Teens in Poland, their typical life, schooling, influences, etc.

I am trying to find some information on the life of teens in Poland. I was speaking with a lady before, and haven't been able to locate her. I am looking for answers to questions such as what a typical teen day is, their schooling, teen influences etc.. I am doing a research paper for college and would appreciate any help I could get. I am supposed to do the interviews by phone, so if anyone could help me out, I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you.

Candice

how are ya candi80?

You'd have to bit a little more specific, Urban or rural teens, life outside the cities are different like everywhere.
One thing I have noticed was the new "mall rats" generation, never saw them before

After the downfall of communism several western-styled subcultures spawned in Poland. Hiphop/Street and Punk-movements are quite big in the larger cities. And although the trendy, well-educated teens move slowly away from the "traditional values", later years have showed quite an upswing in religious commitment and historical interest amoung youths.

So you're saying that while teens are embracing some aspects of Western culture they are also moving more towards religion rather than away from it? Why would that be?

I think we see evidence of this on the forum. Perhaps not necessarily towards religion but to a holding onto traditional values and ways of thinking. Some are seeing 'Western' influence as negative and reacting unfavourably towards it

Yes that makes sense. There is, of course, room for traditional values and some Western culture too. It's just getting the fine balance. You'd think that the youth/teens would be the ones who would want to take on Western culture but it seems that is not the case.

Obviously some aspects will seep in, that's unavoidable but it's good for Polish culture in general if traditional values remain.

Can't say that I've noticed this.

So I've heard.. and read :)

As far as I've noticed, the trendy and well-educated teens move towards atheism, and values such as democracy, civil liberties and tolerance, which are absolutely against Polish traditional values.

So the traditional Polish value is the dictatorship?

On the level of private life and conscience - yes.

More traditional Polish 'value-defenders' think it is great to influence other people's lifestyle, sexual life and religious choices - if that's democracy, I'm Thomas Jefferson.

...which means there is no democracy in the west either, as governments of countries such as the UK or US simply LOVE to influence their citizens' lifestyles, sexual life and religion, even though they tend to do this rather covertly, hiding their true reasons under 'elf-n-safety and political correctness mumbo-jumbo. Oh, and global warming, recently.

The recent smoking ban is just an example of how people meekly agree to have a bit of freedom taken away from them in the name of "the common good". BTW, I have never smoked and hate the stuff, but I see where we are all going with this "good work". Other bans are on their way, and will be more difficult to accept, but we will have gotten used to obedience by then. Democracy?

Good post Magdalena. The pace of the erosion of our civil liberties is quickening. The state knows better is the new mantra. It's all sticking plaster over symptoms in an attempt to avoid having to deal with the causes, viz poor education, lack of parental resposibility and engendering a work ethic. Symptoms of a fat and lazy economy I suspect.

On the other hand you can argue that the lack of smoking ban also restricts civil liberty of non-smoker (as it makes people be poisoned against their will).

I would agree, that US is in fact non-democratic: they torture prisoners of war, ban Darwin at schools in certain states and persecute Muslims. But Western Europe isn't as bad.

Anyway, in the UK, when you say gay people are all sick and Amnesty International should not be allowed to organize anything at schools, you are considered an idiot, an in Poland, you're considered the defender of traditional values and become the minister of education.

I do not claim that Polish law in general is non-democratic (apart from the concordate), but there is a high pressure from certain groups of people to restrict the others' liberties, even against the law (as in the example of a 14-year-old girl who could not get a legal abortion, because a priest and some pro-life organization followed her to the hospital). And those people are the traditional values defenders.

In fact there is no comparison between the slight liberties restrictions in the UK and restrictions posed by the so-called traditional values. In UK, so far, you can be any sexual orientation you like, dress whatever you like, believe in whatever you like and decide what you want to do in your life.

According to the Polish traditional values, whoever is not Polish straight Roman Catholic living in a nuclear family (with, non-working woman, of course) and who never uses contraception (because it's a sin) and who does not vote for right-wing parties, is evil and should be fought with.

And such views are not popular among well-educated, trendy teens. (And the majority of well-educated people). That groups of the teens who go to good schools, read books, and appear in places such as threatres and cinemas (so, let's say the well-educated teens) consider such views as outdated and inappropriate for a young, intelligent person.

I am quite a mature person in the sense that I have seen many summers ;-)
And I must say I have never encountered such attitudes outside the smallest villages and tiniest towns in Poland - ever. 20 years ago, 30 years ago. In fact, as far back as I can remember. Actually, women have been urged to work and "be modern" (in the communist sense of the word, i.e. "revolutionary"). What you are talking about might actually be a backlash of sorts.

Actually, I can see the society is getting more and more conservative. I can hear many people noticing the same thing. I don't have to deal with people like that personally (maybe apart from my grandpa), but it's enough to hear the so-called 'average' people talking on the bus, in the queue, or on the TV or watch the political changes in Poland.

Or maybe it's not about the change in people themselves. Some 10 years ago it was appropriate to be modern, open, and tolerant and those benighted ones were kept quiet, on the margins, and didn't have too much influence on anything. Now, I can observe that xenophobic, homophobic and orthodox ones start being taken seriously in the public discourse and those, who used to be just a bunch of cranks, dominate the political and social life.

Unfortunately, what is so-called traditional Polish values (God-Honour-Fatherland, family, religion etc.) is not what it seems. For example the Polish religiousness is usually limited to going to church and crying after the Pope's funeral. An average Polish Catholic doesn't even know what is written in the Bible and does not show too much Christian charity. I knew only one person who was a conscious believer, and, apart from going to church, followed Christian ethics and did not treat her faith superficially (she was a religion teacher BTW)

The claims to let Poles follow their tradition are in fact driven by obscurantism and intolerance. Sorry to write this, but what usually is behind all the claims to defend the tradition and national identity is looking for an excuse to find scapegoats in the society and have a reason to hate.

Polish conservatives are in fact very similar to American Puritan-rooted movements like those who want to teach creationism at school.

Fascinating stuff here,thanks ,been a good read.

interesting

What else can I think about it hearing arguments such as: "We don't want no EU, 'cause EU will try to invade our Polish culture and heritage and force Poland to introduce gay marriages"

I disagree switezianka,In my opinion you have decidet to quit :) and now you prove why :)

some of your statemnts are true but exaggerated.

look on some posts of "haters" form other countries. Go to UK section :) of this forum

Yeah, right, ten years ago I was sh*tting into nappies and had no TV at home. And I cannot check for what kind of changes this society allowed in Polish law and education.

When I was at primary school, we were going to have sexual education lessons. But, later, the idea was given up, we didn't have it, and sexual education was never introduced to schools.

In 2001 the process of Nieznalska aroused strong controversies and protests against limiting the freedom of speech.
In 2006 people cared less about the idea that homosexuality cannot be discussed at school (Giertych's one) than about uniforms.

When I was a kid, I read about some old grannies and priests who wanted to ban some bands from performing because they were "satanist", and I treated it as absurd humour. But for a few years an MP (Ryszard Nowak) has actually managed to cancel several concerts that he thought "satanist" and made up a list of bands that were supposed to be banned and sent it around to local authorities. The absurd became reality and nobody reacted but a few musicians and listeners. No protests against limiting freedom of speech.

In general, people accept more and more limitations on civil liberties if they follow the conservative values and I am able to perceive it during my lifetime. What would have shocked me five years ago, now happens.

Anyway, I can draw interesting conclusions from comparing TV series made before my birth to the contemporary ones. Soaps are made to cater to wide audiences tastes and the values that positive character follow, mirror the audiences values. Analysing soaps one can see the ideology they actually transfer, which is something the viewers mostly agree with. And when I think about it deeply, I can see either no change or increase in conservativeness of mass-media heroes. I wonder where this came from - I don't remember what people were like in the '80s but their TV series were less conservative.

Giertych isn't member of parliament :)

your examples are strange, not long time ago Lesser has been proving me leftist intellectuals are brainwashing our society.

shortly

Father's Day cards banned in Scottish schools

are you talking about this art ?

both countries are not perfect but still Poland has more freedom than UK. Poland is going in direction where examples you have mentioned are not going to happen and examples form UK are not going to happen as well. True freedom. If you don't see it you are biased.

In my opinion you show some examples from time when we had PiS gov. Now we have new gov. :)

people vote on those politicians who represent them :) it is democracy.

tv stations show what people want to watch ... it is business :)

I am going to sleep, tomorrow I will reply to rest of your imaginative problems. :)

That's what I'm talking about. About a girl who got a sentence for showing some crap in a gallery.


Alright. An example from yesterday.

I just came back from a concert that did not take place. The reason for it was that a group of devotees didn't like it. The local parish priest made up a petition to the local authorities to cancel the concert and somebody called some electricians to ask them to cut off the electricity to the place where the concert was supposed be (Twierdza Kłodzka).

In effect, people came from all over Poland and from abroad, the bands arrived but... somebody CUT A CABLE (the loss is estimated for 2500 zł). The damage was repaired but the electricity went down again and the whole thing was cancelled.

And here's the proof that I haven't made this story up:
forum.klodzko.net.pl/viewtopic.php?t=756

No, there's no problem. PiS government is gone, so everything came back to normal.

One little question: seeing that you speak at least two languages and are able to use Internet, I assume you belong to the more educated part of Polish society. So my question is: do you have to deal a lot with people such as manual workers, uneducated-unemployed, housewives after primary schools, farmers etc.?

I found the link to the English article about that concert:
reflectionsofdarkness.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3465&Itemid=42

I remember a few years ago when religious fanatics had a Black Sabbath concert moved at the last minute.
This is one reason why we don't get any decent bands in town, even now.

We have to put up with cultural shite for snobs and the social elite. The Wratislavia Cantans. I've yet to meet an ordinary person who has ever attended.

Getting back to teens in Poland, the trend towards religion seems more and more to be one of indifference no?

Interesting topic, but I believe the only reason candy posted this is because she was trrying to sell toys. Notice it's her only post? Carry on though......

Teens and Religion? In Poland we have around 95% of catholics but only halve of them is attending church on regular basis. So if you consider a guy who sleeps during religion lessons (but he attends them), sit outside of church during Sunday mass (often with hangover) religious then yeah Polish teens are religious.

In Poland it is still considered strange to confess to atheism, most people are "non-practitioners" or something like that. But nowadays more people are becoming true catholics who nows what their religion is about in the contrast to the old devoted ladies who wants crucify anyone who miss one mass. (Long live the Father-director). It looks different when you live in a village: If you are not in the church you are a scum of society, not worth even to talk to you.

I have a contact with teens, who believe that police is some nasty institution founded only to make their life miserable. People like that seems impressed with things like the criminal record or who throws up further on the party. And of course they drinks a lot of alcohol (mostly to the point when you have no recollection of what happened in the last few hours), and consider smoking as "cool". But there is a lot of teens interested in art and culture or in developing themselves. So you can't generalize.

nice!lol

Even those delinquent teens can be religious no matter how decadent their lifestyles. I once went by my friends house in New York to visit and on the front door was a sticker with the virgin Mary on it - I knew him and his father to be atheists so I asked what's the deal? the father said he put it up to keep the young Hispanics in the building from robbing his apartment because they're all religious. And it worked!

Ups, have I wrote something funny? I'm afraid I don't get but well have fun :D


No, they aren't they go to church to have their parents contented. As few of them would be thrown out if mother know the aren't that religious. You can steal, have fights with others but you can't skip mass. And how religius is someone how drive nuns crazy on religion classes just for fun.

"no they aren't"? How do you back that up mister Census? A lot of these guys are religious, they actually believe in God, they're superstitious, they just don't practice their faith