I haven't seen this thread before and now Ive read it all. And it almost made me vomit.
I'm a Pole myself and I can't say I'm kind a particularly proud of it.
First, I don't think there is anything special about Polish history. Almost any Pole loves to repeat:
1. We SAVED EUROPE against Turkish Muslims! (bull****, it's Russian who did much more against Turkey throughout history; one battle never saves continents).
2. We won the BIGGEST battle. So what? I'm fat because I eat BIGGEST. That battle didn't bring us almost any good then, we could totally smash the enemy after it IF the king head his head at its place. We had many numerous friends who helped us. Maybe should the Lithuanians rather say that they saved Europe, or Russes, Checs, Moldavians or Smolenians?
3. We had the best pilots in the WWII! Haha. Yes. And no planes for them to fly, no airports to go off, no sufficient fuel supplies IN CASE of longlasting war against Russia and Germany. We lost that war, remember? Ło¶ (and Mi¶) were the best bombers of their time, and none of have has ever reached any particular achievements. Ask people about Stuka and Spitfire. All know that names. Ask about Ło¶. Ask about Ło¶. Ask about Ło¶...
4. We broke the Enigma code. Yes, we participated in breaking it in a large part, that's true. I'd even say we are as a nation particularly good in breaking anything we touch.
7. History treated us unfair. - That is the very biggest lie I've ever seen.
Łeż to zaiste! (a, taki wtręcik z Sienkiewicza, nie mogłem się powstrzymać). Ask just ANY of our neighbours, if they were treated 'fair' by us. Ask Checs about Zaolzie. Ask Ukrainians about our occupation and final treason. Ask Lithuanians about... about almost whole our history. Ask Russians too...
They celebrate victory against Poland till XXI century as their national holiday! We were hated and spitted at for centuries for being an unwelcome guest. If we look closer, we see 'history' treated us quite well, but finally we happened to be weaker than neighbours and they decided to eat us for supper. Just as we would do, if we ever could.
8. We had the first constitution in Europe. How long did it last before erasing Poland off the map?
Did it bring any real change in Europe? Did it bring at leat one litle new idea others would pick? Did it save Poland or did it save at least 1 human life?
Forgot the rest, like "we defeated communism", "we saved Europe in 1920", "we...", "we...", "weee".
Ask for "them" at least once. :hmm: What did we give the world? Rennesainse? Did we fill it with our technical or scientifical achievements? Like maybe 50-100 Nobel Prizes? Did we produce the best literature of the..? Maybe just comics..? No.. Or, did we build something really big, like idea of democracy or human rights or uniting Europe, or, say, introdicing ever lasting peace? No, we haven't achieved any of these. European civilisation has earned more from Chinese than from Poles.
But, for this little moment, let's assume that Polish are truly unique (that's the way almost any Pole thinks it is). Matthew Ridley wrote in "The Origins of Virtue": "
there is nothing special in being special. In fact just anything IS special just because it's not like any other thing, that is itself special too". The very idea of being is special itself, I'd say. Even if we are special because we speak Polish and the rest doesn't (the Germans cannot speak at all - Polish word for 'German', Niemiec, means 'mute, dumb', quite offensive I'd say), it doesn't change anything. Italians and French are special too (English and Americans are not, as almost anybody can speak English). And noone cares.
So let's stop mourning our history and just start to live free lives. Let's earn money, let's have sex or let's play games, let the present and the future is our concern, not past. The past was sometimes glorious, sometimes shameful, but it WAS, and we ARE.
No offense to anyone. Remember I'm a Pole too. The above is just an opinion, of the kind you discuss when having a drink. Just wanted to spread some cold water on the pro-Polish enthusiasm here.
It's nice people abroad remember Polish damn good pilots, but that doesn't mean we must instantly tell them all about our national complexes.
PS. And it's not me nor you who won the damn Battle of Tannenberg, so why be proud of it?
