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In these anti-gay declarations, municipalities confirm their support for traditional Polish values that are in opposition to LGBTQI+ ideology, which detractors claim seeks to bring about a cultural revolution in Poland and the sexualization of children.ĭuring the July 2019 anti-gay protests in Białystok, the pro-government newspaper Gazeta Polska distributed LGBT-Free Zone stickers. PiS ally Ordo Iuris, an ultra-conservative NGO based in Warsaw, intervened to help pro-PiS municipalities pass declarations that would reverse anti-discrimination efforts and broadcast a town’s opposition to gay rights. These decisions infuriated Kaczyński and his supporters. The government of Poznań later adopted a similar document. In February 2019, the mayor of Warsaw, Rafał Trzaskowski, indicated his support for the Warsaw Declaration of Municipal Policy for the LGBTQI+ Community, a document based on the World Health Organization’s standards on sexual and anti-discrimination education. These strongholds of liberal democracy include the cities of Warsaw, Poznań, and Gdańsk, which are governed by mayors and local officials from the major opposition party, Platforma Obywatelska (Civic Platform).
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The term conveys the idea that Poland should be “free” from LGBTQI+ individuals and their “ideology.” In truth, LGBT-free zones have their roots in the conflict between the PiS-dominated central government and PiS-ruled towns and counties in rural areas (predominantly in eastern and southeastern Poland) and what the media refers to as “ urban bastions” of progressive liberalism. Supporters of PiS maintain that the term “LGBT-free zones” is a totally made-up slogan or fake news created by gay activists themselves. Although the government has been consistent and persistent, civil society has risen to the challenge. These policies include, among others, President Duda’s veto of the act on transgender rights Duda’s instructing of regional prosecutor’s offices to investigate same-sex couples that married outside of Poland the liquidation of the Council for the Prevention of Racial Discrimination and new limitations on the Assembly Law. In the last few years, this vitriol has been matched by increasing violence and restrictive laws and policies against civil society activists of all kinds, intensifying dissent at home and pushing some Poles to seek a future abroad. Political conservatives supportive of the current government have long maintained that rights for gay people stand in stark opposition to everything that is Polish and Christian. Homophobic rhetoric is not new to Poland. Jarosław Kaczyński, the leader of PiS, regularly criticizes gay activists and calls the LGBT movement “ a threat to the very foundations of our civilization ,” while Poland’s President, Andrzej Duda, won reelection this July after a campaign that called the pro-LGBTQI+ movement an “ideology” more dangerous than communism. With the support of the Catholic Church and other conservative parties, the current government has exacerbated the crisis of LGBTQI+ equality. This is particularly true for LGBTQI+ activists following the establishment of so-called LGBT-free zones around Poland. Since the 2015 election of the right-wing Law and Justice Party (PiS), Polish civil society has been under attack by the ruling party.