Polish relation about Russians, Ukrainians?

Reserches about similarity Poles to the Russians is about the small piece of Russia that boarders with Poland not the Moscow that is far away, and people there have different genetics even without being mixed with tatars.

Interesting :) Still doesn't change the fact that there are no Slavs, outside of the immigrant community, in Paris.

I have no doubts about it

Well, there were some in the past and there are still some in the present; and you can hardly call them immigrants: Guillaume Apollinaire, Michel and Axel Poniatowski, Elena Poniatowska, Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet (and many of her famous ancestors), Irène Joliot-Curie, Helène Langevin-Joliot, Pierre Joliot, Ève Curie, Paul Landowski, Louis Mękarski, Philippe Duke of Anjou, Louis Dauphin of France (and a bunch of other children of Maria Leszczyńska and Louis XV), and so on... :-)

That's where our opinions differ.


If they were so peace loving as you claim, why did Britain and France declare war on Germany? Not because they were the noble "fighters for freedom and democracy", that's for sure.

Were is it writen? In article that I linked on this forum nothing said about it.To those who do not know geography I will tell that tiny Kaliningrad region is only border between Poland and Russia and with rest of Russia Poland is separated with 1 thousand of kilometers distance.


The fact that Russia is large has nothing to do with genetical differences between ethnical Russians and other Slavs.Russia was populated in historically short times. Presence of admixtures in some ethnicity does not mean that we cannot talk about genetics of original ethnicity though there is never such thing as a ``pure`` ethicity.The fact that Barak Obama has some Irish ancestry ancestry does not mean that all Irish look like Obama or are all mixed. As I know, ethnical Tatars are themself very diverse ethnical group.They range from blond Indo-Europeans to Mongoloid with the latest constituting small minority.One example of ethnical Tatar from Ukraine is Rinat Akhmetov. I do not know about all of Russia but in Ukraine according to my personal calculation and observances approximately 1/3 of population are blond, 1/3 are light haired and 1/3 are dark brown or brunette.And take in account that dark pigmintation is dominant, so if only one of your granfathetrs is brunet you are also likely to be a brunette.If you will look at this map: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Light_hair_coloration_map.png?uselang=ru

you will see that large parts of Russia have larger persantage of blond people than Germany with rest of European Russia and Ukraine having approximately the same amount.And defenetly larger than among French.In any case among 150 millions of Russians number of Slavs with very small Tatar admixtures is defenatly larger than totan number of Poles.Would you discard all of them for being Russian? And would you claim that among ethical Poles people with major non-European admixures are rarity?There is large number of Poles with dark hair and easily-tanned skin. For example compare Joseph Pilsudski and Kopernicus with Vladimir Putin and Anna Kurnikova.Your imagination about Russians are based on millenium Polish stereotipes, including movies and posters.Something similar to this (make larger image)

I forgot to mention that among 150 millions of Russian I mentioned, 111 millions live in Russia proper and
rest in different countries.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russians

Honestly, I don't think I know enough about the history of religions to comment on this one...

the link you gave is not even reliable source and there is not much information about it anyway, it's more like some kind of propaganda "love Russians cause they have same genes like us" yea right...


...and Belarus, Lithuania, Latvia is less geneticaly similar to Poles although it's on the way of that 1 thousand kilometers... it's not even possible so please stop with this genetical bullsh1t

The article is in Russian?It gives refference only to credible Western scientists such as John Novembre of the University of California, Los Angeles, and Carlos Bustamante, senior author and statistical geneticist at Cornell University.

If you want you could try to find their original works with details published in Internet or somewhere else. Maybe I will do it later.


Some people need to take lessons of basic ethnography and lingustis.Lithuanian and Latvian languages are not even closely related to Polish, those are Baltic languages, not Slavic.Why genetics should be very similar? Some Russians who live in Vladivostok which something like 10.000 kilometers away could be more genetically similar to Polish than they do.And Belarus was not even shown on the map (what mistake did you do again?).

I'm talking about genetics not languages, why do you even get languages involved into that is absolutely beyond me. It's like saying Romanians are totaly different in genes from Bulgarians because one is romance language and the other slavic.


what are you talking about

Never mind.Sorry for a stupid question.


Language similarities almost always match with genetical similarities unless language is borrowed or genetics is hightly intermixed.
But for a well known reasons it is not a case with Poles and Russians.Baltic and Slavic languages separated few thousnds of years ago as well as ethnicities who spoke those languages.Polish and Russian separated much later as well as tribes who later converted

into Poles and Russians.There is nothing unbeliavable in a fact that Russians and Poles are genetically closer than Poles and Latvians.Distance between people dosn`t always matter.It`s all about migration of people.I advise you to read some basic info on this account.

When I mentioned that Poland was West I didn't mean physical geography, I meant culturally. Poland is culturally "West". Throughout history Poland exchanged ideas with France, Italy and Germany (as an example, Copernicus influenced Galileo).

From your posts and Vlad's it appears you guys are Slovophiles: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavophile

Poles are not slavophiles, from the same article:

There's a huge cultural divide between Poland and Russia (actually all of Eastern Europe). So when Vlad gets on here and says we're all slavs let's be friends he catches lots of heat from the Poles. Because Poles are Western in thought and they find Russians "foreign" in spite of the genetic, food & drink similarities. Same for your Ukrainian friend, she catches heat from Poles at work for the same reason. You mentioned in an earlier thread that Poles were suffering from an inferiority complex, Poles are probably Slavophobes: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavophobia.

Poles are b-tchy to my friend because they're "Western" and she's not? You're not making sense here...

Let's just say for the sake of argument that Russians are complete foreigners that we have nothing in common with. That gives us the right to treat them like cr-p and disrespect them?

From footnotes in the slavophile article:


You're American (your posts sure are. are you not?). The above quote is from the Library of Congress. Remember we're talking cultural differences here, not individual differences. My guess is your friend will not be accepted in poland until she assimilates into Polish culture and society. In short Poles don't like Ukrainians, the cultural divide is too deep.

She doesn't need to assimilate. What do you think she does at work exactly? Does she swing around incense and chant Russian Orthodox prayers?


Oh ok, so it's fine to treat others badly if you don't like where they come from. Brilliant point.

You asked, at the start of this thread what Poles thought of Ukrainians. From what I read not much. But, this doesn't speak for the individual, i.e., there are individuals out there who will overlook the cultural differences.

Poles have stereotypes, and that only makes us look backward.

Most of Europe has gone on with their lives. How often do you see other European nations shouting "Nazi Nazi" when the German football team comes to town?

But yet here we are, throwing bottles and shouting "kurwy" at the Russians, and imagining Putin with a smoke machine in Smolensk. And you think we're European? We got a lot of growing up to do, and a lot of insecurities to get over.

i believe I answered your questions about your mother and your aunt and their attitude towards your friend and other Ukrainians. And it looks like my posts are substantiated by wiki.

Poles are a strange people. They love being Polish but hate Poland. Poles born in the States hate the thought of being American but love living in America. I had to embrace the fact that I was American and I left Poland or Polishness behind. Best decision I ever made and this is not a criticism of Poland or Polishness.

Could you discribe this divide in as more as possible concrete examples?
Personally, as Ukrainian I communicated with some Poles and found nothing in them
that would make me feal culturally inferior near them.On my mind they are rather
typical Slavs in both appearence and some aspects of behavour.
I would be glad to know if you are Polish or American/Westerner.If you are non-Polish
how could you know deeply about such things?And in which Western country Ukrainians
and Russians ever experienced problem with assimilation?Where did you hear that?
The largest comunity of Ukrainians live in Canada - 1.3 millions of people.Do they experience
any problems with assimilation or cultural shock there?Never heard of that...

According to the links I posted Poles are Westerners. Read the links.

Could you give me any link in Internet to mention
that Eastern Slavs experience any problems with
integration or assimilation in any Western country
or that some Western leader would ever told it?
and if Poles are different then what about Hungarians,
Slovakians, Bulgarians, Romanians, Lithuanians,
Croatians, Serbians? Who of them is ``westerner``
and who is not?

According to different links Poland can be argued as being in just about anything: Eastern Europe, Western Europe or Central Europe.

Culturally Western Europe.

Nope. It has influences from both East and West.

Okay Shakespeare, substantiate your argument. I posted my links now you post yours.

Who is American, what are you talking about?

Could they remove CIA spies (those Protestants who suffered from ``Ukrainian bolsheviks``) from this forum?

Start by reading up on Mickiewicz, how he was received in St. Petersburg's literary saloons, his Crimean Sonnets, and how Russian writers were in turn influenced by him, and his views of Pushkin, who greatly admired him.

Vlad123

In some of your earlier posts you mentioned that Poles should not focus on history events which can bring hostility into relations between Poland and Ukraine, was it your point? In fact they don't focus. I can ensure you that in 2007 one of 2 most popular textbooks for extended level history lessons, secondary school (liceum), there was barely one-sentence mention about UPA and Volhynia massacre. I doubt the other one was different. Actually there is a lot of current Ukrainian politics in Polish media, but almost none history related. There was a brief period when history hit media - when some people wanted to name one of the Euro 2012 stadium in honour of Stepan Bandera, the other time was when some Ukrainian organisation tried to get visas for a kids' trip which was led in honour of Bandera as well.

Generally Poles whose families were not affected with the complicated history of those two nations have very indifferent attitude to Ukrainians, neither dislike them nor like them.

Those whose families were affected have often grudge against that Ukrainians throw accusations on Poles while they can't acknowledge their own mischiefs.

That's all in the subject of Ukrainians... wait, I almot forgot! I also fell in love in Bohun after watching Ogniem i mieczem. Sasha Domogarov without Bohun's mustache wasn't so handsome anymore :))) Kozaks are associated with romantic ideas of freedom, not with the cruelty.

Now Russians :)

Polish attitudes varies greatly: from geat fondness to deep prejudice. Personally I felt ashamed for the behavior of some Poles during Euro 2012 but unfortunately it's also the Polish media fault which heated up the atmosphere against that march by portraing it as a political manifestation against Poles.

There is a political party Law nd Justice which is very anti-russian and promotes speculations about the Smoleńsk catastrophe being in fact an assasination. The head of this party is a twin brother of the deceast president. 60-odd per cent of Poles don't believe it could be an assasination comparing to 26% who believes so.


Dominika, please stop projecting your own inferiority complex on whole population of Poland. This forum is the best example that you're wrong and that the "most of Europe" has NOT gone with their lives. How often do I hear that "Polish women are prostitutes"? Or that Poles Poles are "benefit thieves"? On this forum such and other negative claims appear constantly. Certainly many of those "civilized Europeans" think that Poles are in general dirty bunch of alcoholics, an Asiatic horde... which is, undoubtly, a deeply chauvinistic stereotype, yet you as a person raised abroad eagerly repeat such statements. It all contradicts your claims.

The only truth about human nature is that having stereotypes is absolutely a norm for every society on the globe! There are no better or worse nations in regards of that... it's only in your head, Dominika, that Poles are somewhat culturally worse because of that than Western parts of Europe.

Moreover what I've noticed, as a person raised abroad, you yourself obviously want to feel superior to your compatriots. Tell me, isn't such attitude something which is considered provincial not only in Poland but everywhere in world? No offence but now you act as if you were pretending a highly cultured person, while in fact you're snotty and provincial yourself. I've read your thread about Warsaw - funny that you accuse others of having the traits you obviosuly share too. Snotty and arrogant but on wider, global scale (instead of "Oh, I come from Warsaw" there is in your case "Oh, I come from EUROPE unlike other Poles")

Other things which annoys me about you is that you're a person who admitted voluntarily that don't know history of Poland well and don't intend to educate yourself, but despite of that you take part in discussions where having some history knowledge is essential. Doesn't it make you look like an ignorant who purports to have something intelligent to say?


The only person who has to grow up is you, because I find many of your posts offensive and immature. If Poland is not "Europe" then what it is? Asia? Let me remind you that Ukraine is also in Europe so probably many Ukrainians would find your posts insulting as well. And most population of Russia lives in Europe too.


No it's not about shame. I feel that Western Slavs are different than Eastern Slavs. I'd say that Poland culturally have much in common with Slovakia even though it's not a posh country which one would like to be associated with,or is it? (no offence to Slovakians intended).

I find Russian culture distant and exotic. Ikons, Father Frost, Orthodox Church, cyrilics.
And why do you compare being a Slav with being a non Protestant? Ethnicity and religion? What's that got to do with anything?
Between Easten Orthodox Church and Catholic church there is a void too.

And the last sentence:


no, it's only you.

But they don't often throw bottles at them or make up murderous conspiracy theories. There are stereotypes everywhere, but the hatred that some Poles have towards Russians is more deep and intense. It's also more socially acceptable in Poland to stereotype other races, and I've noticed this repeatedly.

Stereotypes are the norm, but that's no excuse to sit back and do nothing? We got a person saying here that my Ukrainian friend was treated badly at work because she hasn't assimilated, and that there is no cultural exchange between Poland and Russia. It is a forum, so we're debating that, instead of sitting back and saying "that's life, it's the norm."

You don't know me personally, but if you enjoy playing pop psychologist online then go for it. I don't know what it has to do with anything - even if I'm arrogant and provincial, it still doesn't mean Russia hasn't influenced Polish culture and vice versa... I love Poland, and like all Poles I've got the right to love or leave Warsaw. Get over it already.

What I hate is when Poles deny their Slavic heritage to try and blend into the EU. Looking west is fine if you remember who you are, and as we see here some Poles don't really want to admit they have anything in common with the country they've lived next door to for centuries. Maybe it's a superiority complex. We think we're better than the Ukrainians and the undemocratic Kremlin.

I said I don't know much about what the Ukrainians did in Poland during WWII, and about the history of the Orthodox church. There is nothing wrong with not knowing everything.

You're twisting my words around just to get in another personal insult.


I've said previously that Poland is central Europe. It's not quite Europe when it comes to hatred against Russians and other stereotypes. Most of Europe is striving for better relations with Russia, and our inability to fully get there is also hurting us financially.


Have you ever been to Moscow? I don't think you'd find it as exotic as you think.

Just so our foreign friends understand it well, Mickiewicz did not go to St. Petersburg for pleasure, he was rather on a tour organized by the tsarist police:



That's partially true. But most of it is just exaggeration. Much of what was said in the past about the friendship and mutual influence of these two poets was coloured by the politics of Communism ("Long live the fraternal love between Soviet Union and Polish People's Republic") and in the distant past - between a subdued nation and a nation doing the subduing. In the case of the latter, it did not cost much to pat the Poles on the back and show some patronizing attitude: as Mickiewicz was often being shown as a kind of a backdrop for the great Pushkin.

Much what was said about their eye to eye communication looks quite apocryphal and it does not make much sense when viewed from afar in the historical context.

Much what was written by the two poets shows how different they actually were: Mickiewicz, a romantic hapless revolutionary and Pushkin - less hysterically patriotic and actually the tsarist apologist. After all Pushkin committed three anti-Polish poems about the Russian military response to the 1830-31 Polish Uprising, which seemed starkly to contradict the ideals of poetry which scholars typically emphasize in both poets.



So much for the eternal friendship... :-)

pushkiniana.org/vol-4-articles--/227-dixon-article04.html