Why the Polish people are being labeled as Anti-Semits? Maybe it is a stupid thing to ask here?

adlep

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2001
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Well I just saw the new Polanski's movie called The Pianist
It is a beautiful movie but it is also very violent and realistic. It got the main prize in this year's Cann film festival too...
And then I came across this:
Mr. Polanski's film is perhaps the most personal of the four, largely because he himself is a Holocaust survivor. Based on Wladyslaw Szpilman's memoir, it is the story of one of Poland's most accomplished pianists, a Jew who survived the entire occupation in Warsaw--first in the Jewish ghetto, and then on the other side of the wall. The film is visually stunning, and there is a real authenticity to the brutality and inhumanity of life inside the ghetto. But perhaps because the film is a valentine to Polanski's Poland, non-Jewish Poles are depicted only as freedom-fighters and rescuers. The Germans are shown as barbarians, but the attitudes of Polish citizens, most of whom were either complicit or indifferent to the fate of their Jewish neighbors, aren't represented in this movie at all. This skewed vision of Polish history is perhaps related to the fact that both Mr. Szpilman and Mr. Polanski himself--in their special, rarefied cases--would not have survived without the assistance of Polish Catholics. But in their gratitude lies a distortion that favorably colors the anti-Semitic attitudes that the vast majority of Poles had toward Jews.
Read the entire review here

And I though that the Wall Street Jurnal is a well respectable newspaper...How they could publish something like this...It is a lie....
The author of the article doesn't like the movie because it is not showing the Poles as anti-Semites?
How weird....
And it is a great movie too....
What should I do now to respond to that article? Should I sue?
It is like someone would use the N**** word against me.....:(

 

adlep

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2001
5,287
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What is the problem with my English and where?
I shall correct it asap...
Please, forgive the typos..
 

ThePresence

Elite Member
Nov 19, 2001
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It is not a lie. The Polish people helped the Nazi's murder and massacre hundreds, if not thousands of Jews. The Polish President and the Pope recently apologized on behalf of their country. Alot of good that did.
 

Lonyo

Lifer
Aug 10, 2002
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Some people suck.
Just be glad you're not as silly as that writer and hope that other people are sensible enough to see that his comments are also totally skewed AGAINST the Polish.

How can someone comment that a film shows a biased view, by putting forward their own totally biased, and opposite, view.
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,415
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Originally posted by: Lonyo
How can someone comment that a film shows a biased view, by putting forward their own totally biased, and opposite, view.
Agreed. While it may be true that some Poles helped the Germans, it's also true that other Poles did their best to help the Jews (at the risk of their own life and liberty, their country was forcibly occupied after all). To say that ALL (edit: or even "vast majority of") Poles had anti-semitic views is a bigoted, prejudicial view in and of itself.

 

ThePresence

Elite Member
Nov 19, 2001
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Originally posted by: Vic
Originally posted by: Lonyo
How can someone comment that a film shows a biased view, by putting forward their own totally biased, and opposite, view.
Agreed. While it may be true that some Poles helped the Germans, it's also true that other Poles did their best to help the Jews (at the risk of their own life and liberty, their country was forcibly occupied after all). To say that ALL (edit: or even "vast majority of") Poles had anti-semitic views is a bigoted, prejudicial view in and of itself.
True. There were those that saved Jewish lives. A very small minority, but they deserve recognition. My grandparents are/were Polish Jews. I heard enough stories to last a lifetime.

Link
 

adlep

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2001
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Yeah...
Well they were never helping out the Germans..
We were the victims of the German occupation almost as much as unfortunate Jews...
We were allowed to live a little bit longer, but the fact is that Poland has lost 6 milion of its citizens durring the WWII half of them were Polish half of them were of Jewish descend...
ThePresence: Do you know something I dont know, if yes share your knowlege.
Some people were afraid thats for sure, but the Poles have never mass murdered the Jewish people..The Polish president did apologised for some unfortunate accidents of violence against the Jews, actually 1 in Jedwabne, but still it was a German inspired precedense. We were never killing nor colaborating with Germans against the Jewish citizens. Poles did not kill hundreds or thousands of Jewish people. This is a lie.
To the contrary my friends... He he look in here:
The official Israeli institute, yad-vashem...
And look at the official, Jsraeli statistics I am proud of....
Then multiply this number by the x number of Poles who helped but had not enough witnesses or documents, x number who just died forgotten, x number who got killed while helping out the Jews and you are going to get a substantial number......
Kind of weird behavior for the Polish pigs isn't it...?

The pogroms....?
Yes this is a Polish name, and of course there were some accidents among our common history, but the fact remains, that for many centuries Poland, my country was a tolerant motherland to millions of Jews. They were allowed to build their own Churches, schools cementaries, they spoke Idish, their own language.. this is NOT ANTI-SEMITIC behavior, please just think about it in a logical way...
Also, Poland for many centuries was no picnic for the Poles either.....
The last 50 years were difficult, but we had a lot of hardships to deal with imposed by the Germans then the Russians....
If we were sooo bad why so many Jewish folks lived in Poland unit the German invasion?
Answer that first please....
And then label my nation like that....

 

adlep

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2001
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Also, the official German punishment for the Polak who got caught hiding a Jewish person was death to him and his familiy....
Therefore all these people were heroes........?
Argue with that now...

Edit:
The Polish people helped the Nazi's murder and massacre hundreds, if not thousands of Jews.
That is a big ass lie, please prove your point....
I can prove something to the contrary... Can you?




Edit: Also there was no death punishment for the French or Dutch people for helping out the Jews....
The Polish people stoped the Nazi's murder and massacre of thousands if not hudreds of thousands Jews.
 

adlep

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2001
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Also, ThePresence...
Your link doesn't prove anything.
Well it does actually... We had enough balls to admit that there were some wrong doings, but to lablel the entire nation
as a rasist in a well known publication like the WSJ is just plain stupid and that is why I am so upset.

Edit: This is a good source of information as well, the Poles were the victims too


Edit: A registry of over 700 Polish citizens killed while helping Jews:

Edit: The Jewish Fundation for the righteous
This is similar to yad-vashem. They have recognized over 1700 people until this point, many of them are Polish.....

Edit: No one cares because we dont make nice cars, and the Poland is not an economic power....How typical

Also,
Poland was the only country, where the death penalty was handed out by the Nazis to anyone who gave the slightest assistance to the Jews.

Edit: Good book in here
Another one
 

Skyclad1uhm1

Lifer
Aug 10, 2001
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Interesting article:

From my perspective, there are two approaches to Polish-Jewish relations, two theses that are clearly false. Once that is established, things become more difficult.

The first thesis which is profoundly false can be summarized by saying, 'Poles were the same as Nazis, or worse.' This is an untruth. It is perhaps held by some uninformed people, but it is simply not true. The crimes of the Nazis in Poland were committed by the Nazis. There are crimes committed by the Nazis against the Jews, and crimes of the Nazis committed against Poles. As you have heard from Professor Thompson, the crimes of the Nazis against the Poles were horrendous and world-shaking if not for the fact that one other crime was even greater, namely, that against the Jews, because approximately three million Polish Jews were killed by the Nazis. A similar number of Poles were also killed. The proportion of Poles killed by the Nazis was of course much smaller, percentage-wise, than the proportion of Jews killed by the Nazis. In the case of Jews, it was almost one hundred percent. In the case of Poles, it was a much smaller percentage. So during the Nazi occupation, if you had a choice to be a Jew or a Pole, it is perfectly obviously that your health would have been much better served by being a Pole than by being a Jew, though being a Pole was also quite dangerous. So that is one untruth, that Poles were the same as Nazis.


The second untruth is that there was no significant anti-Semitism in Poland, that Jews lived happily in Poland, that they were welcomed in Poland. And when I speak of Poland, I am not speaking of nine hundred years ago, I am speaking of Poland of the 1920s and '30s, the period before World War II. This thesis that there was no significant anti-Semitism in Poland is simply not true. I use as my source a book by Ronald Modras, The Catholic Church and Anti-Semitism in Poland, 1933-1939 (Harwood Academic Publishers 1994). Modras is a Professor at St. Louis University and a Catholic of Polish descent. This book is a goldmine of information.
 

adlep

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2001
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I am not claiming that everything was perfect. The incident in Jedwabne was just a single incident for which we apologised. Once again, most likely it was inspired and done by the Germans, but there was some Polish help in that masacre too. That was a single incident for which the entire nation should not pay.
Once again I am not claiming that everything was perfect, because it wasn't. But the Jews in Poland were allowed to live, practice their religion, build schools, speak the laguage, have the property etc, etc for the entire milenium. The incidents happened but on a very small scale. No country is free of antisemitism or rasism. There will be always some idiots who would claim that they are better than some other nation. Still if you are looking at the history of the Polish-Jewish relationship you HAVE to cosider the entire history. Once again there were some dump people in 20's and 30's in Poland but they werent representing the majority of the population. . Also, Poland in the 20's and 30's wasnt always the friendly place but it wasnt dangerous place either (like in THE NAZI Germany). There was not KristalNicht in Poland. Once again: The lagnuage, culture, churches, schools, all of that was present in POLAND and was able to prosper over the many centuries. Plase understand that fact. If the Poles would be against Jews, the entire culture would just disappear...
We were not perfect, but overall we were good and welcoming neighbours to the Jewish people, in spite of the very difficult and bloody history.....

Edit: Jedwabne and some other places would never happened without the Germans invading Poland and creating the anti-jewish atmosphere, this is what you have to understand. The invasion and ocupation unfortunately destroyed the balance that our cultures had created throughout the common (COMMON) history. Who is to blame? The Nazi Germany and the Allies for not helping out at all, and not the Poles....

Edit2: here is a good analogy.....Although it may be shocking for someone, I do not want to ofend anybody....but
Lets suppoused that the ultra-right wing would come to power in the US and they would pass the law, which would say it is OK to kill miniorites, blacks, jews, asians... And the US Police would say " hey that is OK with us, go ahead and do it"...
Do you folks have any idea how many people would get killed..I dont, I can only imagine.....
So in Poland, the Nazi Germans passed the law like that, and the German police units were encouraging the Poles to do the attrocites, yet in spite of that such a shameful behavior was rare.....
Clear now?


 

jjones

Lifer
Oct 9, 2001
15,425
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Actually, Poland had it pretty rough in WWII. As said, if not for the horrendous killing of the Jews, the world would have spoken about the horrendous killing of the Poles. Poland was to be eradicated, wiped from the map and its people along with it, and from what I've been given to understand, soon after the "Jewish problem" was settled once and for all, the Poles were next in line.
 

adlep

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2001
5,287
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Once again, in Poland like in any other nation, the right wing idiots did exist, but the overall majority of the Jews could feel safe in Poland for many centuries. Some incidents shouldnt make the entire nation guilty, and that is the impresion the moron at the top of my thread is giving. My point is that the newspaper like WSJ should not allow anybody to label any nation like that, especially that we have a proven record of heroism durring the WWII. Also, you have to remeber that the war and ocupation itself created a unique situation in which people wanted just to survive. If my survival would be at stake, I would do anything to save my life, sorry. And no one can hold it agains the Poles. Next time England. France, and US should act ASAP to help us in case of the emergency period. THe war could of ended in 1939 if just bitc* Fance and UK did something more but talking. While the majority of the German army was busy in Poland, the Allies could whipeout the enitre Nazi industrial center, and we, the Poles would hold up even longer, come up with some bigg ass controfensive to help the Allies. This way atrocities agains the Jews, Poles, or any other nation would never happened.....
I refuse to be labeled las a rasist...
ThePresence came in here, typed that he heard "some" stories, yet he didn't offered any tangible evidence of the atrocities. Thanks for labeling me, I really hope that I was able to convince some of you that we werent that bad after all...
Regards,
Adam
 

Alphazero

Golden Member
May 9, 2002
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The fact is, anti-semitism was rather popular in Europe before the war, Poland included. The Jews had a hard time throught the 20's and 30's because of anti-semitism on the part of the government and the general population.
 

Darein

Platinum Member
Nov 14, 2000
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Labeling an entire nation based on a group of people who choose one course over another isn't good. As its been said, there were a lot of helpful Polish, there were also a lot of Polish Jews. I know a woman whos mother was in Auschwitz and near the end of the war was able to get out and a Polish farming family helped them hide out for awhile before they could get back to their home, or what was left of it.
 

adlep

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2001
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It is very difficult topic and this is not an a good place to discuss it...
Sorry, didnt mean to ofend anybody, I was just angry about the article...
Thanks for everyone's valid points and feedback...
Cheers!

P.S. And make sure to see The Pianist!

 

ThePresence

Elite Member
Nov 19, 2001
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Originally posted by: adlep
It is very difficult topic and this is not an a good place to discuss it...
Sorry, didnt mean to ofend anybody, I was just angry about the article...
Thanks for everyone's valid points and feedback...
Cheers!

P.S. And make sure to see The Pianist!

Yes, it's a difficult topic. I am not labeling all Polish people as Anti Semites, because that's a rediculous generalization. But to blame it on the Germans for creating an Anti Semitic enviroment is silly. Only Anti Semites would murder Jewish people simply because they are Jewish, no matter what the enviroment was. And the hypothetical example of the US permitting race murders is correct, only the racists would be doing the murders, same as the Anti Semites that massacred the Jews. You can have all the links you want proving your case, I got my own grandparent's horror stories. I am not accusing you of being an Anti Semite. I'm just trying to show that the Polish people do have some blood on their hands.
 

adlep

Diamond Member
Mar 25, 2001
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Yes... ThePresence, but what about the centuries fo Jewish presence in Poland...?
Why they would pick Poland?
And why so many Jewish folks lived in Poland before WWII?
Poles do have some blood on their hand....Of course, Jedwabne....
But it would not have happend without the German attack and occupation.
If the allies and US would of help the Poles and the Polish Jews, none of that massacre could happended....
Do you understand what I am saying?

Once again, sure there were some right-wing idiots in the 20's and 30's but they were a miniority....
There was a small number of murders who killed the innocent people.
There was a bigger number of heroes who were willing to help the Jews... (look at the link)
The most of the people were indiffrient because they were afraid ( there was a death sentence for helping out the Jews in Poland)
Also, there was 3 million of Polish Poles killed by the Germans. We were victims of the Germans almost as much as the Jews. Actually we, the Poles were the target of the mass kilings for the first few years of war.
We were fighting the Nazis on all fronts of the WWII for the freedom of all Polish citizens regardless of the ethnic backround.
In 1939 we could just surrender like France, setup a colaborative goverment like France and many other occupied coutries, and just give up the Jewish citizens (like in France and many other countries). Insead of that we decided to fight for the freedom.
There were some people who were a criminals among the Poles, but I am claiming that they were a miniority. To the contary what the author of the article on the top is claming.
I understand and I am sorry for your grandparents. Nothing can change their experience, and I regret that, but try to unerstand the whole picture, at least try to go through the links I have provided. You might get some additional insight about this difficult chapter in our History. Nothing is just black and white, that is why you have to know the arguments of the both sides....
Regards,
Adam

Edit: The environment you are talking about.... There was an enviroment of fear created by the Nazis, this arument is not silly at all. Once again, the Germans have destoyed the bound between our nations. It is not silly at all. It is tragic.


. And the hypothetical example of the US permitting race murders is correct, only the racists would be doing the murders, same as the Anti Semites that massacred the Jews.
Well, no, not at all. Sadly, some people would kill the other people just because they could. With no fear of being prosecuted, no justice system and police... Do you know what would happened in the US?
Well that was the sitiuation in Poland...Anarchy, fear, violence, and the egoistic will to surival.....
Think about it, and realy, go through my links. They are a valuble and objective resources about the history....