American attitude towards Poland

its no different for you then for us who are polish in America and having to hear it
but just as they joke, we do retort back.

whats good for the goose is good for the gander.

I pay no attention now, and most of the time, if it is a polish joke, they tend to be
more consious of that fact and ask if your offended. some do, not all.

but being born in America, second generations and third gens, and hearing jokes
like that, then hearing that we are thought of as morons. well either way isnt
very encouraging when your attempting to connect with your culture.

But I would think other nationalitys have same problems. because once you leave
no one thinks of you as a part of that culture because you dont live there.

It hard either way.

to clarify this, meaning thought of as morons by some in poland, not all

but getting back to the post, coming to the USA would probably be easier
for someone who is Polish Vs someone from America coming there, because
of language barrier.

There is a similar history in the English making jokes about the Irish. Well they just laugh it off in the main because they tend to be better educated than the English so the joke is on us really. It's funny how the people making the jokes tend to stop when they actually get to know some real Irish people !

Just as a matter of interest, who (if anybody) do the Polish people make jokes about?

Yes, well it still happens...but what was funny, ie because it was based partly in truth no longer applies/happens....so much has the world moved on in recent decades. Secondly, within the island, other regions/counties are joked about...Kerry and Cavan spring to mind!

I don't know where the moron reference to Polish came from, any I have met are as able, skilled and interesting as other peoples, just different experiences and ways of doing things!

Perhaps a lot of is down to an inability to communucate well, initially, hence most problems.......!

Ignorance of other cultures and behaviour leads to jokes if you are lucky and fear and distrust if you're not.....

frank, go look on post # 83, "HOW DO POLISH VIEW OTHERS"




Thats what I was referring to, and that isnt the only time I have ever read
or seen posts that refer to that.

Just as a matter of interest, who (if anybody) do the Polish people make jokes about?

It is probbaly changing but we have jokes about...Russians and Germans - in series there was Polish, Russian and German....

mothers in law...policemen.....

The first Pole I met was when I was about 6 or 7 and my dad brought home one of his co-workers. This guy was very smart and funny in a sarcastic way that my parents aren't. I didn't know what to think because I had heard the "polish jokes" and this guy didn't fit the stereotype. My parents had some explanation that had to do with the Russians promoting the idea of dumb Poles as propaganda.

Anyway, those types of jokes really aren't told anymore, at least not around where I live now.

And German. Generally Germans were trying to convince the world and themselves that poles are worse and dumber then other nations to justify the partition of Poland. You know, the whole "Poles are to dumb to govern themselves, so we actually are doing them a favor annexing their land." I would also add the fact that Poles that came to USA after the polish uprisings, because they didn't know English language were forced to take the menial jobs and were depict as dumb.

PS: Somewhere on this board there is also FISZ's explanation. Also very true.

it was more then that here, it lasted a long time, but its not really like that now.

like I said, most will actually ask if you are offended.

my maiden name was a dead give away compared to my married name.
so no one knows that I am Polish unless I tell them .

those who know me, know my background.

and I still have one friend whos husband still calls me Polack and I say
hows it going "HICK" Golly gee, where'd ya get those extra big sandals?
oh Dems Yer Feet.. sorry gah.

I get asked now if I am Irish. hmmmmmmmmm.....

The ultimate compliment.........

once I was also asked if Im irish.. what was very suprising, cuz I dont have Irish accennt at all, and the guy was Irish.. but usually I am considered as a spanish. if sombody guesses where I m from, answer is always: Spain

Why on earth is a Pole flattered when he is mistaken to be an Irish???

By the way, I think at this moment the depiction of Poles in American media is still slightly negative (just remember the hype of derision surrounding "Bush forgot Poland").

A lot of Americans seem to think I'm Australian .... the world is getting more and more confusing

its a funny old world...

part of the post....

In the 1960s, West Germans began a Polish joke cycle in response to tensions with then-Communist Poland. This was then imported into American comedy.
The civil rights movement made color-based ethnic humor increasingly unacceptable (though, obviously, it never vanished completely), and the rise of left-wing comedians made blue-collar conservatism the butt of many jokes. Working-class Polish-Americans made classic, and acceptable, targets of ethnic jokes.
But Polish-Americans were now too integrated for jokes about broken English and social slip-ups to make sense. So the jokes emphasized technological stupidity.
This struck a chord. In the midst of an arms race, a space race and the increase of techno gadgets in daily life, technology seemed either threatening or just hard to keep up with.
Jokes about people who didn’t understand technology or the logic behind it articulated that anxiety and relieved it by transferring it to another group.
Polish jokes exploded in popularity. By the 1980s, many kids repeating such jokes though “Polack” was another word for “moron” rather than someone from an actual country. Recently, Polish jokes have become socially unacceptable, both because of anti-defamation groups (which recently got a Polish joke removed from “The Drew Carey Show” and because the Solidarity movement of the early ’80s showed Poles were smart and pro-democracy, to boot. But the need to pick on a minority and saddle it with our fears about still-increasing technology remains. The same old jokes are still circulating, now applied to such “acceptable” targets as Iraqis and blondes.


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as far as i know most polish jokes originated in europe and are pretty much interchangeable with any other nationality or trait im an american and i can tell you i love polish people immigrant or not u rock in my book

yeah i guess im a little late with that info fisz here has as usual laid out a very informative post. What do u do for a living fisz u seem to really be on top of it man

I'm in the telecommunications field. I was just curious as to where they originated myself

yeah the weird thing is in every country you have a certain nationality they like to pick on in france its the english and the belgians in belgium its the french and the germans in italy the morrocans and the spanish but the jokes all tend to be the same. i guess we all have preconceptions of what people are going to be like but we're usually totally wrong about it. i'll tell you i went to a polish wedding with a freind of mine once, wasnt sure what to expect but it turned out to be one of the funnest events ive ever been to language barrier and all

LOL....Patrycja.........is USA born and bred L...lol

what gave you that idea?? lol

He is a she, and its because my last name is Irish (husbands last name)
as his father was Irish.

and his name is a common last name, as I have been asked if I know certain
families who came from their town and so I have to offer that this is my
married last name and not maiden and that I am all Polish.

yes, I am 2nd generation for USA.

Frank, somehow, I knew that you were going to say that

Fisz, this is soooooo true. this was what I was referring to. and my last name
was the key to the target. kids at school , everytime my last name was
pronounced for attendance, I would hear crap. eventually I started to ignore
then I joined in, "cant beat emm join emm so to speak" and so thus, those who
were calling me Pollack, or do you know how to Ski?
and growing up, I was pretty pissed off about it, because it was constant, and
relentless.

that is why I say, even us 2nd and third generations had to endure the
jokes, and after hearing it for so long , its time to snap!

so my logic to this was hey, hows it going ya yeller belly varmit! or hill billy hick
once I started picking on their nationality, it tapered down.

oh and my last one " I might be pollack, but least I have all my teeth."
what were ya chewin on , cow turds you said? oh is that why your breath
smells like Sh*t . <~that was my later years comebacks as I wasnt allowed to
swear when I was real young lol.

anyway, I didnt want to do it, but it was the only solution to it.
my name was then used more "patricia" instead of Pollack.

My grandfather loved telling Pollack jokes

in VT a lot of people talk crap about polish people. maybe because they don't have very many polish people here. i've had quite a bit of hurtful things said to me because my parents are both immigrants from Poland, like we're poor, and all the girls are ******.

I'm in VT all the time and I don't ever hear people talking smack about the PL. Where in VT are you?

write some of those please.