Life Rules

Do you think that this blog is all about writing? Well, whatever, it isn't, it's about design. Writing is such a great subject that I want to return to it again - and again. I live in Poland, and living in a foriegn land is never easy because cultures are different. The main problem is not with the many varying aspects of the culture itself, though, but with respect for foriegners. I am lucky because back in the UK I was able to live and work with people originating from many different cultures and I assumed that they were not that much different to me or anyone else, they were just people. OK, they often had different habits, like the Chinese born guy I shared office space with who always noisily slurped his tea. It was a cultural slurp where he was brought up, just as the family next door where I grew up watched football. I do not slurp my tea and I do not watch football, they are merely other people's culture, wherever they were born or with whatever racial history they might have. I knew several Polish people in the UK and we just talked about life, politics and the rest in the UK about the UK, whether or not all or any of us were born in the UK. We all lived in the UK, and we all accorded each other the same level of respect.

Poland, though, has proven to be a different case. Here in my city it is really hard to find anyone who will see me and think "Yo, another human!" What I say is mostly not seen in terms of human-living-here speaking but as he-English-speaking-about-Poland speaking, often without the person being concious of this. Keep the conversation light and on neutral subjects and there is no real problem, but in trying to talk about the social issues here is a nightmare, despite the fact that I have lived here for about eleven years, have been married to a Polish woman all that time, worked for Polish companies and not spent my free time down the bar drinking with my English-speaking-ghetto buddies. And I do care, as I think that anyone with any feeling for others would. No, I am not supposed to say anything that reflects even slightly badly about Poland, and by doing so once it means that I always do so. Mind you, even the press in Poland has been subject to the same requirement, not that this makes me feel any better, quite the opposite.

However, this is not a rant blog but a design blog, so we need to examine some of the dynamics. But first, what kicked this subject off in my head this morning was the inability of many people in politics and the media to deal with Poland being defeated by everyone they played in the UEFA football cup. You cannot escape newspaper's publishing the official email and phone number of the referee who 'did Poland down', or the fact that the same referee has got death threats from Poles unable to deal with the defeats. What is their problem? Where is all this hate coming from?

Poland has had rather an unfortunate history over the past couple of centuries, and this is what usually gets the blame, but the reality is different. Much different. Poland is a country where people are brought up largely as peasants, not in terms of the volume of knowledge taught in schools, but in a defeatist attitude that is designed to keep people where they should be - in their set social position. Hard words, true, but one measure of a cultures freedom is its ability to accept change. In a peasant society you certainly do not want your peasants understanding the reality of the control they are under, only that they respect the hierarchy enough that they become in awe of its highest members. As a result, the answer I get to suggestions is "Oh, that can't be done (here in Poland)". Mu!

A good example, and we need an example, is that of education. This where you are not taught to respect your elders, say, but only to respect the people in power, especially those with a big badge or an important job. Doctors, professors, priests, politicians, lawyers - you cannot say a bad word about them and succeed because the doctors will not treat you, the professors will not let you pass, etc. In this way is created the godhead that must not be questioned. Of course, people do rebel, with the oppression of the godhead to live under you either comply or rebel - and the best thing is that the godhead is so built in that you do not rebel against the godhead itself but break their rules only in ways which effects their fellow sufferers.

At this point I will just mention that I know some fine doctors etc. who are as frustrated as I am by the system and the people who take advantage of the it.

I have no desire to destroy the people around me because the godhead is oppressive, instead I question the godhead and in doing so I become something alien to the people here. I ask of these people why do they do certain things and not others, and again this is against the principle of the godhead. Only if the godhead says yes does it become possible to accept change. Whether the person is passive or rebel, they are taught that change is the enemy, and by association the bringer of change who is not the godhead is the enemy as well.

The teaching involves a lot of focus on 'tradition' and the usual 'this country' biased history most education systems to specialise in, but here always with the twist that sometime in the past was a better time - the 'golden age of Poland'. The assumption that everything went wrong some centuries ago is incorrect, the people in power, Polish or foriegn, have simply never let slip the reins of power, but instead continued to ensure they, as the godhead, remain in power, the movement from nation to dominiom to state to communism simply being the replacement of the people at the top, not their attitudes.

Poland, as I see it, is in pain, but a pain that remains untreated as the symptoms have been mistaken for another disease. Until enough people who care realize that the problem is the retention of an essentially feudal peasant society wrapped in technological gift wrap, then the situation will continue much as it is at present.

All hail the godhead!