Łukasz Warzecha: The Shuchewyk Memorial in Lviv. How did this happen?

Social change is sometimes mentioned by seemingly insignificant and trivial signs. erstwhile I think about how the position of Ukrainian refugees has changed in Poland, I think of the sphere with which I have regular contact: watching my country from behind the wheel. I drive a lot for a private driver. A large part of my travels all year, 25-30 1000 kilometers, are roads out of town.

I remember perfectly the day in mid-March in 2022, erstwhile I was driving on the A2 motorway to the west, to then change direction to the north and under Łódź turn right at A1, going to Bydgoszcz. It was then that a legend about the fact that Warzecha had hated Ukrainian cars was created – present very seldom mentioned. Mr Stanowski and Mazurek, who at the time on the Sports Channel reported my posts on the Twitter at the time completely unreliable, contributed to its consolidation.

What was that all about? We are talking about the first weeks of the Russian invasion of Ukraine erstwhile the first wave of refugees appeared in Poland. It began to say that these refugees mostly come in luxury cars. I decided to check it out on my journey, on a kind of experiment. I looked at vehicles on Ukrainian registrations and tweeted what brand the car was, what model it was, fresh or old. yet it turned out – as I besides clearly wrote – that the experimentation did not show the advantage of luxury cars. It was a mix of various cars – from fresh BMWs or Teslas to utilized kie. My conclusions so denied the narratives of those who then attacked Ukrainians. This, of course, Mr Stanowski and Mazurek did not pass on. They most likely didn't read my entries at all, and so did others, who later for a long time had been throwing them at me.

Today, fewer people remind about this, most likely besides due to the fact that they can see to the bare eye that it was the critics of the Polish attitude who were absolutely right. The satisfaction is, but very bitter.

I mention this due to the fact that it is on Polish roads that you can see what has changed. present it is hard to meet a dozen-year-old Ukrainian car. They inactive happen, but very rarely. There are lower-class vehicles in a clear minority. Most of all – this is my “eye-to-eye” assessment, due to the fact that there are no specified statistic – there are higher class cars, much better than the ones that the average Pole can afford.

The kind of driving Ukrainian drivers on Polish roads has besides changed. You could say they felt at home. For the first, say, 1 and a half years of the presence of Ukrainian refugees in Poland – although I do not know whether the words "refugee" should increasingly be taken in quotes – almost everyone drove very carefully and definitely below velocity limits. Today, this inactive happens, but the number of cars on Ukrainian registrations has increased very clearly, which decision riskyly, very quickly. However, sometimes Ukrainian drivers drive aggressively and decisively above the limit. In fresh weeks I have seen respective specified cases, including in Puławy in Warsaw. These are inactive isolated situations, but in 2022 or the first months of 2023, actually absent, and now already visible.

There are many signals that Ukrainians begin to “set up” our public sphere, entering conflicts with Poles in everyday circumstances. It's besides a phenomenon that can only be assessed anecdotally at the moment, due to the fact that there's not much to measure. So we're talking in part about subjective feeling. However, we have investigation that indirectly confirms this: these are cyclical analyses of the squad of Dr. Robert Staniszewski from the University of Warsaw (who was a guest on my part respective times in connection with them). channel), which checks the attitude of Poles towards immigrants, including refugees from Ukraine, about all six months.

The last of the reports (talk about it with Dr. Staniszewski you will find Here.) shows that nearly half of the respondents (49%) believe that Ukrainian refugees are characterised by a "other culture". erstwhile this group of respondents is asked to clarify this statement, the following statements are most frequently made: "other norms, principles, customs", another religion/faith", "Eastern mentality, russian culture – deficiency of care for the common good", "lack of individual culture", "suspension" and "lack of respect for Polish values, traditions and cultures". This may be flawed, but it confirms the thesis that the prolonged presence in Poland of Ukrainians, equipped with peculiar rights, is starting to origin tensions and dissonance.

Interestingly, it can be seen even in the reactions of those who, it seems, should buy utmost proukrainism in a package of political views: residents of Wilanów Town. On October 14, “Gazeta Wyborcza” (yes!) published the text of Paweł Marcinkiewicz “They have 2 Bentleys in the garage”. How residents of Wilanów Town look at fresh neighbours from Ukraine". It is there that there are observations about luxury cars, but besides the rudeness of visitors ("Do not respond to “good morning”), their tendency to riot and fight or deficiency of regular courtesy.

At the same time, it can be argued that, had it not not been for the real privileged position of Ukrainian refugees in Poland, had it not been for the erstwhile power to open countless gates to abuse the granted social benefits, and finally, if it not been for the caricature of the attitude towards Ukraine at all levels of the hierarchy of the Polish state – from the president, starting with local governments, putting up Ukrainian flags, ending it – the situation would have been different. Ukrainians would feel in Poland as they should feel – guests who have a work to follow the rules of the host. This was the way Ukrainians coming to Poland before the war – only to work.

I am writing about this due to the fact that – what sceptics one more time predicted – this inevitable process of cultural clashes occurs at the same time with the process, which is going truly fast, accepting Ukrainian flag ideology as a completely authoritative state doctrine. This is not a sign of nationalist aggression against Poles, but 1 must have a very weak imagination so as not to fear specified a further sequence. The war with Russia, as it turned out, not only did not put out nationalist sentiment in Ukraine – as Polish naïve people hoped – but on the contrary: it strengthened it highly and built even higher pedestal leaders of the bander movement.

At the same time, the word "pedestal" should be understood rather literally, due to the fact that this nationalist sentiment takes the form of monuments. The latest specified initiative is the Lviv councillors who are taking on the planning of the Roman Szuchewycz monument in this city, the direct leader of the genocide in Poles. I wonder how president Andrzej Duda feels about this, whose pro-Ukrainian sentiment has long exceeded all measures of rationality. I have not heard the reactions of the Polish authorities so far. At the same time, I am even more curious in the reaction of representatives of the largest opposition party, because, however, for almost 2 years, they were the ones who pushed only the right utmost proukrain line, calling each of its critics from the Russian onuc. present they dress up in the feathers of defenders of the Polish business. And all you gotta do is scope for their social media entries from that time to measure the immensity of their hypocrisy.

And again: 1 does not request to be overly pervasive to realize that even if present the praise of Stepan Bandera – the figure most objectively speaking, highly uninteresting – whether Roman Szuchewycz does not have the anti-Polish subject yet, it is not essential for this 1 to appear. After all, aggressive nationalism towards especially Poles was an immanent part of the ideology professed by CNS activists. If these characters become officially sanctioned patterns for Ukrainians, it is only a substance of time, most likely not peculiarly long, before these accents from their achievements begin to enter the general Ukrainian consciousness. And this will be supported by an increasingly assertive attitude, not to say: the aggressive attitude of the leader of the Ukrainian state towards Warsaw. Not a place here to analyse the origin of this attitude – they are complex. It is adequate to state that Kiev pursues its own business, completely without sentiments, and in many cases acts in accordance with the interests of those who presently see the top benefits. Poland is no longer 1 of these countries.

I would be happy to find out how people who pushed us – and any inactive do – towards mistrust of the Polish interest in relations with Ukraine and put us in a position of a submissive loser in front of our neighbour: Mr Andrzej Duda, Mateusz Morawiecki, Jarosław Kaczyński, Paweł Kowal, Paweł Jabłoński, Jakub Kumoch and many others.

Luke Warches