Sunday, June 4, 2023
15 comments:
Bieganski the Blog exists to further explore the themes of the book Bieganski the Brute Polak Stereotype, Its Role in Polish-Jewish Relations and American Popular Culture.
These themes include the false and damaging stereotype of Poles as brutes who are uniquely hateful and responsible for atrocity, and this stereotype's use in distorting WW II history and all accounts of atrocity.
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"the secrets the Polish government is still desperate to keep" The government has founded research of crimes committed by Polish peasants, here is the result https://iupress.org/9780253062864/night-without-end/ A specific way of keeping secrets.
ReplyDeleteYup.
DeleteThank you to Jerzy for alerting me to this book. It was covered in the Boston Globe, iirc. I am unable to access their website so I googled the name of the newspaper article's author and found this book.
ReplyDeleteI totally support factual accounts of non-Jewish Poles who committed crimes against Jews in WW II.
I totally reject the Bieganski stereotype, and as Jerzy points out above, the Amazon text is honed to support the Bieganski stereotype.
Imagine a new book coming out about WW II from a major publisher that plays into the Shylock stereotype. Actually, you can't imagine it. Because our Jewish friends have been activists and have made such publication close to impossible for major publishers and media
But Polish Americans are not activist against the Bieganski stereotype, and so books like this are published and elevated .
I do not know how US readers are informed about ghettos in occupied Poland. Twitter users believe that the Poles deported the Jews to ghettos, in reality Jewish communities moved to the ghettos lured by the Germans. Big ghettos were isolated from Christian Poles. The Germans terrorized ghetto inhabitants, so the Jews had to obey orders. Stories like the one in the book were possible in towns and villages, only if the Jews obtained help from Christian Poles. Criminality in occupied Poland was high, the Jews were vulnerable, so they were preferred victims. A Jewish writer has described how a hiding family was ratted to save an another one. When German police arrived, they needed pray. The same happened inside the ghettos, Polish Jews survived longer in Lodz/Litzmannstadt that Western Jews deported there.
DeleteUnfortunately while many of us Poles/Polonians are doing what we can to counter this stereotype, we have been put in a Catch 22. If we do not protest it, it must be true, or we would. But when we do protest it, that goes to show that we are "revisionists/fascist thugs", so it must be true.
DeleteAnd we also get extra helpings of abuse and vilification for even the mildest form of protest - for even pointing out that the Polish army fought on the Allied, not the Axis Side, in WW2. So I am not surprised that many just opt out, if they do. I can well understand it.
The best and most effective thing in the face of all the horrors "the world" can throw at us is get on with the Kingdom preaching work that our Creator, the God of Abraham, has asked us to do.
God's word is true. And it sets everything straight.
And while I think that money is definitely a factor in this - re Jan's post above - there has to be more, as this revisionism started so early, almost on the day WW2 ended, and the Polish soldiers went from being "our gallant allies" to being redefined as "fascist thugs".
They hadn't a penny. They had lost everything in this fight, apart from their uniforms. My father arrived in England without even a word of English to his name. And given that Poland was being handed over to Stalin, and a long and brutal occupation, it was clearly going to have a struggle to even feed itself, let alone have anything left over worth taking.
I assume the problem essentially is that Poland was not at all enthusiastic about Stalin, who was such a favourite with the Movers and Shakers, and that it has never been forgiven for that.
Oddly, this time round, the Movers and Shakers favour the Ukraine, not Russia. The outcome: in both cases the Russian and the Ukrainian people suffer.
Well, once again, I come back to the Kingdom of God as it alone will end these times during which "man has dominated man to his harm". Already it is teaching millions of us - from "every tribe and nation and tongue" - to live in peace as the brothers and sisters we truly are.
Sue, the war is close to Poland, millions of Ukrainian women with their children travelled through Poland last year, many Ukrainians still live here. I have had some discussions with Russian people in the net, they are fanatical, they do not accept any critics. Russian emigrants either support Putin or stay silent. The Ukrainians fight for freedom, Russians are slaves, especially poor ethnic minorities. If Russia wins, Poland will be the next victim.
DeleteJewish writers write about their traumas.. https://thebcreview.ca/2023/01/18/1703-lederman-schallie/ Lederman had no grandparent. But I had only one pair. My grandfather was killed by NKVD, his wife died shortly after the war. Two brothers of my grandfather were also killed, only one survived. https://www.psychiatriapolska.pl/PTSD-prevalence-among-Polish-World-War-II-survivors,60171,0,2.html Now traumas of Ukrainians refugees are researched. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/371178944_The_War_Trauma_of_Ukrainian_Refugees_in_Poland
DeleteHi Jerzy I do not ignore the horrors that Russia inflicted on the Ukraine and on Poland during the time of Stalin. And I note that they are not crimes that have any political weight in the world.
DeleteI am noting the way our Creator asks us to cope with "the world" and its horrors. His way is already making peace between peoples, between all those who will listen to Him.
Will most people listen? Sadly no. Hence the need for Armageddon. But many are and I hope many more will.
The world divides us, whereas God unites us in love.
Will this sort of stuff ever undergo a sunset?
ReplyDeleteJan I want to thank you again for all your sterling tireless and thankless work in these constant Polish media issues. And the same thanks go to Danusha and Jerzy of course.
DeletePlease be sure Jan that it will end - along with all the injustices and horrors of the present system of things on the earth. The Kingdom of God will put an end to the time during which "man has dominated man to his harm".
It will also end Satan's rule over the earth. And please don't forget that Jesus called Satan "the father of the lie". And isn't the whole world system we are presently living in founded on a lie, the first lie ever told?
Dealing with these Polish media issues - which i do intermittently - and seeing how easily Poland has been moved from Allied to Axis has powerfully underlined the truth of the Biblical warnings about "the world" for me.
Please think about this prophecy in Daniel: “In the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that will never be destroyed. And this kingdom will not be passed on to any other people. It will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, and it alone will stand forever," - Daniel 2:44
The Kingdom of God, the heavenly government for whose coming Jesus taught us to pray, will put an end to the time of human rulership on the earth.
Is this really going to happen? Well, please bear in mind that the 70 weeks prophecy in Daniel not only told the Jews the exact year the Messiah would appear, but warned what would happen afterwards - as it did.
The Bible writers are telling us the truth. They are writing down Jehovah's inspired word, his loving message to us. He wants nothing but good for us, his creation.
"As a Jew born in Poland, who found out he was Jewish in his 30s, I can attest that the Polish government will water down their involvement but the people are reclaiming the long history of Jewish culture in Poland. Jewish life is reviving in Poland. Of course Israel is our home."
ReplyDeleteI do not know when the writer left Poland, what is his expertise in Polish reality, government. I read hundreds of texts and I doubt the government of Poland has any policy regarding the Holocaust education. The government has funded Grabowski's and Engelking's research and never has demanded critical assessment of the research until last month, when mister Czarnek declared to cut the funding. The same government funds the IPN, who ineptly and ineffectually criticizes Grabowski and Engelking. This reminds me the accusation published by Grabowski and Klein, that there exists Polish conspiracy in English Wikipedia. The Wikipedia has studied the problem and punished its three editors, one of them Polish. Shira Klein repeats her "Protocols of Elders of Giewont" accusations https://forward.com/opinion/550600/wikipedia-holocaust-disinformation/ (Giewont is a kind of Polish Zion, Polish knights sleep there and they will arrive when needed).
The US citizen declares, that Polish Jews' home is Israel. Polish antisemites believe the same.
Shira Klein continues her campaign. She has lost in English Wikipedia, now she is supported by Jewish organisations https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_pHCw0G1hSwiOtQ9RJHw45w#/registration
ReplyDeleteShira Klein teaches about "Holocaust Myths and Memories". 4 (od 15) lectures about Poland:
ReplyDeletePoland: Cracks in the traditional view of Poles’ role in the Holocaust
Poland: the Neighbors watershed
Poland’s Holocaust law: government backlash
Poland’s Holocaust Law compared to Israel’s Nakba Law https://www.academia.edu/38214760/Holocaust_Myths_and_Memories_Course_Syllabus
Holocaust myths I know:
ReplyDeleteThe King of Denmark Wore a Yellow Star,
The Painted Bird is autobiographic
Poles deported the Jews to ghettos
Poland participated in the Holocaust
"One British delegate recounted to me in horror how a German official had privately suggested to him that Jewish people were ‘in a different league’ to Poles when it came to reparations. This bizarre remark is startlingly blinkered to the fact that many Holocaust victims and their families remain without recompense due to Germany’s bungled interactions with Warsaw, not in spite of them."
ReplyDelete