Poland’s ruling party vicious attack on LGBT+
Just a week ago I was convincing my polish friend, a London gay banker in her mid-30s, that Warsaw was finally embracing gay rights.
“There are signs of a shift in public thinking on LGBTQ issues”, I told her and cited LGBT+ declaration and Ipsos poll in which 56 percent of Poles supported same-sex couples rights.
“So I could now come out in Poland and feel safe to be who I am?” — she seemed sceptical, and rightly so.
Earlier last month Rafal Trzaskowski’s, young and progressive mayor of Warsaw, signed of LGBT+ rights declaration. But the vision for the capital city in which everyone feels welcome, including children thrown out of their homes by homophobic parents or bullied at school, was not shared by the Law and Justice (PiS) government. Last Saturday, PIS chief Jarosław Kaczyński warned about the supposed “danger” of LGBT education — the words which might as well have come from the mouth of North Korean or Pakistan politicians. This hysterical, anti-gay narrative resonates well with PiS shrinking, socially conservative — to say the least — voters who as of last week took to social media to express their hysterical beliefs about gay people.
The children’s ombudsman, appointed by government, also raised questions about the LGBT+ declaration and its impact on children. Trzaskowski fired back: “I’d rather the ombudsman occupy himself with children who are persecuted, who commit suicide because of widening intolerance.”
The mass attack on LGBT+ declaration comes as PIS is dealing with a growing number of corruption scandals, “Kaczynski tapes” and also recent revelation about Polish priests sexual abuse history. For years, church leaders — traditionally supportive of PiS — have been sweeping under the carpet the sexual abuse happening in church. With every new abuse revelation, of which archbishops were well aware of, priests were simply reassigned from one parish to another, continuing their service as usual.
However, polish bishops didn’t shy away from taking a stance at this occasion. They issued a warning today against the LGBT+ declaration. In their opinion, it’s a threat for polish democracy and will likely ‘deprave’ children.
You could be forgiven for thinking that priests have bigger worries now than tolerance education, like for example their own grappling with pedophilia and sexual harassment?
Nonetheless, the current school teaching on marriage and sexuality is still heavily influenced by Polish church’s hard-lines. That is obviously out of touch with reality and damaging for young people. But tackling the non-existing LGBT tolerance program and bringing sexual education into polish schools still amounts, as of today, to a revolution.
