Lech Walesa: photo - Lech Walesa Institute
Professor Magdalena Sroda of Warsaw University wrote in the Gazeta Wyborcza daily that Walesa is not alone, as “for some time now a group of 'new barbarians' has been emerging, treating freedom as an opportunity to disregard norms of etiquette, politeness and civilised behaviour.”
Walesa's initial comments were in relation to ongoing debates about legalising civil partnerships, after draft legislation was rejected in parliament in January. MPs in Prime Minister Tusk's centre-right Civic Platform party are currently trying to seek a compromise over the issue.
Besides suggesting that homosexual MPs should “sit behind a wall” in parliament, Walesa said that homosexuals “must know they are a minority and adapt themselves to smaller things.”
Meanwhile, Walesa has published on his personal blog both letters in his support and an interview in which he states his refusal to apologise.
“The lord God created woman and man and told then to reproduce. If everyone followed the example of homosexuals, who would pay for our retirement?” he argued.
Walesa published several supportive letters, adding that 95 percent of those he had received were in a similar tone.
“I support your remark,” writes one sender.
“Also, I'm of the opinion that queers (pedaly) and lesbians are ill as a result of their own wishes, they are perverts.”
Another letter says: “I must congratulate you on the bravery and manliness that you showed. Mr President, the time has come to unite the nation and take up the fight for a great Poland.”
MP Stefan Niesiolowski from the ruling centre-right Civic Platform told the TVN private television channel that most of the letters that Walesa published were at the level of “graffiti in toilets.”
However, he added that Walesa's argument that the homosexual minority “cannot impose itself on the majority”was “true.”
“This attack on Walesa, in which he is presented as being not entirely normal, is mean,” Niesiolowski argued.
The MP had himself got into hot water last month over a flippant remark about the allegedly homosexual daughter of prominent film director Agnieszka Holland. (nh/pg)