the truth is that several of these "emerging democracies" have reverted to a brand of ultra-nationalistic politics that would repel most voters in western Europe. It exists in Poland". In response to the above attacks Timothy Garton Ash
Timothy Garton Ash
Timothy Garton Ash is a British historian, author and commentator. He is currently serving as Professor of European Studies at Oxford University. Much of his work has been concerned with the late modern and contemporary history of Central and Eastern Europe...
wrote in the same paper on 23 December: "In my experience, the automatic equation of Poland with Catholicism, nationalism and antisemitism – and thence a slide to guilt by association with the Holocaust – is still widespread. This collective stereotyping does no justice to the historical record."
Writing in The Guardian, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband
David Miliband
David Wright Miliband is a British Labour Party politician who has been the Member of Parliament for South Shields since 2001, and was the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs from 2007 to 2010. He is the elder son of the late Marxist theorist Ralph Miliband...
described Poland's conservative Law and Justice
Law and Justice
Law and Justice , abbreviated to PiS, is a right-wing, conservative political party in Poland. With 147 seats in the Sejm and 38 in the Senate, it is the second-largest party in the Polish parliament....
party as "far right
Far right
Far-right, extreme right, hard right, radical right, and ultra-right are terms used to discuss the qualitative or quantitative position a group or person occupies within right-wing politics. Far-right politics may involve anti-immigration and anti-integration stances towards groups that are...
". His language sparked a protest by Daniel Hannan
Daniel Hannan
Daniel John Hannan is a British journalist, author and politician who is currently a Member of the European Parliament, representing South East England for the Conservative Party and the European Conservatives and Reformists political group...
of The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
, who said on October 29, 2009, that the British Foreign Secretary David Miliband should apologize to the people of Poland. Hannan wrote that Miliband's "increasingly unhinged allegations have been greeted with horror in Poland." However, more diatribes reminiscent of wartime propaganda included also The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...
's own article by Julian Kossoff who wrote on November 13, 2009, about the alleged "anti-Semitism embedded in Polish history," an "episode of Polish bloodlust and nightmarish slaughter" and "the unspeakable guilt of the Polish collaborators." The Daily Telegraph's Gerald Warner complained about Kossoff's "insulting attack on Catholics and Poles which grotesquely misrepresents historical fact and which, if leveled at almost any other targets, would probably be characterized as a 'hate crime
Hate crime
In crime and law, hate crimes occur when a perpetrator targets a victim because of his or her perceived membership in a certain social group, usually defined by racial group, religion, sexual orientation, disability, class, ethnicity, nationality, age, gender, gender identity, social status or...
'."
Also in 2008 the Polish ambassador sent an official protest to the Press Complaints Commission
Press Complaints Commission
The Press Complaints Commission is a voluntary regulatory body for British printed newspapers and magazines, consisting of representatives of the major publishers. The PCC is funded by the annual levy it charges newspapers and magazines...
about The Times
The Times
The Times is a British daily national newspaper, first published in London in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register . The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times are published by Times Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary since 1981 of News International...
. On July 26, 2008, columnist Giles Coren
Giles Coren
Giles Coren is a British food critic, television presenter and novelist. He is known for expressing controversial opinions, and for his television appearances with the comedian Sue Perkins.-Personal:...
had a comment piece published there with the racial slur 'Polack
Polack
The noun Polack , in the contemporary English language, is a derogatory reference to a person of Polish descent. It is an Anglicisation of the Polish language word Polak, which means a Polish male person...
' used to describe Polish immigrants. He accused Poland of complicity in the six million Jewish deaths of The Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
, prompting not only an official letter of complaint to The Times, but also an early day motion
Early day motion
An Early Day Motion , in the Westminster system, is a motion, expressed as a single sentence, tabled by Members of Parliament for debate "on an early day" . Controversial EDMs are not signed by Government Ministers, PPS or the Speaker of the House of Commons and very few are debated on the floor...
in the UK parliament, followed by an editorial in The Economist
The Economist
The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
. The ambassador, Tuge-Erecinska, explained that the article was "unsupported by any basic historic or geographic knowledge," and that "the issue of Polish-Jewish relations has been unfairly and deeply falsified" by Coren's "aggressive remarks" and "contempt". Coren reacted by telling The Jewish Chronicle
The Jewish Chronicle
The Jewish Chronicle is a London-based Jewish newspaper. Founded in 1841, it is the oldest continuously published Jewish newspaper in the world.-Publication data and readership figures:...
: "F*** the Poles". The case has been referred to the European Court of Human Rights
European Court of Human Rights
The European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg is a supra-national court established by the European Convention on Human Rights and hears complaints that a contracting state has violated the human rights enshrined in the Convention and its protocols. Complaints can be brought by individuals or...
. The editor of The Jewish Chronicle, Stephen Pollard
Stephen Pollard
Stephen Pollard is a British author and journalist, currently editor of The Jewish Chronicle. He is a former Chairman of the European Institute for the Study of Contemporary Antisemitism and a former president of the Centre for the New Europe, a free-market think tank based in Brussels...
, commented on August 6, 2009: "There are few things more despicable than anti-Semitism, but here's one of them: using a false charge of anti-Semitism for political gain."
On October 6, 2009, Stephen Fry
Stephen Fry
Stephen John Fry is an English actor, screenwriter, author, playwright, journalist, poet, comedian, television presenter and film director, and a director of Norwich City Football Club. He first came to attention in the 1981 Cambridge Footlights Revue presentation "The Cellar Tapes", which also...
was interviewed by Jon Snow
Jon Snow
Jon Snow is an English journalist and presenter, currently employed by ITN. He is best known for presenting Channel 4 News.He was Chancellor of Oxford Brookes University from 2001 to 2008.-Early life:...
on Channel 4 News
Channel 4 News
Channel 4 News is the news division of British television broadcaster Channel 4. It is produced by ITN, and has been in operation since the broadcaster's launch in 1982.-Channel 4 News:...
as a signatory of a letter to British Conservative Party
Conservative Party (UK)
The Conservative Party, formally the Conservative and Unionist Party, is a centre-right political party in the United Kingdom that adheres to the philosophies of conservatism and British unionism. It is the largest political party in the UK, and is currently the largest single party in the House...
leader David Cameron
David Cameron
David William Donald Cameron is the current Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, First Lord of the Treasury, Minister for the Civil Service and Leader of the Conservative Party. Cameron represents Witney as its Member of Parliament ....
expressing concern about the party's relationship with the right-wing Polish Law and Justice
Law and Justice
Law and Justice , abbreviated to PiS, is a right-wing, conservative political party in Poland. With 147 seats in the Sejm and 38 in the Senate, it is the second-largest party in the Polish parliament....
Party in the European Parliament
European Parliament
The European Parliament is the directly elected parliamentary institution of the European Union . Together with the Council of the European Union and the Commission, it exercises the legislative function of the EU and it has been described as one of the most powerful legislatures in the world...
. During the interview, Fry stated: "There has been a history, let's face it, in Poland of a right-wing Catholicism which has been deeply disturbing for those of us who know a little history, and remember which side of the border Auschwitz was on..." The remark prompted a complaint from the Polish Embassy in London, as well as an editorial in The Economist
The Economist
The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
and criticism from British Jewish historian David Cesarani
David Cesarani
David Cesarani OBE is an English historian who specialises in Jewish history, especially the Holocaust. He has also written several biographies, notably Arthur Koestler: The Homeless Mind.-Early life:...
. Fry has since posted an apology on his personal weblog, in which he stated: "It was a rubbishy, cheap and offensive remark that I have been regretting ever since... I take this opportunity to apologize now. On October 30, 2009, the Chief Rabbi of Poland, Michael Schudrich
Michael Schudrich
Michael Joseph Schudrich is the Chief Rabbi of Poland. He is the oldest of four children of Rabbi David Schudrich and Doris Goldfarb Schudrich.-Biography:...
, complained about this new British political row playing on a "'false and painful stereotype that all Poles are antisemitic', whereas the truth was that the problem was around the same there as elsewhere in Europe."
United States
Fox Broadcasting Company
Fox Broadcasting Company, commonly referred to as Fox Network or simply Fox , is an American commercial broadcasting television network owned by Fox Entertainment Group, part of Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. Launched on October 9, 1986, Fox was the highest-rated broadcast network in the...
aired the episode of Back to You, "Something's Up There
Something's Up There
"Something's Up There" is the seventh episode of the first season of the situation comedy Back to You. It aired on November 14, 2007. This episode is also known for its controversial content.-Plot:It's Gracie's birthday and everything goes wrong....
", which contained a controversial Polish
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
slur. The slur involved Marsh trying to convince the show's lone Polish-American character, Gary, to go bowling after work by saying: "Come on, it's in your blood, like kielbasa
Kielbasa
Kielbasa, kołbasa, kobasa, kovbasa, kobasa, kobasi, and kubasa are common North American anglicizations for a type of Eastern European sausage. Synonyms include Polish sausage, Ukrainian sausage, etc...
and collaborating with the Nazis." Fox later apologized on November 20, 2007. They vowed never to air the line of dialogue again in repeats and/or syndicated broadcasts. Fox stated that, "The line was delivered by a character known for being ignorant, clueless, and for saying outlandish things. Allowing the line to remain in the show, however, demonstrated poor judgment, and we apologize to anyone who was offended."
"Polish jokes"
"Polish jokes" belong to a category of conditional jokes, meaning that their understanding requires knowledge of what a Polish joke is. Conditional jokes depend on the audience's affective preference—on their likes and dislikes. Though these jokes might be understood by many, their success depends entirely on the negative disposition of the listener.Presumably the first Polish jokes by German displaced person
Displaced person
A displaced person is a person who has been forced to leave his or her native place, a phenomenon known as forced migration.- Origin of term :...
s fleeing war-torn Europe were brought to America in the late 1940s. These jokes were fueled by ethnic slurs disseminated by German National Socialist propaganda, which attempted to justify the Nazis' murdering of Poles by presenting them as "dreck"—dirty, stupid and inferior. It is also possible that some early American Polack
Polack
The noun Polack , in the contemporary English language, is a derogatory reference to a person of Polish descent. It is an Anglicisation of the Polish language word Polak, which means a Polish male person...
jokes from Germany were originally told before World War II in disputed border regions such as Silesia
Silesia
Silesia is a historical region of Central Europe located mostly in Poland, with smaller parts also in the Czech Republic, and Germany.Silesia is rich in mineral and natural resources, and includes several important industrial areas. Silesia's largest city and historical capital is Wrocław...
.
There is debate as to whether the early "Polish jokes" brought to states such as Wisconsin
Wisconsin
Wisconsin is a U.S. state located in the north-central United States and is part of the Midwest. It is bordered by Minnesota to the west, Iowa to the southwest, Illinois to the south, Lake Michigan to the east, Michigan to the northeast, and Lake Superior to the north. Wisconsin's capital is...
by German immigrants relate directly to the wave of American jokes of the early 1960s. A "provocative critique of previous scholarship on the subject" has been made by British writer Christie Davies
Christie Davies
Christie Davies is a British sociologist, professor emeritus of sociology at the University of Reading, England, the author of many articles and books on criminology, the sociology of morality, censorship, and humor...
in The Mirth of Nations, which suggests that "Polish jokes" did not originate in Nazi Germany but much earlier, as an outgrowth of regional jokes rooted in "social class differences reaching back to the nineteenth century." According to Davies, American versions of Polish jokes are an unrelated "purely American phenomenon" and do not express the "historical Old World hatreds of the Germans for the Poles. However Hollywood in the 1960s and 1970s imported the subhuman-intelligence jokes about Poles from old Nazi propaganda."
For decades, Polish Americans have been the subject of derogatory jokes originating in anti-immigrant stereotypes that had developed in the U.S. before the 1920s. During the Partitions of Poland
Partitions of Poland
The Partitions of Poland or Partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth took place in the second half of the 18th century and ended the existence of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, resulting in the elimination of sovereign Poland for 123 years...
, Polish immigrants came to America in considerable numbers, fleeing mass persecution at home. They were taking the only jobs available to them, usually requiring physical labor. The same ethnic and job-related stereotypes persisted even as Polish Americans joined the middle class in the mid-20th century. "These degrading stereotypes were far from harmless. The constant derision, often publicly disseminated through the mass media, caused serious identity crises, feeling of inadequacy, and low self-esteem for many Polish Americans." In spite of the plight of Polish people under Cold War communism, negative stereotypes about Polish Americans endured.
Since the late 1960s, Polish American
Polish American
A Polish American , is a citizen of the United States of Polish descent. There are an estimated 10 million Polish Americans, representing about 3.2% of the population of the United States...
organizations have made continuous effort to challenge the negative stereotyping of the Polish people once prevalent in American media. The Polish American Guardian Society has argued that NBC-TV used the tremendous power of TV to introduce and push subhuman intelligence jokes about Poles (that were worse than prior simple anti-immigrant jokes) using the repetitive big lie technique to degrade Poles. The play called “Polish Joke” by David Ives
David Ives
David Ives is a contemporary American playwright. A native of South Chicago, Ives attended a minor Catholic seminary and Northwestern University and, after some years' interval, Yale School of Drama, where he received an MFA in playwriting...
has resulted in a number of complaints by the Polonia in the US. The "Polish jokes" heard in the 1970s were particularly offensive, so much so that the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs approached the U.S. State Department about that, however unsuccessfully. The syndrome receded only after Cardinal Karol Wojtyła was elected pope, and Polish jokes became passé. Gradually, Americans have developed a more positive image of their Polish neighbors in the following decades.
In 2010, a documentary film, Polack, explores the source of the Polish joke in America, tracing it through history and into contemporary politics (see the Polack webpage for this film about Polish jokes.)
Use of the term in a modern political context
The term "anti-Polonism" is said to have been used for campaign purposes by political parties such as the League of Polish FamiliesLeague of Polish Families
The League of Polish Families is a right-wing political party in Poland. It was represented in the Polish parliament, forming part of the cabinet of Jarosław Kaczyński, until the latter dissolved in September 2007....
or Self-Defense of the Republic of Poland
Self-Defense of the Republic of Poland
Self-Defence of the Republic of Poland , abbreviated to SRP, is an agrarian political party and trade union in Poland led by Andrzej Lepper. Its platform combines left-wing populist economic policies with religious conservative social policies....
as well as by Polish far-right organizations such as Association against Anti-Polonism led by former presidential candidate and leader of extremist Polish National Party
Polish National Party
The Polish National Party is a fringe nationalist and ultra-conservative political party in Poland led by Leszek Bubel. It was registered on March 22, 2004...
Leszek Bubel. Bubel was taken to court by a group of ten well-known Polish intellectuals who filed a lawsuit against him for "violating the public good". Among the signatories were: former Foreign Minister Władysław Bartoszewski and filmmaker Kazimierz Kutz
Kazimierz Kutz
Kazimierz Julian Kutz is a Polish film director, author, journalist and politician, one of the representatives of the Polish Film School and a deputy speaker of the Senate of Poland.- Biography :...
.
According to writer Joanna Michlic the term is used in Poland also as an argument against the self-critical intellectuals who discuss Polish-Jewish relations, accusing them of "anti-Polish positions and interests." For example, historian Jan T. Gross
Jan T. Gross
Jan Tomasz Gross is a Polish-American historian and sociologist. He is the Norman B. Tomlinson '16 and '48 Professor of War and Society and Professor of History at Princeton University.- Biography :Jan T...
has been accused of being anti-Polish when he wrote about crimes such as the Jedwabne massacre. In her view, the charge is "not limited to arguments that can objectively be classified as anti-Polish—such as equating the Poles with the Nazis—but rather applied to any critical inquiry into the collective past. Moreover, anti-Polonism is equated with anti-Semitism." Publisher Adam Michnik wrote for the New York Times that "almost all Poles react very sharply when confronted with the charge that Poles get their anti-Semitism 'with their mothers' milk'." (see: Yitzhak Shamir
Yitzhak Shamir
' is a former Israeli politician, the seventh Prime Minister of Israel, in 1983–84 and 1986–92.-Biography:Icchak Jeziernicky was born in Ruzhany , Russian Empire . He studied at a Hebrew High School in Białystok, Poland. As a youth he joined Betar, the Revisionist Zionist youth movement...
's outburst in an interview with Jerusalem Post, 1989-9-08.) Such verbal attacks – according to Michnik – are interpreted by anti-Semites as "proof of the international anti-Polish Jewish conspiracy". For the 1994 anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising
Warsaw Uprising
The Warsaw Uprising was a major World War II operation by the Polish resistance Home Army , to liberate Warsaw from Nazi Germany. The rebellion was timed to coincide with the Soviet Union's Red Army approaching the eastern suburbs of the city and the retreat of German forces...
, a Polish Gazeta Wyborcza journalist, Michał Cichy, wrote a review of a collection of 1943 memoirs entitled Czy ja jestem mordercą? (Am I a murderer?) by Calel Perechodnik
Calel Perechodnik
Calel Perechodnik was a Polish Jew who joined the Jewish Ghetto Police in the Otwock Ghetto during the Nazi German occupation of Poland...
, a Jewish ghetto policeman
Jewish Ghetto Police
Jewish Ghetto Police , also known as the Jewish Police Service and referred to by the Jews as the Jewish Police, were the auxiliary police units organized in the Jewish ghettos of Europe by local Judenrat councils under orders of occupying German Nazis.Members of the did not have official...
from Otwock and member of the "Chrobry II Battalion
Chrobry II Battalion
The Chrobry II Battalion was a unit, formally subordinate to the Polish Home Army , which took part in the Warsaw Uprising. It was named after the Polish king Bolesław I Chrobry .-Formation and name:...
", alleging (as hearsay) that about 40 Jews were killed by a group of Polish insurgents during the 1944 Uprising. Unlike the book (later reprinted with factual corrections), the actual review by Cichy elicited a fury of protests, while selected fragments of his article were confirmed by three Polish historians. Prof. Tomasz Strzembosz
Tomasz Strzembosz
Tomasz Strzembosz was a Polish historian and writer who specialized in the history of Poland during World War II. He was a professor at the Polish Academy of Sciences' Institute of Political Studies in Warsaw; and, at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin...
accused Cichy of practicing a 'distinct type of racism,' and charged Gazeta Wyborcza editor Adam Michnik
Adam Michnik
Adam Michnik is the editor-in-chief of Gazeta Wyborcza, where he sometimes writes under the pen-names of Andrzej Zagozda or Andrzej Jagodziński. In 1966–1989 he was one of the leading organizers of the illegal, democratic opposition in Poland...
with 'cultivating a species of tolerance that is absolutely intolerant of antisemitism yet regards anti-Polonism and anti-goyism as something altogether natural'." Michnik responded to the controversy by praising the heroism of the AK, while asking "Is it an attack on Polish people when the past is being explored to seek the truth?" Cichy later apologized for the tone of his article, but not for the erroneous facts.
The notion of anti-Polonism has been used in some instances as a justification for Polish antisemitism. Cardinal Józef Glemp in his controversial and widely criticized speech delivered on August 26, 1989 (and retracted in 1991) argued that the outbursts of antisemitism are a "legitimate form of national self-defence against Jewish 'Anti-Polonism'." He "asked Jews who 'have great power over the mass media in many countries' to rein in their anti-Polonism because 'if there won't be anti-Polonism, there won't be such antisemitism among us'." Similar concerns, but with less display, were echoed in Rethinking Poles and Jews by Robert Cherry and Annamaria Orla-Bukowska who noted that anti-Polonism and anti-Semitism remain "grotesquely twinned into our own time. We cannot combat the one without combating the other."
See also
- Nazi racial policy
- Nazi crimes against ethnic PolesNazi crimes against ethnic PolesIn addition to about 2.9 million Polish Jews , about 2.8 million non-Jewish Polish citizens perished during the course of the war...
- World War II crimes in Poland
- Occupation of Poland (1939–1945)
- Nazi crimes in WarmiaNazi crimes in WarmiaNazi crimes in Warmia are the nazi crimes in Warmia. During the 1930s and World War II, German authorities engaged in persecution of Poles in Warmia.The activities of Polish organisations in Warmia were observed and reported by police...
- Destruction of KaliszDestruction of KaliszThe destruction and sacking of the city of Kalisz occurred in August 1914. It was perpetrated by the German Empire troops. From August 2 until August 22, 1914 at the beginning of World War I, one of the oldest towns in Poland , was shelled, bombed and burned down...
- List of anti-ethnic and anti-national terms
- Polish plumberPolish PlumberPolish Plumber was a phrase first used by Philippe Val in Charlie Hebdo and popularised by Philippe de Villiers as a symbol of cheap labour coming in from Central Europe as a result of the Directive on services in the internal market during the EU Constitution referendum in France in 2005.The...
- LebensraumLebensraumwas one of the major political ideas of Adolf Hitler, and an important component of Nazi ideology. It served as the motivation for the expansionist policies of Nazi Germany, aiming to provide extra space for the growth of the German population, for a Greater Germany...
- World War II crimes in Poland
- Massacre of Lwów professorsMassacre of Lwów professorsIn July 1941, 25 Polish academics from the city of Lwów, Poland ; now in Ukraine) were killed by Nazi German occupation forces along with their families and guests...
- OstfluchtOstfluchtThe Ostflucht was a movement by residents of the former eastern territories of Germany, such as East Prussia, West Prussia, Silesia and Province of Posen beginning around 1850, to the more industrialized western German Rhine and Ruhr provinces...
- World War II Behind Closed Doors: Stalin, the Nazis and the WestWorld War II Behind Closed Doors: Stalin, the Nazis and the WestWWII Behind Closed Doors: Stalin, the Nazis and the West is a BBC / PBS documentary film on the role of Joseph Stalin during World War II. The 2008 film combines narrative-led documentary segments, interwoven by dramatic re-enactments, with actors representing main political figures of the period....
- Polish population transfers (1944–1946)
- Jan Tomasz Gross
Further reading
- The Forgotten Holocaust (mass deportations of Poles to the Soviet Union during WWII) article
- A Forgotten Odyssey (mass deportations of Poles to the Soviet Union during WWII) website
- "False terminology in the foreign media used in reference to Nazi German concentration camps in occupied Poland" - Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs report
- The Institute of National Remembrance
- Linguistic imprecision? (anti-Polish bias in the English-language media)
- Non-Jewish Holocaust Victims - the 5 Million Others
- Alex Kurczaba, 'East Central Europe and Multiculturalism in the American Academy', The Sarmatian Review, 3/1998
- Interview with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland, Prof. Adam Daniel Rotfeld "We shall not let our country be libeled" "Takich obozow nie bylo" Kto pisze w USA nową historię Europy, Polski i II wojny światowej?
- Polonia in Germany
- Religion, Nationality, or Politics: Catholicism in the Russian Empire, 1863-1905 (pdf)
- A Polish Deportee Recalls Her Ordeal
- Richard Jensen, "No Irish need apply" by a retired Professor of History, University of Illinois in Chicago