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Poland Dares to Speak Up!
Translated from the Polish by Krzysztof Zarzecki, Hugh McDonald, Paweł Styrna
Dom Polski, Warsaw 2012
Author’s Foreword
Sometimes silence is golden. This is so when a rash word of ours may hurt, or even harm someone. It’s especially important when we deal with overly sensitive or sick people. It calls for tact and circumspection. We must remain in control of ourselves and hold our tongues. There are also circumstances when we must remain silent in order not to betray an all-important secret. Sometimes this calls for true heroism. In Poland, during and after World War II, oppressors resorted to torture in order to obtain information from the captured soldiers of the underground anti-Nazi, anti-communist resistance army. Some, unable to bear the suffering, betrayed their brothers-in-arms; others, uncertain of their power of endurance, swallowed poison; still others didn’t breathe a word under torture and took their secrets to the grave. There are times, situations and challenges when we must remain silent. Whoever does remain silent is then a hero.
However, there are also times when we should not remain silent, indeed we must not! Another imperative comes into force then, which was defi ned by the ancients: Qui tacet, consentire videtur (Whoever remains silent, gives consent). Yes, silence is no longer a mark of heroism then but indeed becomes a mark of outright cowardice. When is it so? First of all, when lies are disseminated in public life, and corruption propagated. We must speak up bravely then. Why bravely? Because such actions may bring serious blows, both verbal and in the form of discrimination. This happens when people who care nothing for moral principles, faith and patriotism, and who will resort to any means to intimidate those who preserve a healthy conscience, have gained the upper hand in both the media and in politics. When intimidation is not suffi cient, they will keep slandering the defi ant person or, exercising their acquired power, will rely upon various tools of revenge, including terminating that individual’s employment.
Nowadays an often ruthless struggle is being waged in Poland. Its aim is to corrupt our Polish consciences, so that we will lose the ability to distinguish a person from an animal, a woman from a man, a wife from a husband, the nation from human resources, subjugation from independence, and ideology from faith. In this struggle, we cannot surrender: we must defend ourselves wisely, we must speak up, we must not keep silent! Silence is consent, and there can be no consent to that which threatens our culture. Most of the essays collected in this volume were initially aired on Radio Maryja and on TV TRWAM, and were published in the weekly magazine Nasza Polska and in the daily Nasz Dziennik. Some were delivered at the international conferences. I hope they will inspire the readers to further reading and refl ection, to discussion and study, because the problems that they probe are of the utmost importance and relevance.
This book is written for everyone but especially for ordinary people who in their everyday lives fi nd deep and troubling issues confronting them in their relationships in their work, or within their families, or just in their lives generally. It tries to look at these and examine them from their point of view, in language and ideas which may give them some understanding about these very issues.
I would like to express my thanks to doctor Antoni Gliwa, Piotr Szarkowski, Krzysztof Tomaszewski, Krystyna Zaremba and Marek Żelazny who were very helpful in preparing this book for publication.
Warsaw, September 17, 2011
Contents
The Treasure of Polish Culture ........................................................................................... 9
State – Nation – Fatherland ............................................................................................... 22
How Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill Decided the Fate of the World .............................. 26
Europe Without a Memory? .............................................................................................. 29
A Superpower Still Invisible? ........................................................................................... 32
On the Need for Local Elites ............................................................................................ 35
The Discretionary State? ................................................................................................... 38
Knocking Out the Catholic Church ................................................................................... 41
The Price of Emigration .................................................................................................... 44
Origins of the USSR ......................................................................................................... 47
The Illegal Polish People’s Republic ................................................................................ 50
The End of Democracy? ................................................................................................... 53
The High Priests of Democracy ........................................................................................ 56
The World Is Watching Us ................................................................................................ 59
The European Union – Beyond Democracy? ................................................................... 62
Let’s Look at the Media .................................................................................................... 65
Soviet Propaganda ............................................................................................................ 68
A Bit of Wisdom ............................................................................................................... 71
Had it Been a Pole… ......................................................................................................... 74
Homo-manipulation .......................................................................................................... 77
Disciples of the Encyclopedists ........................................................................................ 80
The “Face” of an Animal .................................................................................................. 83
An Unpunished Crime ...................................................................................................... 86
Simulated Debates ............................................................................................................ 89
The Caricature ................................................................................................................... 92
The Model Boy ................................................................................................................. 95
The Boyfriend ................................................................................................................... 98
The Man in the Family .................................................................................................... 101
Demoralization Is Ideology ............................................................................................. 104
The Marxist Stamp .......................................................................................................... 107
The Media Guillotine ...................................................................................................... 110
The Freedom of a Childand Parental Authority .............................................................. 113
“An Enemy to Man and God” ......................................................................................... 115
Rule by Technocrats ........................................................................................................ 119
Descartes and… Television ............................................................................................. 122
Christian Humanism and the Challenges of Modern Culture in Post-Communist States ..125
Freedom and Tolerance ................................................................................................... 134
Książkę można zamówić pod adresem:
Wydawnictwo Dom Polski
ul. Wandy 14/10
03 949 Warszawa
tel. (22) 672 85 87
e-mail:
PKO BP LVII Oddz. Warszawa
16 1020 1127 0000 1102 0012 0238
