Poland’s going to right-wing Catholic hell

79 thoughts on “Poland’s going to right-wing Catholic hell”

1. For shame.

2. I think the problem with Poland must be traceable to the fact that it has long had to struggle for it’s sovereignty. If my high school history was correct, it was invaded and the borders shifted many times, while Germany/Prussia maintained a relatively stable existence. Without a stable state structure in place, I think there must be a lack of trust between institutions, factions, and between the people and the government. This might account for a resort to right wing, authoritarian rule, which might be seen as the only way to keep dangerous change and liberalization at bay. The Church, of course, being the ultimate authoritarian institution.

   1. +1

   2. + another

      cr

3. Poland is not alone. The combination of economic hard times and the threat of terrorism has led many European nations (and beyond) to make a hard right turn. Why people continue to belief that conservative, authoritarian “strong men” are the solution is beyond me when we have so much evidence that they make things worse and often lead their nations down a destructive path.

   1. +1

4. God is going to spend a lot of time in prison fo all those spontaneous abortions.

   1. Should be for all those spontaneous abortions.

      1. That was one of my first thoughts too.

   2. + 1

5. In the proposed law, is the woman getting the abortion considered a “prenatal killer?” The post seems to imply this, but it is not explicit.

   The “pro-life” people argue that abortion is murder since according to them life begins at conception. The notion that a woman having an abortion is a murderer follows logically from this premise (as flawed as it may be and which I reject). Logically, it is no different than a woman hiring a hit man to kill an abusive husband. This is why Trump accidently told the truth in his interview with Chris Matthews when he stated that a woman having an abortion should be punished. Of course, the pro-lifers denounced Trump, stating that only the doctor should be punished because the woman is only a victim. This is pure hypocrisy. If the pro-lifers openly stated that the woman should be punished (which many actually believe), they know that this would result in an electoral disaster. But, it would not surprise me that if the right wing has more electoral successes that the call to punish women having abortions will no longer be a minority voice in the pro-life crowd.

   In the New York Times, Katha Pollitt demolishes the pro-lifers, revealing what loathsome hypocrites they are.

   http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/02/opinion/campaign-stops/abortion-and-punishment.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-left-region&region=opinion-c-col-left-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-left-region&_r=0

   1. I haven’t seen the text of the proposed bill, only newspapers’ reports. I couldn’t find anything about punishment to women undergoing abortion, but it was very unclear whether such a punishment was proposed or not. In a few days there will probably be the text available and then I will be able to answer.

   2. Well, Trump was at least being consistent. If abortion is a crime, of course the woman should be punished as an accessory.

      Not surprising the ‘pro-lifers’ want to soft-pedal that, with one quoted saying the woman ‘is a victim along with the unborn child’. Utter bollocks! The woman is only a victim if she CAN’T get an abortion. If they succeed in driving all abortion practitioners out of business, then the real victims will be all those women who are punished by being forced to have an unwanted child.

      cr

6. Noooo! My family is from Poland and they would not have voted such religious extremists into political office. Why does this even need to be an issue in the 21st century? How does restricting abortions improve the lives of a society? Can’t we all just focus on issues that can improve society as a whole instead of concerning ourselves over what some woman does or does not do?

   In other words, mind your own business and work on programs that help the working class.

   1. Conservative governments of all types are never about helping the working class, they want to “conserve” the status quo. Logically, this means that the working class must remain in their position and be repressed.

7. This is not a government’s proposal, it originates from catholic church via a organization that is very close to the church and keeps pushing variation of this bill for a while now (it’s 4 or 5 attempt AFAIR). It’s just that now with PiS having strong majority they can finally pass it. And keep in mind that PiS is strongly tied to the church, they recently passed a few bills that will benefit it financially.

8. I wish legislators would stop a moment, realize that they are not medical experts and then allow the AMA to develop guidelines for doctors.

9. Certainly this has Catholic church written all over it and it’s a shame to see Poland headed down that road to the dark ages along with the good old U.S.A. We may not have been around in those years but we sure know how to get there.

   I suppose the day after pill is out of the question and would be considered just another prenatal killer. In the end, it is more laws to be broken by reasonable people and I feel sorry for the women of Poland.

   Catholic law can be nearly as barbaric as Islam if given a chance.

   1. Catholic law can be precisely as barbaric as Islam if given a chance.

      Think, Inquisition.

      (There, ftfy 😉

      cr

10. Does the Catholic Church intend to pay to for the baby’s if the baby’s unwanted by their parents?

    1. It can always sell the baby to rich Americans.

11. I wonder if the proposed law is compatible with Poland’s membership in the EU and its obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights. My recollection, for what it’s worth, is that the Irish abortion laws were found to be in violation of the ECHR, and this is one reason they were changed – perhaps Grania can correct this if wrong; but if so, I would think that a law such as is proposed in Poland would also run afoul of the ECHR.

    1. Poland and the EU have more quarrels, about the wish of the present government to dominate the constitutional court, for instance.
       http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/dec/23/polands-government-carries-through-on-threat-to-constitutional-court
       http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/feb/29/polands-changes-to-court-system-risking-democracy
       http://www.marketwatch.com/story/polands-high-court-annuls-controversial-law-deepening-constitutional-crisis-2016-03-09

       The present PiS government is anti EU.

       1. “The present PiS government is anti EU.”

          I don’t think it’s an accurate portrayal of the situation.

          From the BBC interview with Deputy Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki:

          “I hope that Great Britain will stay as part of the European Union, because times are not easy,” he said.

          “We have some geopolitical turbulence around us – in the Ukraine and in the refugee problem – and it’s better to deal with these collectively.”

          He said if he UK does vote to leave, Poland would remain “a firm pillar of the European Union argument”, and would resist any possible “domino effect”.

          http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-35837447

          Polish government is pro-EU, wants Britain to stay in the EU, and even in the event of Brexit would “resist possible domino effect.”

12. This is absolutely disgusting. I feel for the women of Poland. It seems their own government sees their principal value to be breeding machines, and if that kills them, so be it.

    As Rachel Maddow pointed out the other day, this potentially makes the scene of a spontaneous abortion a crime scene, and the product of the abortion evidence, until it can be proven the event really was spontaneous.

    As usual, it is the poor who will suffer the most. Those with money will just go to another country for their abortion.

    It sickens me to think of the lives some young girls just coming to womanhood could be subjected to because of this law, trapped after being impregnated by their grandfather, or just because they got in over their heads in a relationship.

    1. If this bill passes it’s commonly considered it would be simply the government paying off the debt of church support during last election.
       And this has many more side effects. For one it’s likely that rape statistics will go down, because now it would be illegal to have an abortion that is result of it. Women might fear that if they got pregnant and they will report it, they won’t be able to abort it. So this will only add to the trauma of such violent crime. And all in the name of “protecting” them.

       1. I hadn’t thought of that consequence. Just awful.

          This is the sort of thing that happens when religion has control. I don’t know how these people can live with themselves.

          1. They’re foul but “righteous”. That’s how they protect themselves.

13. “…that if the right wing has more electoral successes that the call to punish women having abortions will no longer be a minority voice in the pro-life crowd.”
    If this eventuated then it takes two to tango should take effect, calling for both male and female to be punished otherwise it starts to look like the Islam farce of a rape of a female who then is murdered for honour or stoned to death by religious decree.
    Will the real farce please stand up!?
    Meanwhile back in Poland, the stench of catholicism is alarming to say the least, if post 2 & 3 have it right as a semblance of causality and driven by the CC, constricted by fear it’s little wonder it’s manifesting itself with this load of tripe.
    The planet has just started a misogynistic religiosity wobble yet again.

14. The people of Poland are outraged and they are going out on the streets to protest. They are also using social media to raise awareness of the dangers of current radicalisation of politics in the country

15. It used to be a Marxist-Leninist state. But of course, even the most liberal person would say that Poland is better off now under right-wing Polish nationalists than when under the tyranny of the Warsaw Pact.

    This is absolutely disgusting. I feel for the women of Poland. It seems their own government sees their principal value to be breeding machines, and if that kills them, so be it.

    Most of the women in Poland voted for this. Yeah, the woman may die in pregnancy. So be it. She will then be venerated as Gianna Beretta Molla. I just pointed it out as Catholicism finds that death inherently noble.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gianna_Beretta_Molla

    1. Revolting. Religion can create a second state of social values that is extremely difficult to resist – we need values but traditional religion is stuck in the middle ages – it is simply obsessed with controlling women’s bodies and gender roles appropriate to an era when sustaining population levels and stable care for child survival was incredibly difficult
       a) A Huge proportion of children 0-5 years died of various diseases – there has been a worldwide dramatic reduction of this from the 60s on – let alone in “developed” countries.
       b) a far greater proportion of the adult population died of disease and plague also – this has been dramatically reduced in the west and reduced elsewhere
       c) Everywhere was agricultural economy – relied on lots of manual labour to work the land and lots of inequality – few places are purely agricultural economies today and many places have mechanised agriculture
       b) We now have reliable contraception so destitution or even infanticide on this account is not anything like such an issue. Prior to 1960s there was no way to easily modulate population – so if population did start to outstrip the capacity of the land agricultrue/mining etc resources the result was famine/ expansionist war/ colonialism.

       This situation has changed but trad religion hasn’t.

    2. “even the most liberal person would say that Poland is better off now under right-wing Polish nationalists than when under the tyranny of the Warsaw Pact.”

       I wouldn’t say that. At least, not without further consideration. For half the population (the female half), that is by no means a foregone conclusion.

       cr

       1. I would agree.
          There were any number of obvious shortcomings in the soviet era but equality for woman and pro abortion was one positive.

       2. I disagree. For me, the right to free speech (which was absent in the Warsaw Pact) is considerably more important than the right to abortion. Consider that women in Poland can talk about their right to abortion and eventually succeed in abolition of the law, while no amount of abortions could help them acquire free speech.

          1. And no amount of free speech is going to help someone who needs an abortion right now. Talking about their right to abortion is no substitute for the actuality.

             Come to that, what is the use of free speech if those in power aren’t listening?

             I wish them luck in their protests. It just seems tragic that they are going to have to fight to retain a fraction of the rights (in respect of abortion) that they had a few decades ago.

             cr

             1. I can see that in a democracy there is the option to change the law later; the worry is will a climate of fear be created in a changing Europe where public loyalty to (national/cultural) identity politics may become increasingly important. This is a worry.

                Also the law would demonise women who have a miscarriage and the insistence that an egg at the instant of fertilisation is a person implies women shouldn’t be able to take contraception.

                and since (I think) the pill can kill an egg thats been released presumably if taken erratically, I suspect even access to contraception may be curbed with the implication a woman must get married asap and have (plenty of) children in wedlock.

                Also the sheer invasiveness of constantly policing whether a woman is pregnant or not and grounds for denial of medical treatment to pregnant women

             2. PS – the same applies if theres major crisis in the US – which has its own issues with women’s bodies

             3. I doubt that any secular institution could possibly be as vociferous and agitated about embryos. It’s clearly the Church and it’s mythological ideology of souls and sin. As someone pointed out, the formation of political alliances can be the instigator of such a depraved effort, and I think that’s what we see now in Poland. It’s disgusting.

16. Particularly sad since, under Communism, abortion was completely legal**. So in respect of that policy, Poland has gone from the 20th century back to the Dark Ages in a couple of decades.

    (**According to Wikipedia, Swedish women would travel to Poland for an abortion as it was easy to obtain there).

    Doesn’t only happen to Iran and Syria.

    cr

    1. I’m against the new anti-abortion law, but please don’t bring these “under Communism it was legal (wasn’t Communism great?)” arguments because they are totally ridiculous!

       1. Communism wan’t great, but it obviously wasn’t all bad,

          1. My point exactly. It seems a pity that, in rejecting the negative aspects of Communism, they have also thrown out one of its better aspects.

             cr

          2. You don’t know what you’re talking about.

             Poles were exterminated under communism before the war (in Russia), during the war, and after the war (members of the opposition were either killed or jailed by the communists!).

             https://twitter.com/sikorskiradek/status/631129295772078080

          3. The big power manifestations of it (USSR, Maoist China) managed to kill an extraordinary amount of people

       2. + 1 (I’d give you + 1000 if I could!).

          1. The only reason I can think of as to why there are still some leftist apologists of communism is because there never was a Nuremberg for Communist crimes, and there should have been!

17. What appalling news – I’m so sad for my sisters in Poland. Woe to those with a uterus!

18. Poland hss become Democracy where women have battery hen status. Pity they don’t have Educate Together Schools (which won the Secularist of the Year Prize 2016)
    In Australia our politics has been polarising for a while. Within the left there is a sizeable group that often panders to soft religion which has a mixture of lapsed and practising Catholics who are accepting of LGBT rights, and more clearly pro minorities and the poor. They believe that social oppression and exploitation generally is due to modern capitalist life and individualism. For them the solution is a vaguely defined communalism that is concerned for the oppressed but religious – with all the implied conservatism for women, creeping authoritarianism, and feel good Pope-friendly internationalism (they never seem to notice that the positions he’s most consistent on is traditional roles for women, insisting on controlling their bodies, and insistence on the value of religious “dignity” over democracy).

    On the topic of figures showing grave acceleration in national domestic violence figures, Scott Stephens a “communitarian” style former uniting church minister and for past 8 years Religion director at ABC Radio National, chose to interview Angela Shanahan. It was on “Counterpoint” early this year during a period when the usual host Amanda Vanstone, was away. Angela Shanahan is a very conservative Catholic with 9 children married to political editor of the conservative Australian newspaper. She has written in the Australian condemning women on the pill and praising conservative minded Muslim women as the way of the future. On this Counterpoint episode about the Problem of Domestic Violence, Shanahan predictably blamed domestic violence on “feminism” and what she would see as the new women’s entitlement, saying return to traditional roles would remove this (Im sure it would -since in such societies abuse is normalised and grossly underreported at national level) Stephens did not challenge her on this.

    1. “Poland hss become Democracy where women have battery hen status.”

       Just an FYI:

       Women in Poland have voting rights and are thus free to vote on the political parties that are going to best represent their interests.

       And by the way, as a matter of historical fact, Poland granted women the right to vote two years before the USA.

       1. … except, as a matter of historical fact, for Utah, Idaho, Washington, California, Oregon, Arizona, Kansas, Alaska, Nevada, Montana, New York, Oklahoma and South Dakota, all of whom gave women voting rights before 1918…

          Also Finland (then part of the Russian empire), who was first in 1907, Norway and Denmark… it seems to have been in the air at the time.

          cr

          1. The US ratified the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. Poland granted women the right to vote in 1918 (only two weeks after regaining independence).

             1. the Nineteenth Amendment …

                which extended to all remaining states the rights already possessed by women in all the US states I listed above.

                In other words, millions of American women had full voting rights before any Poles. So your claim is simplistic and not of any relevance to the current sad state of affairs in any case.

                cr

             2. This link:

                https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_women%27s_suffrage

                (if it works) is relevant.

                cr

             3. I wasn’t talking about few individual states, but the whole country.

                And the fact remains that ALL Polish women had been granted voting rights before ALL American women were granted the same right.

             4. Okay, in the way of whole countries, all Azerbaijani, Armenian, Belorusian, Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Russian, Ukrainian and Uruguayan women had been granted it before all Polish women. And that was just the year before. Many others were earlier (see the Wikipedia list). I really don’t know what you’re trying to prove there. Poland wasn’t lagging but it wasn’t leading either.

                cr

             5. Well, Poland only regained its independence in 1918, and granted women the right to vote just two weeks after that, so yes, I agree that Poland wasn’t lagging.

             6. And as for the current state of affairs; Polish women still have voting rights and are free to cast their ballots as they please (on left-, center-, or right-wing parties), and thus shape the law of the country. Just wanted to remind everyone about that.

             7. As do most women in most countries. I don’t think anyone questioned that, but in the present context it’s almost irrelevant. The trouble is that democracy is easily suborned by politics and pressure groups, as we all know.

                cr

             8. It’s not “almost irrelevant,” because the right to vote is the essential instrument the citizens of democratic countries have that allows them to shape the politics of their country.

             9. It might be essential but it’s obviously not sufficient by itself. Or the situation this entire thread is about would not have arisen.

                cr

             10. If Polish women didn’t vote as they did (the Church-backed Law & Justice party received the greatest number of women votes), and if some 50% of Polish women didn’t choose to stay at home during the parliamentary election, we perhaps wouldn’t have this situation.

             11. Agreed on that, but that was the basis of my comment about democracy being ‘suborned by politics and pressure groups’. Even if a genuine majority decides (and votes) to do something horrible to the minority, is that true ‘democracy’? As with free speech, ‘democracy’ (especially if it translates into ‘dictatorship of the majority’) is not a magic answer to everything.

                 And also, of course, the issues people vote on are not always the issues their duly-elected representatives subsequently impose on them.

                 cr

             12. You’re right that sometimes political parties betray or disappoint their electorate, but in a democratic country there are always next elections to show your discontent with the political party that wronged you.

             13. PS

                 Democracy is not perfect, but until the current democratic world can move to a truly meritocratic system of governance and also agree on a set of generally accepted ethical values to serve as the indispensable second pillar of evidence-based policymaking, democracy is the best thing we have.

19. The “Law and Justice Party”- this implies two things: (1) That they ARE, indeed, for law and justice (simply because of their name, right?) (2) That any other party is, automatically, NOT for law and justice (because that name’s already taken, dontcha know?)- a standard Orwellian tactic of a repressive regime; like naming your bureau of propaganda the “Bureau of Information”.

    I think the region that today is called “Poland” has some serious “regional mental health and identity issues”- of course, the world was not created with a particular country called “Poland” with its borders set in stone; as usual, the country is the result of centuries of different ethnic/religious groups trying to assert dominance over as large a territory as they can. Extreme nationalism (and xenophobia) is used as a substitute for any legitimate claim backing up that this area “should” be ruled by one particular religion, clan, etc. This modern world or mass communication, mostly free trade, and multiculturalism presents many challenges as to the validity and legitimacy of governments and social orders. Just like when a religion is challenged, a state will often appeal to “fundamentalist” ideals and goals (“Let’s make America GREAT again” is a good example) as a reaction. With the state and religion intertwined so thoroughly, it’s no surprise that both are using each other to further their “back to the fundamentals” game.

20. That makes me wonder how long before it’s OK to persecute the Jews again. It’s only been 20 or so years of improvements in the treatment of the Polish Jews and I wouldn’t want to see rabid catlicks undoing all that.

21. This reminds me of the excellent movie released in 2007 titled “4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days”. It portrays the situation in Romania which had (has?) similarly draconian abortion laws.

22. We remember the poor polling of 49% (1st round) and 55% (2nd round, run-off) in May 2015.

    That’s what you get if you don’t exercise your right to vote, people.

23. I can’t believe how barbaric and misogynist this is – straight out of the Dark Ages.

    The hard Left and the Right support two different extreme traditionalist religions. Neither likes modernity and runs backwards in response to economic/security stress.

    1. I don’t see how a Marxist-Leninist could support “traditionalism”. A Marxist-Leninist would likely lament the triumph of neoliberalism, and would look positively of the social and economic accomplishments of the states of the Eastern Bloc (while also trying to figure out what caused them to disintegrate such as whether it was the prevalence of a decadent revisionism).

       I just want the accomplishments of socialism to be recognized and celebrated and not unfairly conflated with Nazism (as for example the date of August 23rd commemorates the victims of Stalinism and Nazism).

       One should realize that a primary element in the ideological edifice of modern Poland is virulent anti-communism. Such anti-communism is related to strongly reactionary worldview that would suppose these type of antiabortion policies. Moreover, one should remember that Poland was fundamentally a right-wing dictatorship (that anti-communists would usually downplay as “authoritarian” as in contrast to alleged Soviet “totalitarianism”. This anti-communism and reactionary social views are fundamentally interconnected; I would say that essentially Poland’s opposition to its socialist government emanates from a reactionary values.

       1. Socialism is different from communism – but I think rigid context free ideology of any kind can be highjacked in times of stress.
          The major communist countries morphed into nationalism morphed into religiosity or traditional belief systems combined with national/ethnic identity. Likewise when the more regressive bits of the left give avid support to Islamism, giving cover to hard right people to endorse or practise anti Muslim behaviour or racist behaviour. The process may proceed by stages and be undertaken by different sectors of a movement with some true believers appalled. In my country quite a lot of the left are sympathetic to religion of the Pope Francis variety – assuming naively that the Pope will one day change the less progressive social doctrine. No movement is monolithic and in stress theres different interactions but what isn’t addressed becomes dominant.

          Some atheists on the left are quite sympathetic to conservative religion as long as it professes to be anti capitalism, and/or anti US anti technology and supposedly for the poor (so long as they support the Church or are religious). I mentioned in another post that it would serve the Church very well if there is a terrible crisis in Europe of an economic kind or environmental or security or challenge to liberal culture stress (or all these kinds) because in pre modernity conditions, traditionalist religious values have assisted the mode of survival (however crap that life was) and people tend to hanker for those conservative aggressive norms that they know when there’s a big crisis that seems beyond repair.

          However its not racist to control borders Stopping all migration or asylum is – but there is such a thing as a limit and some countries have probably reached that for the time being. Im not one of those people that believes any society can exist as a recognisable society and culture without some kind of territory and (where wholesale exiled from their natural homeland) a kin and cultural connection like the Jews. Its necessary to maintain (as opposed to expand) borders. This norm does not just apply to states with borders that are recognised by millions in an international system. In pre modern pre state Europe communication was slow and far fewer and weaker institutions. The culture of the common people was very local – Even serf villages owned by endlessly changing feudal lords effectively retained their culture and land despite aristocratic wars because the new lords recognised the villages – they wanted their usual share of the produce. In a larger societal unit – one that has to work together for a common economy/mode of survival the territory – and the cultural goals within it – is bigger

24. I assume when you say “dark ages” you mean something like 1960, when abortion was in the penal code of practically every country composing the “West” (but not the atheistic communist states of the East).

    When people have spent two or three generations under despotic state atheist governments, they are much more conservative than folks who grew up in free societies that still insisted on minimum levels of social conformity rooted in tradition. Not to mention the strength of anti-eugenics sentiments in the 1960’s.

    Abortion on demand was first triumphant in the Soviet Union, and the primary form of contraception for many decades. If you consider the historic situation of the Poles, brutalized by Nazi’s, and then brutalized and colonized by the Soviets, I suspect many Poles would view a return to the ethos of the Soviet occupation as the real return to the Dark Ages.

    But this is the interesting question for the so-called “atheists”–they never seem to clearly distinguish between those aspects of Soviet Communism that were good (such as destroying independent social institutions like organized religion that served as political and cultural restraints on the State) and those aspects of Soviet Communism that were bad (e.g., after destroying any rival social institutions and concentrating all power into the State, shock, shock, they used their almost absolute power despotically).

    1. Some of that is right.

       But – “When people have spent two or three generations under despotic state atheist governments, they are much more conservative than folks who grew up in free societies that still insisted on minimum levels of social conformity rooted in tradition.”

       That doesn’t explain the southern US states though.

       cr

    2. I think there’s identity politics at play here in response to the traumatic history of Eastern European countries, and recent economic and migration stresses, and the sense that Western Europe is insensitive to their plight.

       I suspect there’s a resentment of Western dominated EU telling these (Eastern European) countries what to do, as when Merkel castigated Hungary on various occasions.
       The Eastern European countries fear the recent people movement crisis thanks to a different experience Islam to the West, plus communist oppression where many were actually popped off to concentration camps or killed (eastern Germany was a bit of an exception because it was the window-shop). The eastern european countries have a history of centuries of external invasion and actual survival issues into the modern era that Western Europe hasn’t had at least to the same degree, plus are poorer and more affected by economic downturn. So they are probably affected by identity politics to defend against western arrogance – wanting to turn to cultural symbols even if these can be a bit of a double edged sword – like Ireland used to turn to Catholicism.

25. The problem with Poland is the influence of the Catholic Church. It used to be the same in Ireland, but isnt as prevalent these Days, but they still have too much influence. Religions and Religious Leaders should have no say in Government because of their position, if they want a say ,they should put themselves up for Election.

26. Thousands protest in Warsaw against proposed abortion ban

    http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/apr/03/warsaw-protest-against-proposed-abortion-ban

27. There, but for the First Amendment, go we.

28. Distressing. I too wonder if the EU human rights stuff can be used here.

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