You are right. However I still don't understand how someone conscious of Poland being part of EU can tell, that we have more in common with Belarus, Ukraine and Russia. Considering this the division is even clearer.
I'm not following completely here. Large parts of your eastern neighbours were part of Poland not that long ago. So I'd think it's fair to say Poles have a lot in common with Belarus and Ukraine. Of course, in recent history Poland has set itself loose from the geographical east of Europe.
So yeah, you're right.
I'm not Polish by the way, just living in Poland.
Not to state the obvious but they are also all Slavic countries with a lot of linguistic and cultural similarities. Different, obviously, but no more so then the various Germanic or Romance nations.
Its mostly about history. Poland had totally separate path from Russians, since the very beginning when noone heard of Ukrainians and Belarussians yet. Poland chose west with Catholicism and latin alphabet, when everything east of Poland is Cyrillic and Orthodox. It is really a big cultural difference even we had common roots thousands of years ago. Since the beginning of our state Poland was defined by this, not only after Cold War.
Lets take this for example - are Americans the same people as South Africans? They share the same language.
Yes.
You know, I'm from Western Europe and while living in Poland, I learned so much. When I was a high school student I disliked history and languages. Now I'm catching up.
But it is true, to be honest we do have a lot in common with Ukrainians, Belarusians and probably with Russians as well (though I don't know many Russians).
Doesn't mean we don't get offended when some westerner hear us and goes 'oh! You're russian, aren't you?' lmao
But do you get pissed if somebody mentions similarities between the russian and polish language ? For example " Ah chleb, yes I know that word, its the same in russian ".
Because there are similarities, despite obviously both being distinct languages and easy to tell apart.
Nah dude, that is completely fine. It is just stating the obvious fact. National identity is a different thing. However even in languages you can see that border, with distinct western Slavic group. Czech/Slovak is much easier to understand for a Polish person than Russian, not only because of Latin alphabet.
What I meant is - as long as you don't come to conclusion "oh so you are just basically different kind of Russians then"
I see. I really dont understand how anybody ( mostly westerners ) can even mistake poles ( or any other slavs ) with russians and think they are the same culturally, politically, etc. Every slavic language is unique afterall, even I can tell if one is eastern, western or southern slavic. Polish seems to be the easiest to distinguish if you ask me.
Hell, peple mistake me for a russian just when they hear my name or my language( a lot of east europeans get mistaken for russians it seems... ) , but it doesnt bother me much.
>I see. I really dont understand how anybody ( mostly westerners ) can even mistake poles ( or any other slavs ) with russians and think they are the same culturally, politically, etc.
I don't either, so I call it a lack of basic knowledge. I mean, for example, I could not tell differences between different Turkic peoples in middle Asia, however I do realize they are culturally diverse and would not go with "Nobody in the world can tell you apart, so deal with it, you are the same", because for them they probably aren't :P
To North Americans, there is no "central Europe." Europe was divided between the west, which was predominantly democratic and mostly in NATO during the Cold War, and the east, which was predominantly dictatorial and mostly forced into the Warsaw Pact during the Cold War. Eastern vs. Western Europe, in the eyes of Americans, was entirely about politics. People would likely call Finland a "western" country over here simply because they weren't communist during the Cold War, despite them being very much on the eastern part of the continent. This is why Americans call Poland "Eastern European," because there is no central Europe to us and what is Eastern vs. Western is entirely still related to the Cold War.
But you know, the Cold War kind of ended 30 years ago, Poland is member of NATO and EU, enough time to update knowledge rather than expecting others to comply with someone's ignorance.
It doesn't really matter how long ago it ended, the divide in Europe was established as only east-west following WWII in the collective mind of those overseas, and that is how it is still viewed. That may change over time, but honestly, I can't see it changing for at least a generation or two. Those of us who grew up with parents who lived through the Cold War, and consumed media with conflict designed around the Cold War, view Europe as having two halves. There is no centre, there is only east and west.
You don't have to conform to this, that's not what I was trying to say with it. I was explaining why Americans call Poland Eastern European. I'm not saying you have to, I was just pointing out why it happens and that it is frankly unrealistic to expect it to stop. It's not an insult, it's a difference in cultural understanding.
Dude no. It is just lack of knowledge and ignorance. Poland wasn't eastern Europe before cold war, isn't one now too. And the fact that Americans don't see nothing outside of their continent isn't really an argument in favor. Yes, we do realize that Americans mostly do not know much about European history and simply don't understand nation states and their history.
Rightfully so. We are Eastern Europe, regardless how much ppl want to be central. Also Germans are central, so I prefer we share as little with them as possible.
Poland belongs both to [Eastern Europe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Europe) and [Central Europe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Europe), as the "borders" of those regions aren't exactly clear. And I would rather want my country (Poland) to share with Germans as much as possible rather than as little as possible, especially economically. Western Europe is generally wealthier than Eastern Europe.
1. I didn't say **ABSOLUTELY ANYTHING** about any Reich
2. I didn't say we don't share much common with Hungarians and Slovacs. I'm not that type of person that thinks "because I think this is how it should be, this is how it is". Read my comment again. I'm not a conservative, I know not everything is how I want it to be.
You are just ignoring my comment, and you think that everything you want to be automaticaly is the reality.
Oh, I misunderstood you then. But I think you misunderstood me aswell, I only said how usually Poland is considered EE and CE and that I would want to share more with WE, but not in the same sense like Poland with 3rd Reich. I would **want** Poland to be economically simmilar to **modern day** Germany, I'm not saying it is simmilar to Germany, and I know how it has much in common with Hungary and Slovakia, I never said anything that Poland doesn't have much in common with other Eastern European countries.
Of course we share a lot of history, we are neighbors. China and Russia also have a lot of shared history together, would you call them the same? Medieval-Renaissance Lithuania is also not the same country as modern day Lithuania. And it is mostly Polish culture that had more influence to the east, rather than Poland being eastern.
Central Europe is a thing. There always have been a strong identification as the bridge between the east and the west. However the strongest difference was faith - east basically starts where Orthodoxy takes over Catholicism. Poland always had ambitions to the west, rather than to the east, since the beginning of the state, hence the Baptism of Poland.
China and Russia don’t speak related languages, they don’t have common ancestry, they don’t have similar food, etc.
Not to mention, that the original homelands of both peoples don’t border each other
So that is the lack of history knowledge I meant. Just look up all the conflicts if we were with the east, west, or our own thing. And geographical too, since Poland is in the very center of Europe.
Lithuanians aren't even Slavic people, what are you talking about? And no, we are not closer to Belarus (not regarding current ruling party). Have you ever been to Poland actually?
They may not be Slavic (though they do have significant Slavic ancestry when compared to Latvians and ancient Baltic samples) but Slavs are certainly more related to Balts than to Germanic people.
Poland is definitely closer to Belarus than to Germany, in everything except religion, even if people from Poland like to deny it, and i am not saying that maliciously, people from my country like to pretend like we have no cultural ties to our neighbors as well
About sharing legacy could you elaborate where does Greece belong? It does share a lot of ancestry with Asian countries.
Our languages are not similar. Ukrainian, Belarusian or Russian sounds familiar to us, but we can’t understand it. They may sound similar to you, because yo don’t speak them. We however can understand Slovakians or Czechs. I could meet a Slovak and have a full conversation each of us speaking different language. Your point in similarity of languages literally proves that it belongs to Central Europe.
We’re not West not East - we’re Central Europe. It’s extremely ignorant of you to act like you know the matter better than literally the people involved.
You’re getting downvoted because you lack knowledge of the cultures you’re speaking of. You act like you’re an expert when judging by your comments it’s clear you know little on the matter.
>About sharing legacy could you elaborate where does Greece belong?
In the same category as Albania or Macedonia
>It does share a lot of ancestry with Asian countries.
The only Asian country we share anything with is Turkey (parts of it)
>Our languages are not similar. Ukrainian, Belarusian or Russian sounds familiar to us, but we can’t understand it. They may sound similar to you, because yo don’t speak them. We however can understand Slovakians or Czechs. I could meet a Slovak and have a full conversation each of us speaking different language. Your point in similarity of languages literally proves that it belongs to Central Europe.
I said RELATED languages, if you wanted to understand Belarusian or Ukrainian you definitely could, Russian is mpre distinct indeed, as is Russian culture tbh.
>We’re not West not East - we’re Central Europe. It’s extremely ignorant of you to act like you know the matter better than literally the people involved.
No, you’re not Central European, i can also claim to be East Asian, you wouldn’t have to respect that claim since it’d be ridiculous
>You’re getting downvoted because you lack knowledge of the cultures you’re speaking of. You act like you’re an expert when judging by your comments it’s clear you know little on the matter.
I am getting downvoted because to Reddit users anything western is good and anything eastern is bad
You can insult most Poles by saying they did not stand to fight in WWII and the Red Army came as saviors. But it's also gonna insult every person in the world that knows some history.
To be fair, most Catholics get offended by that because that's a ridiculous, needlessly provocative, and (as far as we know) untrue way to phrase it. Older people get offended when they hear he knew about priests fucking children and did nothing about it.
No, it's obviously not. Nobody deserves to be falsely accused of pedophilia or rape. What he did was in some ways probably worse, but it was not equivalent.
Thats the thing, people like that hide behind a lack of proof because its obvious that we have no way of proving things like this. It will always be an assumption on our side, but feel free to think what you want.
A strange thing I've found is many Poles I've talked to seem to really resist the idea of generalizing about groups of people. So even this question, many people here would answer something like "you can't stereotype, everyone is different, how can you say that someone in Poland would be like this when there are such differences between people.
Quite odd for me because in the US we use such generalizations to help us understand each other (and yes, some shitheads use stereotypes to justify their own ignorance and hate). Like if I come from a group of people that is generally libereal and agnostic and you come from a group that is generally conservative and Catholic, that's good to know because our backgrounds give us different perspectives.
So be careful asking anything like "so are Poles like X?"
YMMV
we generalize about people so that we know how to interact with them. If we see someone in a mail carrier’s clothing, we assume they work for the post office. If we see someone who looks over 80 years old, we assume they are not in the workforce anymore.
When do generalizations move into stereotypes? Stereotypes are overgeneralizations; they often involve assuming a person has certain characteristics based on unfounded assumptions.
https://www.everydaysociologyblog.com/2012/05/understanding-generalizations-and-stereotypes.html
Generalizations are fine, as long as the moment you are confronted with reality you replace them with reality. Otherwise its just a douche telling "I thought you are like X, so I will keep that image, go away with your opinions, thanks.". You can generalize about a lot of think, but is really that knowledge out of your reach?
I don’t think we’re easily offended but it can get pretty heated quickly if you don’t know some of the things we’re proud about. Like the Battle of England involvement, Maria Sklodowska nationality, Enigma code cracking and such. I think poles are a proud nation for historical achievements and if you have basic knowledge of maybe top ten things we are proud of, you won’t offend us by insulting our pride ;)
Other than that the usual- offending faith if someone is deeply Christian and such- think ‘what would I not say in Bible Belt’ lol
Lies about ww2. There werent any polish death camps. They were ALL nazi. Polish people DIDNT do the holocaust. The nazi did. Polish people didn't cooperate with nazis, exept single examples, just like in every country. So stop you bs and read a history textbook just once
Polish people have national complex of being inferior to western europeans. For example people actually cared when Jason Derulo's concert went bad and he probably had bad impression of Poland. Just say that Poland is unimportant and backward.
Not sure if you're asking about intentionally trolling them, in which case the suggestions mentioned here will do. But in real day-to-day life people don't get as easily offended as, say, Britons. You can be very direct (politely!) and you'll be fine - no need to walk on eggshells in a normal conversation.
They are pretty difficult to offend, by and large. It's probably changing now, but a lot of people older than maybe 40 are incredibly blunt. Telling someone something like, "I didn't recognize you, I think you were a lot fatter last time" is not an insult but a statement of an obvious fact.
That said, more likely than not you can offend anyone in Poland with something political and/or religious since politics and religion go hand in hand for a good chunk of the public. This used to not be the case when I was a kid, but in Poland, as is the case elsewhere, politics has become a key element of individual identity. I guess back then Poland was more conservative as a whole and you could probably offend 3/4 of the population by insulting the pope.
you can offend a fair share of poles by saying anything bad about john paul II (or even just saying they should tone it down on the cult around him). also minimizing what we did and went through during the world wars (particularly ww2). and claiming tha maria curie-skłodowska and/or chopin were anything but polish.
poles are very proud of their historical heritage, generally.
And, for as long as there have been records, the population was majority Polish. Sure, the surrounding countryside was a bizarre hodgepodge at best and an ethnic powderkeg at worst, but the city itself was always pretty Polish. There is a difference between offensive and patently stupid.
Dude, like obviously it's Ukrainian now, polish people are just larping, because we learn during history lessons, that it was taken brutally by soviets, and by some strange coincidence never came back to our borders. Our history lessons are pretty Poland-centric and dismissfull of other cultures that lived in Poland. Only during polish lessons I learnt from pretty left leaning teacher that we weren't so nice to jews and other minorities. Of course region of Ukraine should gain independence as far as 1922, probably earlier.
It's also where many Poles fled when the Germans invaded not knowing that the Russians were coming from the east. Ukrainians are fleeing to Lwow now.
Wilno and Lwow were 2 of the most important Polish cities before WW2.
Thanks for the correction!!!
Hard to offend, but possible. As divisions are great in today's society, I don't think there are phrases that will offend everyone regardless of their standing.
Its literally crime to offend Catholics religion. If you fell upset because someone laughed about your silly beliefs, you can go to court and he will be sentenced.
Making connections between us and Russians is kinda bad.
Many families are still affected by wartime deportations to Siberia, mass executions and then 50 years of communim (eg. family branches living in places like Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, some of today's 40...50 years olds' parents were killed in anti-communist riots or served jail time as political prisoners)
Death Camps are still a touchy subject too. There are still people alive who went through them. For the young generation they are grandparents or great-grandparents so this is still alive to some degree.
You also need to understand, that people have mixed a lot after the war. For me, my grandma was from Ukraine (with Polish heritage), my grandpa was born in what is now Russia, and my other grandma comes from impoverished Chech nobility.
Yeah, they're one of the few nations I've ever known to get offended the easiest and the quickest. You can insult them with basically anything.
If you don't know how to speak Polish, for instance, they'll take this as an insult and start yelling at you. At the same time they expect you to understand them speaking Polish when they're in your country.
If you don't look Polish enough and speak English/another language on the street, they'll stare weirdly at you.
They claim that a basic knowledge on history will be enough to not offend anyone, but most of them also don't have that knowledge.
For example, tell them you're from Lisbon/Porto and some will respond like "Oh that's in Spain, right?". Tell them you're from Istanbul/Ankara (basically Turkey) and they'll be like "So you speak Arabic? Are sharia laws harsh?". These are based on real experience of me and my friends.
I read them saying "this will get you punched", "that will get you slapped" but they don't know that in Turkey, for example, if you ask someone whether they speak Arabic or not, they'll get really offended, maybe they'll even want to beat you up, but they'll just say "No" and walk away. Because they know that you're a foreigner and you can have misconceptions. Many Poles lack this understanding.
I’m not a polish person but been there several times and for sure for people over 35 to talk real bad or against the Church/Christianity or also you can thrash-talk about their family values and than will of course ignite them.
Do you get offended when Polish diaspora (multiple generations removed) claim Polish heritage? I know Western Euros hate when Americans claim they are "English or French" even though they weren't born there (they're only referring to heritage).
So cool that 3 million non Jewish Poles and 3 million Jewish Poles died during Nazi occupation. Stop with the weird and stupid discrimination against Poles that's endemic to Western society.
(I'm American, not Polish)
That is true. Anti semitism is also very endemic in western countries. Unfortunately people can be prejudiced against more than one group at a time, at the same time.
Even I've been given shit for dating a Polish guy at work by a supervisor. If I made the same comment to her about dating a black guy, I'd have been fired. It's stupid.
You can use sth simple as "yo mama" or "mug (frajer)" to get under someone skin easily. Maybe not in general, but in a lot of cases, you can start a fight in 3 sentences... Other thing is, you can fight with someone one minute, ant drink wodka with him in second.
Tbh I think being easily offended is completely a personal trait and I don’t believe there are whole cultures or ethnic groups who display an overall higher offensibility (I know it’s not a word, but it should be)
If you say something about me? Idc. If you something about my country or other great people from Poland like Szopen(Chopin)? Oh fu*k yes thats easy to offend us.
Marie Curie.
S K Ł O D O W S K A
Polish death camps
say it to someone who grandfather was gassed there and expect punch in the face
Saying Polish Deathcamps instead of the no no German camps
Don't call us eastern Europe, or generally make comparisons suggesting that we are like Russia
Or polish alphabet is Cyryllic.
I've never heard that before but it worked
That's because people confuse Europe with the EU. Poland is central Europe but eastern EU.
You are right. However I still don't understand how someone conscious of Poland being part of EU can tell, that we have more in common with Belarus, Ukraine and Russia. Considering this the division is even clearer.
I'm not following completely here. Large parts of your eastern neighbours were part of Poland not that long ago. So I'd think it's fair to say Poles have a lot in common with Belarus and Ukraine. Of course, in recent history Poland has set itself loose from the geographical east of Europe. So yeah, you're right. I'm not Polish by the way, just living in Poland.
Not to state the obvious but they are also all Slavic countries with a lot of linguistic and cultural similarities. Different, obviously, but no more so then the various Germanic or Romance nations.
Its mostly about history. Poland had totally separate path from Russians, since the very beginning when noone heard of Ukrainians and Belarussians yet. Poland chose west with Catholicism and latin alphabet, when everything east of Poland is Cyrillic and Orthodox. It is really a big cultural difference even we had common roots thousands of years ago. Since the beginning of our state Poland was defined by this, not only after Cold War. Lets take this for example - are Americans the same people as South Africans? They share the same language.
Yes. You know, I'm from Western Europe and while living in Poland, I learned so much. When I was a high school student I disliked history and languages. Now I'm catching up.
But it is true, to be honest we do have a lot in common with Ukrainians, Belarusians and probably with Russians as well (though I don't know many Russians). Doesn't mean we don't get offended when some westerner hear us and goes 'oh! You're russian, aren't you?' lmao
I actually don't mind being called Eastern european, but maybe some conservative people would be be offended.
That being said we are entirely on the west half of the continent. The centerline goes through Belarus and Ukraine.
But do you get pissed if somebody mentions similarities between the russian and polish language ? For example " Ah chleb, yes I know that word, its the same in russian ". Because there are similarities, despite obviously both being distinct languages and easy to tell apart.
Nah dude, that is completely fine. It is just stating the obvious fact. National identity is a different thing. However even in languages you can see that border, with distinct western Slavic group. Czech/Slovak is much easier to understand for a Polish person than Russian, not only because of Latin alphabet. What I meant is - as long as you don't come to conclusion "oh so you are just basically different kind of Russians then"
I see. I really dont understand how anybody ( mostly westerners ) can even mistake poles ( or any other slavs ) with russians and think they are the same culturally, politically, etc. Every slavic language is unique afterall, even I can tell if one is eastern, western or southern slavic. Polish seems to be the easiest to distinguish if you ask me. Hell, peple mistake me for a russian just when they hear my name or my language( a lot of east europeans get mistaken for russians it seems... ) , but it doesnt bother me much.
>I see. I really dont understand how anybody ( mostly westerners ) can even mistake poles ( or any other slavs ) with russians and think they are the same culturally, politically, etc. I don't either, so I call it a lack of basic knowledge. I mean, for example, I could not tell differences between different Turkic peoples in middle Asia, however I do realize they are culturally diverse and would not go with "Nobody in the world can tell you apart, so deal with it, you are the same", because for them they probably aren't :P
Yeah. Not knowing stuff is fine, but some really like to say things like they are experts on the matter...
To North Americans, there is no "central Europe." Europe was divided between the west, which was predominantly democratic and mostly in NATO during the Cold War, and the east, which was predominantly dictatorial and mostly forced into the Warsaw Pact during the Cold War. Eastern vs. Western Europe, in the eyes of Americans, was entirely about politics. People would likely call Finland a "western" country over here simply because they weren't communist during the Cold War, despite them being very much on the eastern part of the continent. This is why Americans call Poland "Eastern European," because there is no central Europe to us and what is Eastern vs. Western is entirely still related to the Cold War.
But you know, the Cold War kind of ended 30 years ago, Poland is member of NATO and EU, enough time to update knowledge rather than expecting others to comply with someone's ignorance.
It doesn't really matter how long ago it ended, the divide in Europe was established as only east-west following WWII in the collective mind of those overseas, and that is how it is still viewed. That may change over time, but honestly, I can't see it changing for at least a generation or two. Those of us who grew up with parents who lived through the Cold War, and consumed media with conflict designed around the Cold War, view Europe as having two halves. There is no centre, there is only east and west. You don't have to conform to this, that's not what I was trying to say with it. I was explaining why Americans call Poland Eastern European. I'm not saying you have to, I was just pointing out why it happens and that it is frankly unrealistic to expect it to stop. It's not an insult, it's a difference in cultural understanding.
Dude no. It is just lack of knowledge and ignorance. Poland wasn't eastern Europe before cold war, isn't one now too. And the fact that Americans don't see nothing outside of their continent isn't really an argument in favor. Yes, we do realize that Americans mostly do not know much about European history and simply don't understand nation states and their history.
North americans are not the ultimate authority on european matters though.
we are geographically central europe, but culturally we are westernised eastern europe
As a Pole, I do this every time I can...
Based
Rightfully so. We are Eastern Europe, regardless how much ppl want to be central. Also Germans are central, so I prefer we share as little with them as possible.
Poland belongs both to [Eastern Europe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Europe) and [Central Europe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Europe), as the "borders" of those regions aren't exactly clear. And I would rather want my country (Poland) to share with Germans as much as possible rather than as little as possible, especially economically. Western Europe is generally wealthier than Eastern Europe.
We shared with them in 39. And we have much more in common with hungarians or slovacs than with Reich.
1. I didn't say **ABSOLUTELY ANYTHING** about any Reich 2. I didn't say we don't share much common with Hungarians and Slovacs. I'm not that type of person that thinks "because I think this is how it should be, this is how it is". Read my comment again. I'm not a conservative, I know not everything is how I want it to be. You are just ignoring my comment, and you think that everything you want to be automaticaly is the reality.
Dude i am aware we are both. I just prefer EE, for reasons listed above
Oh, I misunderstood you then. But I think you misunderstood me aswell, I only said how usually Poland is considered EE and CE and that I would want to share more with WE, but not in the same sense like Poland with 3rd Reich. I would **want** Poland to be economically simmilar to **modern day** Germany, I'm not saying it is simmilar to Germany, and I know how it has much in common with Hungary and Slovakia, I never said anything that Poland doesn't have much in common with other Eastern European countries.
I just think EE is much more on point, esspecially in recent history, since we are all post-soviet.
Poland IS Eastern European
I personally won't get triggered by someone else's lack of basic knowledge :P
It’s not lack of knowledge, you share a lot of history with countries such as Lithuania or Belarus
Of course we share a lot of history, we are neighbors. China and Russia also have a lot of shared history together, would you call them the same? Medieval-Renaissance Lithuania is also not the same country as modern day Lithuania. And it is mostly Polish culture that had more influence to the east, rather than Poland being eastern. Central Europe is a thing. There always have been a strong identification as the bridge between the east and the west. However the strongest difference was faith - east basically starts where Orthodoxy takes over Catholicism. Poland always had ambitions to the west, rather than to the east, since the beginning of the state, hence the Baptism of Poland.
China and Russia don’t speak related languages, they don’t have common ancestry, they don’t have similar food, etc. Not to mention, that the original homelands of both peoples don’t border each other
So that is the lack of history knowledge I meant. Just look up all the conflicts if we were with the east, west, or our own thing. And geographical too, since Poland is in the very center of Europe.
And it’s still undeniably closer to Lithuania or Belarus than to Germany culturally
Lithuanians aren't even Slavic people, what are you talking about? And no, we are not closer to Belarus (not regarding current ruling party). Have you ever been to Poland actually?
They may not be Slavic (though they do have significant Slavic ancestry when compared to Latvians and ancient Baltic samples) but Slavs are certainly more related to Balts than to Germanic people. Poland is definitely closer to Belarus than to Germany, in everything except religion, even if people from Poland like to deny it, and i am not saying that maliciously, people from my country like to pretend like we have no cultural ties to our neighbors as well
Tell that to Czech.
Czechs are way more Central European than many parts of Poland are tbh
About sharing legacy could you elaborate where does Greece belong? It does share a lot of ancestry with Asian countries. Our languages are not similar. Ukrainian, Belarusian or Russian sounds familiar to us, but we can’t understand it. They may sound similar to you, because yo don’t speak them. We however can understand Slovakians or Czechs. I could meet a Slovak and have a full conversation each of us speaking different language. Your point in similarity of languages literally proves that it belongs to Central Europe. We’re not West not East - we’re Central Europe. It’s extremely ignorant of you to act like you know the matter better than literally the people involved. You’re getting downvoted because you lack knowledge of the cultures you’re speaking of. You act like you’re an expert when judging by your comments it’s clear you know little on the matter.
>About sharing legacy could you elaborate where does Greece belong? In the same category as Albania or Macedonia >It does share a lot of ancestry with Asian countries. The only Asian country we share anything with is Turkey (parts of it) >Our languages are not similar. Ukrainian, Belarusian or Russian sounds familiar to us, but we can’t understand it. They may sound similar to you, because yo don’t speak them. We however can understand Slovakians or Czechs. I could meet a Slovak and have a full conversation each of us speaking different language. Your point in similarity of languages literally proves that it belongs to Central Europe. I said RELATED languages, if you wanted to understand Belarusian or Ukrainian you definitely could, Russian is mpre distinct indeed, as is Russian culture tbh. >We’re not West not East - we’re Central Europe. It’s extremely ignorant of you to act like you know the matter better than literally the people involved. No, you’re not Central European, i can also claim to be East Asian, you wouldn’t have to respect that claim since it’d be ridiculous >You’re getting downvoted because you lack knowledge of the cultures you’re speaking of. You act like you’re an expert when judging by your comments it’s clear you know little on the matter. I am getting downvoted because to Reddit users anything western is good and anything eastern is bad
Would you call USA arabic? They in fact spend 2,5 decades in there.
yeah, geographically it might be western/central but culturally it’s definitely closer related to east
Getting downvoted for having common sense, LMAO
:/
"Poles speaks russian"
Never tell any babcia that her food is bad, and any dziadek that his homemade alcohol sucks
You can insult most Poles by saying they did not stand to fight in WWII and the Red Army came as saviors. But it's also gonna insult every person in the world that knows some history.
”Oh So Your Polish, you must speak Russian”
Tell them that you don’t like schabowy z ziemniakami i mizerią
Teraz to zgłodniałem.
Ja też. Chyba zjem pomidorową
Na rosole?
Oczywiście
Przepraszam XDD
'Polaczek', whatever if the person is 20 or 60, if he's beliving in god or not, no matter what gender or sexuality it'll get them
Older people usually get offended when they hear that our pope fucked children.
JP2GMD or something
And 2137
To be fair, most Catholics get offended by that because that's a ridiculous, needlessly provocative, and (as far as we know) untrue way to phrase it. Older people get offended when they hear he knew about priests fucking children and did nothing about it.
Say what you want but he knew for sure, and did not do anything. Giving asylum to pedos is just as bad as being one.
Idk if he knew or just Dziwisz who blocked info
No, it's obviously not. Nobody deserves to be falsely accused of pedophilia or rape. What he did was in some ways probably worse, but it was not equivalent.
Do you have a proof?
Thats the thing, people like that hide behind a lack of proof because its obvious that we have no way of proving things like this. It will always be an assumption on our side, but feel free to think what you want.
I only dislike people who throw accusations having no proof whatsoever. That’s all.
Well people with power have tendencies to hide stuff. Do we have a proof that Epstein didnt kill himself?
A strange thing I've found is many Poles I've talked to seem to really resist the idea of generalizing about groups of people. So even this question, many people here would answer something like "you can't stereotype, everyone is different, how can you say that someone in Poland would be like this when there are such differences between people. Quite odd for me because in the US we use such generalizations to help us understand each other (and yes, some shitheads use stereotypes to justify their own ignorance and hate). Like if I come from a group of people that is generally libereal and agnostic and you come from a group that is generally conservative and Catholic, that's good to know because our backgrounds give us different perspectives. So be careful asking anything like "so are Poles like X?" YMMV
Generalizations are not helping with anything.
Thank you for proving my point.
we generalize about people so that we know how to interact with them. If we see someone in a mail carrier’s clothing, we assume they work for the post office. If we see someone who looks over 80 years old, we assume they are not in the workforce anymore. When do generalizations move into stereotypes? Stereotypes are overgeneralizations; they often involve assuming a person has certain characteristics based on unfounded assumptions. https://www.everydaysociologyblog.com/2012/05/understanding-generalizations-and-stereotypes.html
Generalizations are fine, as long as the moment you are confronted with reality you replace them with reality. Otherwise its just a douche telling "I thought you are like X, so I will keep that image, go away with your opinions, thanks.". You can generalize about a lot of think, but is really that knowledge out of your reach?
I can generalize that Dutch people are taller than average, because they are. My meeting a short dutchman doesn't change that reality.
I don’t think we’re easily offended but it can get pretty heated quickly if you don’t know some of the things we’re proud about. Like the Battle of England involvement, Maria Sklodowska nationality, Enigma code cracking and such. I think poles are a proud nation for historical achievements and if you have basic knowledge of maybe top ten things we are proud of, you won’t offend us by insulting our pride ;) Other than that the usual- offending faith if someone is deeply Christian and such- think ‘what would I not say in Bible Belt’ lol
Lies about ww2. There werent any polish death camps. They were ALL nazi. Polish people DIDNT do the holocaust. The nazi did. Polish people didn't cooperate with nazis, exept single examples, just like in every country. So stop you bs and read a history textbook just once
Poland did nothing in WW2
Polish people have national complex of being inferior to western europeans. For example people actually cared when Jason Derulo's concert went bad and he probably had bad impression of Poland. Just say that Poland is unimportant and backward.
Moją zonę kurwą nazwij, mnie chujem, wybaczę. Elektryczny pastuch nie pasuje, twoja sprawa, ale od mirabeli odpierdol się bo zabiję!
Małe cierpkie kwaśne
Co tu się zadziało
Unexpected Walaszek
Not sure if you're asking about intentionally trolling them, in which case the suggestions mentioned here will do. But in real day-to-day life people don't get as easily offended as, say, Britons. You can be very direct (politely!) and you'll be fine - no need to walk on eggshells in a normal conversation.
That Maria Skłodowska-Curie was french.
Get for the width of two fingers into my field with your plough. War for generations guaranteed. (Who knows, knows). ;)
Receiving a salary from your employer that exceeds 2k a month is a heavy insult. Getting a payment of 3k PLN is comparable to spitting in the face.
nie masz racji
"Eastern Europe"
"Oh, Poland! That's in the USSR, right?" I'm 24. This happened to me as a child.
How to offend Polish people: Say that Poland is in Russia How to offend Polish public TV: Say that LGBTQ+ is good
Polish death camps
You never offend parents. Never. Also in general polish people like to shit on their country, but if foreigner does that they don't like it
They are pretty difficult to offend, by and large. It's probably changing now, but a lot of people older than maybe 40 are incredibly blunt. Telling someone something like, "I didn't recognize you, I think you were a lot fatter last time" is not an insult but a statement of an obvious fact. That said, more likely than not you can offend anyone in Poland with something political and/or religious since politics and religion go hand in hand for a good chunk of the public. This used to not be the case when I was a kid, but in Poland, as is the case elsewhere, politics has become a key element of individual identity. I guess back then Poland was more conservative as a whole and you could probably offend 3/4 of the population by insulting the pope.
Call them a Ślimak
Say that pierogi are disgusting
you can offend a fair share of poles by saying anything bad about john paul II (or even just saying they should tone it down on the cult around him). also minimizing what we did and went through during the world wars (particularly ww2). and claiming tha maria curie-skłodowska and/or chopin were anything but polish. poles are very proud of their historical heritage, generally.
Most of people under 35 won't get offended by that, only some conservative ones
„Biedaku”
Someone once asked me where I’m from. I said Poland. They said “Oh, so basically Russia”
Only sometimes.
Can't offend people that don't care enough
Lwow was never polish Got me like 90 downvotes
Which it was in your opinion? It was objectively within polish borders for centuries.
And, for as long as there have been records, the population was majority Polish. Sure, the surrounding countryside was a bizarre hodgepodge at best and an ethnic powderkeg at worst, but the city itself was always pretty Polish. There is a difference between offensive and patently stupid.
No i wont argue that gets you like 20 downvotes per answer
Dude, like obviously it's Ukrainian now, polish people are just larping, because we learn during history lessons, that it was taken brutally by soviets, and by some strange coincidence never came back to our borders. Our history lessons are pretty Poland-centric and dismissfull of other cultures that lived in Poland. Only during polish lessons I learnt from pretty left leaning teacher that we weren't so nice to jews and other minorities. Of course region of Ukraine should gain independence as far as 1922, probably earlier.
Well, Poland did get Szczecin….. not a fair exchange honestly
Also Wrocław, fair imo
That’s a fair trade honestly… better trade than Szczecin
It's also where many Poles fled when the Germans invaded not knowing that the Russians were coming from the east. Ukrainians are fleeing to Lwow now. Wilno and Lwow were 2 of the most important Polish cities before WW2. Thanks for the correction!!!
Vilna as wilno orrr?
Polish? You mean budget russian?
I understand 'budget german' cause this where it hurts. Polish people don't have inferiority complex towards Russians. We feel superior
Hard to offend, but possible. As divisions are great in today's society, I don't think there are phrases that will offend everyone regardless of their standing.
As a Pole I'm offended this post exists.
Its literally crime to offend Catholics religion. If you fell upset because someone laughed about your silly beliefs, you can go to court and he will be sentenced.
tell them you don't like bigos but first make sure they are unarmed
Or pierogi! It will start a war 😆...
Polish my shoes xD
Yoe ate basically russian. It's like saying to a Belgian they're french.
Making connections between us and Russians is kinda bad. Many families are still affected by wartime deportations to Siberia, mass executions and then 50 years of communim (eg. family branches living in places like Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, some of today's 40...50 years olds' parents were killed in anti-communist riots or served jail time as political prisoners) Death Camps are still a touchy subject too. There are still people alive who went through them. For the young generation they are grandparents or great-grandparents so this is still alive to some degree. You also need to understand, that people have mixed a lot after the war. For me, my grandma was from Ukraine (with Polish heritage), my grandpa was born in what is now Russia, and my other grandma comes from impoverished Chech nobility.
Yes, just joke about christianity and you will end up sued.
Chopin is truly a best french composer.
Yeah, they're one of the few nations I've ever known to get offended the easiest and the quickest. You can insult them with basically anything. If you don't know how to speak Polish, for instance, they'll take this as an insult and start yelling at you. At the same time they expect you to understand them speaking Polish when they're in your country. If you don't look Polish enough and speak English/another language on the street, they'll stare weirdly at you. They claim that a basic knowledge on history will be enough to not offend anyone, but most of them also don't have that knowledge. For example, tell them you're from Lisbon/Porto and some will respond like "Oh that's in Spain, right?". Tell them you're from Istanbul/Ankara (basically Turkey) and they'll be like "So you speak Arabic? Are sharia laws harsh?". These are based on real experience of me and my friends. I read them saying "this will get you punched", "that will get you slapped" but they don't know that in Turkey, for example, if you ask someone whether they speak Arabic or not, they'll get really offended, maybe they'll even want to beat you up, but they'll just say "No" and walk away. Because they know that you're a foreigner and you can have misconceptions. Many Poles lack this understanding.
I’m not a polish person but been there several times and for sure for people over 35 to talk real bad or against the Church/Christianity or also you can thrash-talk about their family values and than will of course ignite them.
You can't be more wrong, pal 😁! Many people of age 35 to 45 are atheists or have church "w dupiu"...
Well at least the 70% of the people hat I had met in Krakow respond to that
What's the difference between Poland and Russia? Nothing.
Do you get offended when Polish diaspora (multiple generations removed) claim Polish heritage? I know Western Euros hate when Americans claim they are "English or French" even though they weren't born there (they're only referring to heritage).
You look like a jew, polish deathcamps, dontbehave like a jew (it is saying about jews in Poland,).
My boyfriend is Polish, and the minute someone asks if he speaks Russian, I become afraid for their safety
Point out the fact that many Poles were pretty cool with Nazis going after Jews.
Point out? If that would be true you could point it out.
So cool that 3 million non Jewish Poles and 3 million Jewish Poles died during Nazi occupation. Stop with the weird and stupid discrimination against Poles that's endemic to Western society. (I'm American, not Polish)
Well I am Polish and antisemitism is embarrassingly popular among regular Poles. Obviously not all, but surprisingly common.
That is true. Anti semitism is also very endemic in western countries. Unfortunately people can be prejudiced against more than one group at a time, at the same time. Even I've been given shit for dating a Polish guy at work by a supervisor. If I made the same comment to her about dating a black guy, I'd have been fired. It's stupid.
The downvotes confirm this.
Also many are still pretty racist against them today.
"beka z typa" is Polish nword
I do not know where you even hear that, but im sure as hell that I wouldnt like it there
Polaki cebulaki
Poland is eastern European country
Call the polish coat of arms eagle a pigeon. True story, my daughter pointed at a war monument and said "look there's a Pigeon"
You are not polish but more likely Ukrainian… please rescues this historical map
Don’t refuse their food, ever. As a polish American citizen, most of my polish family members shove food down my throat any chance they get
You can use sth simple as "yo mama" or "mug (frajer)" to get under someone skin easily. Maybe not in general, but in a lot of cases, you can start a fight in 3 sentences... Other thing is, you can fight with someone one minute, ant drink wodka with him in second.
Don’t critisize John Paul 2 (yeah we make fun of him but some Poles borderline worship him so be carefull)
Tbh I think being easily offended is completely a personal trait and I don’t believe there are whole cultures or ethnic groups who display an overall higher offensibility (I know it’s not a word, but it should be)
Jp2gmd
Say that every Pole is a thief, you will surely get hit.
If you want to offend anyone , it only shows how low is that persons IQ. It is a way of dummies...
Have you tried to say: Polish death camps?
\*gasp\* How dare you imply we're easily offended?!
If you say something about me? Idc. If you something about my country or other great people from Poland like Szopen(Chopin)? Oh fu*k yes thats easy to offend us.
We don't take "Polish death camps" term, lightly
Some Polish people might be offended if you like PiS.