Life / Why are Polish people so strange & unusual? [51]

One's very first impression, at least in my case, of multi-aged male Poles who've crossed my path over the years (especially if I were speaking to them in English at first, rather than Polish!), is that of smart aleck, full of one upmanship and seemingly invasive questions about me, followed by blunt, snap judgements as to who they think I "must" be, based solely on their initial impression.

I've come to expect same whenever I meet up with a male Pole (Jewish Poles as well). and I've never been disappointed to date:-)

Examples: "So why you are speaking Polish?", "You must be Jew, yes?", "You are married?", "Why you never lived in Poland?", "You talking **** about Poland...!" etc.

On the other hand, at least one cannot accuse them of NOT speaking their minds. However, it does tend to put on on the defensive a little, even if this wasn't exactly their intent.

I merely take it all with humor, plus a healthy grain of salt and never let it bother me.

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

@Dougpol, slight correction here. A majority of the poorer classes DID in fact vote Hitler into office, it was however the military who felt that once voting Hitler in, they could easily sway him to do their bidding! The less fortunate sectors of German society felt they had no choice but to elect Hitler; even Hindenburg (senile at the time though he was) was fooled when he conceded official power over to Hitler.

The point is that Hitler was voted into power, DEMOCRATICALLY too, one should add:-)

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

I'd have to honestly take a close(r) look at some brick-and-mortar sources for that, I'm afraid. Wiki's limited in more ways than one, furthermore, it surely won't be the first time either that the perpetrator's cried victim!

This pernicious slander that the Jews have something in their genes which makes them so rapacious for power that they seek to take over the world has to be finally put to rest. As it can't be proven, it has zero validity:-)

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

If you mean Jews killing gentile Poles who sought to kill them, you're historically right. The example though beggars comparison....except to an anti-Semite.

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Poles weren't murdered in Israel, were they? Yet Jews were murdered in Poland. The families and survivors of Auschwitz wound up where?? In Palestine aka modern Israel.

Guess, Netanyahu and Ambassador Azari see some connection there.

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

@Dirk,
The Israelis might well be as misguided as they Poles in this respect, or even the Nazis! In poetry, we do speak of "foreign blood" (The Marseilleise, for example), yet we know in reality that such doesn't, cannot exist....if you believe in science:-)))

As to why the Jews kept getting thrown out again and again from most European countries has as much to do with Catholic dogma concerning alleged Christ killers as anything else.

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Blood knows no nationality or the like, someone ought to have reminded Hitler......and Archie Bunker when he went in for a transfusionLOL

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Perhaps as an American, I see matters differently, but to be for example Polish, German, French etc. in the end means to feel, speak, act Polish, German or French in one's heart, despite the superficial differences between ethnic as compared with "naturalized" minorities.

Tell a Polish Jew who considered themselves lucky enough to be considered for the army etc. that they're not as Polish as a Christian Slav who never had to overcome the disadvantages of prejudice!

Tell a Black American who was a Tuskeegee airman that the color of his skin makes him less of an American than a white man.....I dare ya!!!

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Polish Jews most certainly ARE Poles, as are American Jews Americans (inspite of the tricky nomenclature of being associated with an essentially immigrant nation vs. one homogeneous nationality, I'll grant you), German Jews Germans etc..

The artificial distinctions of race vs. nationality vs. religion cannot deprive any citizen from their legal birthright to be counted as belonging to the country of their birth.

While it is true that the bulk of Polish Jewry once resided in shtettls, spoke exclusively Yiddish, not Polsh or even German, and were culturally isolated from their gentile neighbors (not by the former's consent, I might add), a large number became great contributors to the majority Polish society such as Julian Tuwim, Tadeusz Roziewicz etc., writing in a Polish which continues to set standards even to this this day.

It would therefore be a grave injustice to those Poles to associate the "average" Polish Jew of today with some Isaac Bashevis Singer characters of a bygone era!

Life / Why are Polish people so strange & unusual? [51]

Israel is naturally reluctant to admit the fact that Germany alone planned and executed the Holocaust, since much of Israel's technology depnends on Germany, and not Poland:-)

Kinda smells, don't it!

Life / Why are Polish people so strange & unusual? [51]

There I couldn't agree with you more, Dougpol1! Then again, the Poles have only themselves to blame, as I've said once before, re-electing the same party which nearly destroyed their country during part of the '90's!

But let's don't be too hard on 'em. It hurts like Hell, I'm sure, to be constantly maligned by others.

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Fair enough, TheOther. I take your point.

Life / Why are Polish people so strange & unusual? [51]

Knownaim,

My experience, both all too briefly in Poland, as well as with Polish people here in the States over many, many years, is that Polish hospitality is unrivaled among Europeans whom I've enountered during my travels!

As far as some of what I've read which you experienced, I must beg to differ sharply. Poles as a group are certainly not slower or faster than any other peoples; they can though be quite intense as concerns both their own history along with their place in the world. They are indeed sensitive to stereotyped misconceptions about themselves and if they perceive they are being made fun of or condescended to in any way, their feelers go up like a bird dog, and they will usually respond by looking you straight in the eye, above all, honestly, truthfully, and sometimes even, not so diplomatically.

At present, they have a lot on their plate, in addition to being unfairly made to feel as though the Nazi Holocaust was somehow their "fault".

History / Lusatian-Sarmatic obsession of Poles [153]

Let's hope you will be:-)

History / Lusatian-Sarmatic obsession of Poles [153]

The Celts were to be sure to be found all throughout Central Europe, merging with both the Germanic and the Slavic nations, as we both know:-)

As to their origins, there are numerous theories yet to be historically substantiated.

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

I couldn't agree more, dolno.

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Only in post -War Poland (also Romania), were Jews punished simply because they were Jews. Even in post-War Germany, Hungary, and Austria, there is nothing to equate with Kielce, sorry.

History / Lusatian-Sarmatic obsession of Poles [153]

Impossible because you are a Slav, that's all. If you were a Celt, like Dr, Cahill from Ireland, you'd claim the Irish saved civilization etc.

Come off it, Crow!

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Amen, delph! Spot on.

History / Lusatian-Sarmatic obsession of Poles [153]

@Crow, is it not possible that maybe the reverse is true, that all Slavs have more than a little German in them, more that is, than many might care to admit?

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

@TheOther,

So now you even doubt Wiki, eh? I know very well what I read, namely, that old man Gabriel (Sigmar's dad) WAS a Nazi sympathizer. Clear enough for you?

Furthermore, what's self-flagelatory about coming clean about one's familiy's Nazi ties, however faded, however distant?

According to a book put out during the 90's, I believe, ("Papa, hast du's getan?: Taeterkinder sprechen" = Did you really do that, dad? The children of Nazi

criminals speak), the past is still very present in German society, literary excursions into "American-style" adventure fiction notwithstanding!

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Gabriel's right, and exhibits considerable sensitivity to the entire Israeli dynamic as well. Maybe the well-documented fact that his father in particular was an unabashed Nazi sympathizer might have something to do with his thoughtful stance:-)

History / Lusatian-Sarmatic obsession of Poles [153]

Try General von Steuben in the US (...before it became the United States of America)! The Prussian fought shoulder to shoulder with General Washington, plus, it was yet another German, Emanuel Leutze, whose painting of Washington crossing the Delaware prior to reaching Valley Forge, which remains one of the most indelible images in all of US history to this day. And there's always the former printer John Peter Zenger who was the first to openly champion freedom of speech in the colonies.

:-)

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Yes, that's right, Frapol.

What I've read of Wilczek, he's quite accomplished and has authored any number of academic historical texts in both Polish as well as English!

It's all a question really of accurate nomenclature and the fact is that "POLISH" death camps is inaccurate, therefore misleading.

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Poland's Ambassador to the US, Piotr Wilczek, wrote a strongly-worded, forceful op-ed piece in today's NYT in which he vehemently protests claims of Polish complicity in the Holocaust, placing blame squarely on Nazi Germany.

Figured you might be interested in it. You can of course always read it on line.

Work / Can I find a job in Poland that requires speaking in English? [82]

Of course, Dirk!

Nobody's saying that English is even the primary tongue when talking with the average people in the street, and this surprisingly includes countries such as Sweden or Denmark, where English has been taught in school as a compulsory subject for more than half-a-century:-) At the upper echelons though, whether its in Lithuania, Germany, Iceland, Spain, Italy or France etc. it's a fact that a generally respectable level of English will be widely understood.

The thing is that in order to truly understand what one's interlocutor is actually trying to say, English ALONE simply won't cut it in most instances. The reasons for this naturally are too involved, not to mention numerous, to go into now or on this thread.

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Whole problem with the phrase "Polish Death Camps" is that it falsely (if unintentionally) misrepresents the facts, namely, that they were not "Polish", but in actuality, German death camps which merely stood on what is nowadays Polish soil.

This oughtn't be that difficult to grasp now, should it?

Work / Can I find a job in Poland that requires speaking in English? [82]

Granted, if I as a Polish employer for instance looked at some Norwegian univ. grad's cv and he claimed to know Polish backwards, forwards, inside-out, whereas his/her IT or company skills were lacking, (and the job description were : IT SPECIALIST SOUGHT FOR POLISH START UP FIRM IN NOWY SACZ), obviously I wouldn't hire the person.

Nonetheless, it would certainly be a definite plus if that person spoke fluent Polish in addition. I'd make a business decision most likely and tell the chap that his Internet knowledge is so good that I'd overlook the candidate/applicant's lack of Polish skills...under the proviso that the candidate work with an on-staff bilingual Polish-English, or whatever software engineer to smooth out any language problems, if there were any, and everything would be just hunky-dory!

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

I agree here. The Death Camps were physically located in what is now Poland, yet they were manned, that is, run, and conceived by, Germans. NOT Poles!

In addition, the area where they were erected was considered Deutsches Reich, and not independent Polish territory.

News / Israel opposing potential new Polish law to criminalise term 'Polish death camps' [1539]

Precisely! Let's be exact. There were "KZs" or "Concentration Camps" for numerous others, not exclusively Jews at all, used to warehouse, and of course kill or torture, millions of prisoners for the duration of the War. There were "Vernichtungslager" or "Extermination Camps", known in the vernacular as "Death Camps" or "Todeslager" whose sole purpose was the physical elimination of "undesirables", primarily (though not only) Jews, as well as homosexuals, not necessarily Jews, Sinti-Roma as well as the mentally or terminally ill. Finally, there were "Sammellager" or "Internment Camps" where so-called "Enemies of the Reich" along with other miscellaneous foreign prisoners, were housed during the War.