Racism in Poland
[1][2] As per the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), hate crimes recorded by the Police of Poland dropped between 2018 and 2020, but rose steadily until 2022, reaching a level higher than 2018 (table below).
[3][4] King Casimir III the Great brought Jews to Poland during the Black Death when Jewish communities were persecuted and expelled from several European kingdoms.
In 1485, Jewish elders were forced to renounce trade in Kraków, leading many Jews to leave for Kazimierz which did not fall under the restrictions due to its status as a royal town.
[7] Starting in 1527, Jews were no longer admitted into the city walls of Warsaw (generally speaking, temporary stays were possible in the royal palace).
[8]: 334 The Council of Four Lands created in 1581 was a Jewish diet[clarification needed] presided over by community elders from each major part of Poland, while another governing body was established in Lithuania in 1623.
[8]: 358 In Congress Poland, Jews gained civic rights with the ukase (edict) of 5 June 1862, two years before serfdom was abolished.
In response, the government organized the Camp of National Unity (OZON) to take over the Polish parliament in 1938, which went on to draft anti-Jewish legislations similar to those in Nazi Germany, Hungary, Romania etc.
"[22] Comments peddling antisemitic tropes and blaming all Jews for the Gaza War are also reportedly common in Reddit's subreddit r/Poland, subject to no apparent administrative interventions despite blatant violations.
[28] In June 1991, the Mława riot, a series of violent incidents against Polska Roma, broke out after a Romani teenager drove into three ethnic Poles in a crosswalk, killing one Polish man and permanently injuring another, before fleeing the scene of the accident.
Both the Mława police chief[30] and University of Warsaw sociology researchers[29] said that the pogrom was primarily due to class envy (some Romani have grown wealthy in the gold and automobile trades).
Instead, they were seen as owning high-end cars, living in fancy mansions, flaunting their wealth while bragging that local authorities and police are on their payroll, leaving them unafraid of anyone.
[32][better source needed] During the second half of the last millennium, Poland experienced significant periods when its feudal economy was dominated by serfdom.
[33] In modern Poland, where Ukrainians form a significant minority of migrant workers, they are subject to occasional racism in everyday life.
In Communist Poland, Uncle Tom's Cabin, by Harriet Beecher Stowe was translated quite freely and targeted at children because it was seen as anti-capitalist and anti-slavery, but now is seen as reinforcing various black stereotypes.
[37] One high-profile event with regard to blacks in Poland was the death of Maxwell Itoya in 2010, a Nigerian street vendor from a mixed marriage who was selling counterfeit goods.
[38] He was shot in the upper leg by a police officer during a street brawl that followed a screening check at a market in Warsaw, and died of a severed artery.
[40][better source needed] In Strzelce Opolskie, black football players from the LZS Piotrówka club were attacked in a bar by fans of opposing team Odra Opole in 2015 and two young men were arrested.
[49][50][51] The Kulturkampf campaign led by Otto von Bismarck resulted in a legacy of anti-Polish racism; the Polish population experienced oppression and exploitation at the hands of Germans.
[52] The racist ideas of the Prussian state directed against Polish people were adopted by German social scientists, led in part by Max Weber.
During World War II Poland was occupied by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union and Polish people were harshly discriminated against in their own country.
[54][55]Most Nazis considered the Poles, like the majority of other Slavs, to be non-Aryan and non-European "masses from the East" which should be either totally annihilated along with the Jews and Gypsies, or entirely expelled from the European continent.
Just as it is considered the greatest disgrace to become involved with a Jew, any German engaging in intimate relations with a Polish male or female is guilty of sinful behavior.
The factors behind these decreases in tolerance and the radicalization in attitudes towards other ethnic groups during this time likely included the country's economic problems associated with a costly transition from Communism (for example, high unemployment), ineffectual government and possibly an increase in immigration from outside.
[69] These attitudes began to change after 2000, possibly due to Poland's entry into the European Union, increased travel abroad and more frequent encounters with people of other races.
[70] The authors noted that "belief in [a] Jewish conspiracy proved to be the strongest significant predictor of discriminatory intentions towards Jews in all fields.
The Implementation Report (2010)[76] stated that the programme suffered from various obstacles, including lacking and unclear funding, and eventually some planned tasks were completed, while others were not.
[77] In 2013 Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk started The Council Against Racial Discrimination and Xenophobia, but it was shut down by the new Law and Justice government in May 2016.
