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Stereotyping in the Polish culture: Are Polish blondes really dumb?


Admin  25 | 400   Administrator
14 Dec 2005 /  #1
Stereotypes are nothing unique to the Poles - every nation has them; stereotypes make life easy. The Scots are stingy, the Swedes are uncommunicative and the Russians are always drunk and so on...

The unusual bit, though, appears to be the fact, that Poles seem to exaggerate the "problem" with the hair color just a (fair) bit more than the rest. The redheads, just like the cats - for some unexplained reason, the men more often than the females - are by the Poles believed to be false by nature, and the blondes are cast as totally unintelligent, dumb, and stupid - unbelievably stupid. (Strangely enough the other hair colors do not seem to reveal or influence any other character traits.)

True, the blondes are dumb even by US standards. A sign of a blonde starring in a Hollywood movie tells you all you need to know about her mental capacity or the lack of such, the platinum head being an obvious signal of deficiency, signaling the kind of girl that will laugh loudly at anyone's pointless jokes and stare at you, no matter how trivial the conversation, with her big blue eyes wide open, as if you were Casanova's next of kin, which you are obviously not, judging by your image in the mirror.

The Polish blondes do not compare to their American compatriots. Being a laughing stock is one thing, being a complete imbecile, yet another. The Polish blondes excel at stupidity, according to the Polish (male) lore. In this context, I still find it incomprehensible why the color of one's hair would influence one's mental capacity.

The matter becomes even more mystifying taking into account that very few Polish females are real platinum blondes. (Marilyn, where are you?) In general the natural hair color of a Polish female is what you could call dark blond (which is a bit ordinary and not at all exciting shade of blond). It is a bit hard to describe in words but if you have seen a (female) sparrow, you get the idea.

True, the real Polish country girls are often depicted as blondes equipped with suitably pigmented pigtails, but this is all simply a poetic license.
So why are the Polish males having so much fun on the account of poor blondes, while not fearing any repercussions? Could the explanation be, that since there are no real blondes in Poland, the jokes about them are safe to make. The dumb blondes are not your sisters, mothers, girlfriends or wives, thus making fun of poor blondes in the land of Poles is totally risk free. Any girl can join in and laugh.

This is not a new phenomenon. The jokes about the blondes have been around for as long as anyone can remember. Sometimes the blondes are stupid when they drive their cars, as if car driving required a special kind of advanced (read male) intelligence, but in general, they are stupid under any circumstances.

A point is case is that it is mostly men, that conceive jokes about blondes and laugh at them. To illustrate the point, let me tell you an old one about two blondes driving a Fiat with an engine in the rear. One of them is having a problem with her car. She opens the hood and gasps. Another blonde in the same kind of car stops to help. "What's the trouble," she asks. "Look here," replies the first one. "Someone stole my engine."

"Relax," says the other. "I just checked my boot in the morning, and I found out that I got a spare one. You can have it."

Obviously the "blondes" are too stupid to understand the complexity of the men's world of motoring. Seeing it this way, the jokes are not about the blondes at all, but about women in general. The blondes are just a symbol of a stupid female, a dumb cow that is neither bright, nor capable enough to master the intricacies of the male world. In this context the blondes are simply a convenient metaphor employed to denigrate the females in general, not only the blonde ones.

I am afraid the jokes tell us much more about the Polish men than about the Polish blondes. They do seem to reveal the true nature of the very macho men of Warsaw or Krakow in their wonderful machines whistling loud when seeing yet another, not necessarily blond, female behind the steering wheel.

Females behind the wheel? Men, they do all look blond to us!

----

Contributed by Steven
Guest  
13 Mar 2006 /  #2
I think not only Polish blondes are dumb (sorry, couldn't resist ;}.
pio  
13 Jun 2006 /  #3
Not true.
bossie  1 | 123  
9 Jul 2006 /  #4
I think not only Polish blondes are dumb (sorry, couldn't resist ;}.

Guest

So are you
Ly_  
30 Sep 2006 /  #5
what...? I'm a blonde, I heard countless amount of jokes about blondes and I've never been offended because it's a JOKE! =) It's stupid to take a joke seriously, c'mon.

And about females behind the wheel.... try driving in Poland. If you don't have an accident, die, destroy your car, or lose yourself then I'll say that maybe we're bad at driving. But it's almost impossible since EVERYONE has problems with driving in Poland...
Eurola  4 | 1898  
15 Dec 2006 /  #6
Hollywood is full of dumb blonds who make A LOT OF MONEY, HEADLINES and FAME for themselves promoting stupidity.
Especially, the blond white trash of Paris, Britney, Nicole...just to name a few.

It is always the uneducated, ignorant moron who trives on stereotypes, trying to feel better about himself. YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE. So there.
FISZ  24 | 2116  
15 Dec 2006 /  #7
Especially, the blond white trash of Paris, Britney, Nicole...just to name a few

The spirit of America :) No panties-pornos-annorexia :)
Eurola  4 | 1898  
15 Dec 2006 /  #8
= MONEY
PoleSoul  
28 Feb 2007 /  #9
Being both Polish and blonde, I'm quite the little connoisseur in terms of this discussion. However, the stereotyping hasn't done much for my reputation, so its debatable whether or not anyone will take in anything I say at all. I have to say though, I don't consider myself particularly dumb. Driving in Poland is said to be quite dangerous, but how would i know, considering I don't even live there? Upon visits I've been warned against driving in Poland, simply because there is a danger factor widely associated with Polish roads, and heightened by the colder seasons when roads happen to be quite slippery. Also, I'm not old enough to drive. Apparently that's a good enough reason for not driving in poland, in itself.

Regardless of the roads and what they're associated with, I've never felt belittled in Poland, from men or women. I haven't heard that from anyone in Poland. Australia is quite a supporter of making blondes feel 'dumb'. Ooh, how harsh, indeed. Words truly hurt. I've discovered that the best way to 'insult' a blonde is to call them a 'blonde bimbo'. How clever.

The especially clever part of this is that brunettes are the ones who seem so keen to use this lovely little statement, as though it some how proves that intelligence is skipped among those with fair hair, and yet it is brunettes that are constantly bleaching their hair to look just as blonde. And isn't it wonderfully clever when people assume those who've dyed their hair are promiscuous and unintelligent? Here's a strange fact- peroxide doesn't affect intelligence, and promiscuousity among women with blonde hair is a gender expectation! Hair dye changes hair colour! Not level of intelligence!!

Hair colour should not in any way affect how people are viewed by society in general. If one can look at something as trivial as someone's hair colour, and instantly assess their whole psychological profile, that is just as bad as someone who treats someone of a different race/culture differently. A joke is a joke, understandably. But considering that blondes, especially natural ones, are a minority group among others, comments such as 'blonde bimbo' should be avoided...and if you do say something to that extent, and you're a female, you've substantially let yourself be programmed to assert the values of the patriarchal society you are a part of.

Sadly, just as society becoming matriarchal is highly doubtful, the concept of the 'dumb blonde' will hardly be 'phased out' anytime soon. But if you are a blondes-truly-are-dumb conformist, just take some time to reflect on how pathetic that has made you sound. And if that offends you in anyway- well, deal with it, like a blonde.

Joke:
A guy walks into a Pole, and starts having a conversation!!
dada  
6 Mar 2007 /  #10
Stereotyping in the Polish culture: Are Polish blondes really dumb?

Of course not.

Regardless of their nationality it just means they died their hair blond.

Any other smart question, Steve?


(Gee, how dumb some people are. Blonde or not. You gotta explain everything to them. They see a batman on TV and think that if they wear red pyjama they could fly too. And sometimes you can keep explaining and they will still believe something else. "No, Steve, don't jump off that roof, you can't fly". Gotta be patient with Steves..)
wigglebandit  
23 Apr 2007 /  #11
They're stunning - who cares how thick they are!
zbigniew  1 | 10  
28 Apr 2007 /  #12
Everybody thinks Polish blondes are stupid -- until they have you eating out of there hands. I see it time and time again.

Polish blondes are some of the smartest, most dangerous women in a of God's creation and they seem to *work* it everywhere -- church, work, home. The web's they weave are some of the tightest, craftiest and most ruthless in history.

I've watched my evil sister and cousins for 33 years in action, as a result I married a brunette.

z.
David_18  65 | 966  
8 May 2007 /  #13
Its the same in Sweden
sjaxman123  
6 Jul 2007 /  #14
I don't know many polish people, living in north florida. But I've known people from chicago who would tell me about how stupid they are. He should me a picture of one, and boy did he look stupid! And he told me that the aryans who invaded eastern europe used to breed the slavs for work, just like the southerners bred black people.
Michal  - | 1865  
6 Jul 2007 /  #15
I think that all Polish women are quite clever in a devious sense. They all know how to achieve their own goals in life. A very two faced lot if you ask me!
sapphire  22 | 1241  
6 Jul 2007 /  #16
This is aterinle msyognistic thread. Z man (whose name I cant be bothered to remember)...words fail me! Michal.. are you Polish yourself or you have you just had your fingers burnt by a Polish woman? If you have, then why stay on the Polish Forum.. just to moan about it?
southern  73 | 7059  
6 Jul 2007 /  #17
Michal.. are you Polish yourself or you have you just had your fingers burnt by a Polish woman?

Michal has rather milk on his fingers.
FISZ  24 | 2116  
6 Jul 2007 /  #18
He's a miserable old man from what I can see :)
sjaxman123  
6 Jul 2007 /  #19
Another reason the slavs are not that intelligent generally is that if the ayrans fond an intelligent slav, they would kill him. another reason is the smartest people became priests and yet the priests were not allowed to have children. So anywhere that was predominantly catholic, it gradually lowere the iq of the general population. Whereas in judaism the rabbis had big families and that raised the iq.
Ranj  21 | 947  
6 Jul 2007 /  #20
ROFLMAO.....What a load of CRAP!!!!! (Every Pole I personally know....and there are quite a few....they are very intelligent)!
Daisy  3 | 1211  
6 Jul 2007 /  #21
ROFLMAO.....What a load of CRAP!!!!!

it's certainly the biggest crock of shite I've ever read..
Wyspianska  
6 Jul 2007 /  #22
The same here ^^
Thx for that funny theory! Its cool that there exist some people, which can think soooo absurdly o.O
sjaxman123  
6 Jul 2007 /  #23
let me pt it to you this way. Zbigniew bresinski is highly inteligent. But yao ming is a 7-6 professional basketball player. so their are always exceptions.
Wyspianska  
6 Jul 2007 /  #24
First of all: u cant say generally that Poles are clever/stupid, beautiful/ugly or so. It just isnt depend on nationality.
Amen.
sjaxman123  
6 Jul 2007 /  #25
wyspianska, i'm just going by general averages. obviously, their must be a few tall pygmies.
Lady in red  
6 Jul 2007 /  #26
I think that all Polish women are quite clever in a devious sense. They all know how to achieve their own goals in life. A very two faced lot if you ask me!

How on earth can you make such a remark ? You don't personally know 'all Polish women'.

It's a bit like me saying 'all men called Michal are pathetic'........isn't it ?

First of all: u cant say generally that Poles are clever/stupid, beautiful/ugly or so. It just isnt depend on nationality.Amen.

I agree.
Daisy  3 | 1211  
6 Jul 2007 /  #27
You don't personally know 'all Polish women'.

no, but he thinks he knows it all....
Lady in red  
6 Jul 2007 /  #28
I know. :(
Daisy  3 | 1211  
6 Jul 2007 /  #29
I don't know why his wife stays with him
ukinpoland  5 | 338  
6 Jul 2007 /  #30
It's a bit like me saying 'all men called Michal are pathetic'

Im not going to comment.

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