• SmithrunHills [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    7 days ago

    Reminds me of when people on Tumblr(or was it Reddit? i cant really recall) were like “actually ☝🏽🤓 saying white people have no culture is racist to slavs!” very cracker coded nonsense

  • Cysio@lemmygrad.ml
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    9 days ago

    context: the guy in the movie made up the name on the spot just to fuck with the Nazi officer who was forced to write it down

  • Evilsandwichman [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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    9 days ago

    Polish people out here making family names that would pass a strong password criteria check

    That or it’s Polish tradition to make your family name the unique sound your bloodline makes falling down the stairs

    “My father was a Brzęczyszczykiewicz, my grandfather was a Brzęczyszczykiewicz, and we’re throwing you down the stairs to see if you’re also truly a Brzęczyszczykiewicz”

      • spudnik [he/him, they/them]@hexbear.net
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        9 days ago

        They did have a fascist government that ran concentration camps though. Plus more than a couple euro nations never had a formal colonial empire, but benefitted/still benefit from western imperialism. Idk where that leaves us re: the original question, but “it’s only ok to make fun of European ethnicities that had colonies” doesn’t seem super solid.

        (I have a hard time communicating tone and I’m trying real hard to not come off all debate pervert, apologies if I failed)

      • newacctidk [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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        9 days ago

        So there was this thing called Polonization whereby Poland seized land from the newly formed Western Ukrainian People’s Republic, Belarus, and Lithuania, among slivers of others. This was just flatly a land grab and imperialistic. More than that, they attempted to assimilate the minority populations, limiting the number of schools in their languages. Even when this was somewhat lessened, any Belarusian with a streak of pride was viewed with suspicion and seen as a communist spy.

        Ukrainians faced a load of shit, destruction of Greek Orthodox churches explicitly in revenge for the dissolution of Catholic power by the Romanovs after Partition. Essentially taking it out on Ukrainians and Belarusians.

        They then worked with the Nazis solely for the purpose of taking Czechoslovak territory. Poland is not colonial inasmuch as it was not a thing for most of the colonial era, but the 2nd Polish Republic was imperialist and locally colonialist with their goals of creating clear ethnic borders within their territory and with their neighbors, with the goal of Polonizing those caught in the middle

      • Llituro [he/him, they/them]@hexbear.net
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        9 days ago

        lack of a colonial empire doesn’t really excuse participation in settler-colonialism. i’m not trying to be ignorant of any particular historical bigotries towards poles, but in the context of being in the heart of empire in 2025, i fail to see what existing bigotries have persisted against the children of white polish immigrants. again, i don’t have any onus against regarding making fun of poles to be racist in the sense of the german venture towards extermination. i’m also not sure to what extent one could consider modern poland as under the thumb of us imperialism any more so than say germany or finland.

        • infuziSporg [e/em/eir]@hexbear.net
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          9 days ago

          What does “participation in settler-colonialism” mean when applied to nationalities instead of individuals, if not state projects?

          By the time that Polish migration to America got underway, most of the land had already been staked by common law. There isn’t much of a “Polish Belt”; Polish-Americans lived largely in cities and either became assimilated as white Americans or lived in enclaves and kept their othered status. And if I recall correctly, Poles in Haiti were friendlier with the Haitian population and largely were okay with the revolution.

          To answer the question of what makes Poles different from Italians, Italy is unambiguously more “imperial core” than Poland is, and this has been the case for 150 years (would be 250, but Italy hasn’t existed as a unified entity that long). The last time Poland was able to subjugate anyone was the 1730s. In the European context (which is what is relevant to the OP), both nationalities had lots of migration to Northern and Western Europe for a while, but for Italy this ended shortly after unification, while for Poland it continues to this day. In England, Germany, and Benelux, Italians are closer to being seen as part of the cultural continuity, while Poles are seen as waves of immigrant menial laborers.

          Whitey has a hierarchy, and Tadeusz is pretty low on it.

          • newacctidk [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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            8 days ago

            Poland did subjugate Lithuania, Belarus, Ukraine, and Czechoslovakia, the latter in living memory.

            I think you make a good point, but let’s not white wash that.

    • AssortedBiscuits [they/them]@hexbear.net
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      9 days ago

      Every European country outside of like Ireland deserves an emote honestly and even Ireland can be argued to deserve one as well since they largely benefit from their place within the imperial core even after factoring in their history.

    • SwitchyandWitchy [she/her]@hexbear.net
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      8 days ago

      Yeah, there’s a reason race “science” is a joke. Race is a social construct, constructed by racists to justify their xenophobia against whatever nationality or group of nationalities they decide that they need to feel superior to. This is probably part of the reason why western european racists assign so many more specific races to Europeans than Africans or Asians for example.

  • SuperNovaCouchGuy2 [any]@hexbear.net
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    9 days ago

    Poland is a theocratic far right fascist shithole where a majority of the politically aware population are rabidly anti communist, and a lot of people consider themselves white, hate anyone with more melanin than them, and participate in violent anti immigrant hate rallies. They learned nothing from nazi settler colonialism and genocide except how to be better genocidal racists. The example shared is just minor friendly banter poking fun at their naming conventions. Nothing racist about that.

  • newacctidk [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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    8 days ago

    I finally checked the wikipedia link and ha, one of the only details about the movie is literally THIS joke being super well known in Poland. Its like removing a comment quoting Airplane because it is rude to people named Shirley