The reverse of “we will pay you to have anal sex with men” is of course “if you don’t have anal sex with men, we will not pay you.”
Pretty simple, really. Not sure why this confused the Poles, unless they really are as stupid as all those old jokes claimed.
The European Union will not provide funding to six Polish towns that have declared themselves “L.G.B.T.-free zones,” a rare financial sanction of a member nation for issues related to the equal treatment of its citizens.
While the amounts of money being withheld are modest — from $6,000 to $29,000 — the exclusion of the towns from funding for a program that connects local communities across Europe was intended to have a deeper symbolic resonance.
“E.U. values and fundamental rights must be respected by Member States and state authorities,” Helena Dalli, the European Union commissioner for equality, wrote on Twitter. The Polish authorities that adopted “L.G.B.T.-free zones” or “family rights” resolutions failed to protect those rights, she wrote, and their funding applications had therefore been rejected.
The decision comes just days after the leaders of the 27-nation European Union bowed to pressure from Poland and Hungary and relaxed a framework devised to tie long-term budget spending by the bloc to issues related to rule of law.
Both countries, to different degrees, have steadily chipped away at some of the bedrock institutions that allow for a healthy democracy, including a free press and a judicial system free of political influence.
But even as Poland and Hungary have caused increasing consternation in Brussels — both countries have been threatened with having their voting rights in the bloc suspended — they have faced little in the way of concrete punishments.
Even by the often brutal standards of Polish politics, however, the demonization of gay men and lesbians by government officials over the past two years has been ferocious.
Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the leader of the governing party, has repeatedly told supporters that Poles will not be forced “to stand under the rainbow flag.” He has said that homosexuality represents a “threat to Polish identity, to our nation, to its existence and thus to the Polish state.”
It has been a campaign amplified by state television, which has been turned into a propaganda arm of the government, and by prominent members of the Catholic clergy.
Nearly 100 local governments, representing a third of Poland’s territory, declared themselves “free from L.G.B.T. ideology.”
Although the declarations do not have legal force, they are viewed by many as menacing. And the heated rhetoric has been blamed for violence against gay men and lesbians.
Yeah, Kaczynski says he’s not gay – then he walks around like this:
Doesn’t look to me like that’s a person who isn’t gay.
I’ve seen a lot of people who weren’t gay in my time, and not one of them was wearing a fag-muzzle.
That coffee stain on his shirt too…
Definitely not my favorite Kaczynski. I can tell you that.
But seriously: Poland is going more anti-gay because the West has gone full-anal and pushing for complete double-anal. The thing about gays is that people used to just ignore them. Other than warning their young boys to watch out for men who were a bit too interested in them, no one really thought much about the issue.
Then, all of a sudden, the West starts telling everyone that anal sex with men is just the most wonderful thing on earth, and that everyone should be forced to do it constantly, because it’s just that great. This led to negative reactions among people who do not think man-on-man anal is a positive undertaking.