miketx
Diamond Member
- Dec 25, 2015
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- #21
...Anti-Polish rhetoric combined with the condemnation of Polish culture was most prominent in the 18th-century Prussia during the partitions of Poland. However, anti-Polish propaganda begins with the Teutonic Order in the 14th century. It was a very important tool in the Order's attempt to conquer the Duchy of Lithuania which eventually failed because of Lithuania's Personal union with the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland and conversion to Catholicism. Germany, becoming more and more permeated with Teutonic Prussianism, has never since abandoned these tactics. For instance, David Blackbourn of Harvard University speaks of the scandalised writings of German intellectual Johann Georg Forster, who was granted a tenure at Vilnius University by the Polish Commission of National Education in 1784.[23] Forster wrote of Poland's "backwardness" in a similar vein to "ignorance and barbarism" of southeast Asia.[24]Such views were later repeated in the German ideas of Lebensraum and exploited by the Nazis.[25] German academics between the 18th and 20th centuries attempted to project, in the difference between Germany and Poland, a "boundary between civilization and barbarism; high German Kultur and primitive Slavdom" (1793 racist diatribe by J.C. Schulz republished by the Nazis in 1941).[26] Prussian officials, eager to secure Polish partition, encouraged the view that the Poles were culturally inferior and in need of Prussian tutelage.[24] Such racist texts, originally published from the 18th century onwards, were republished by the German Reichprior to and after its invasion of Poland.
Frederick the Great of Prussia nourished a particular hatred and contempt for the Polish people. Following his conquest of Poland, he compared the Poles to "Iroquois" of Canada.[24] In his all-encompassing anti-Polish campaign, even the nobility of Polish background living in Prussia were obliged to pay higher taxes than those of German heritage. Polish monasteries were viewed as "lairs of idleness" and their property often seized by Prussian authorities. The prevalent Catholicism among Poles was stigmatised. The Polish language was persecuted at all levels...
Anti-Polish sentiment - Wikipedia
Frederick the Great of Prussia nourished a particular hatred and contempt for the Polish people. Following his conquest of Poland, he compared the Poles to "Iroquois" of Canada.[24] In his all-encompassing anti-Polish campaign, even the nobility of Polish background living in Prussia were obliged to pay higher taxes than those of German heritage. Polish monasteries were viewed as "lairs of idleness" and their property often seized by Prussian authorities. The prevalent Catholicism among Poles was stigmatised. The Polish language was persecuted at all levels...
Anti-Polish sentiment - Wikipedia