Reply #5: NYT: Palikot’s Party Signals Poland’s Move Toward a More Secular, Liberal Society

[pampango]

The parliamentary election on Sunday revealed the depth of change that Polish society has undergone over the past generation. Long pigeonholed as deeply conservative and devoutly Roman Catholic, many Poles have drifted away from the church and seek a secular state more in step with Western Europe.

No party better encapsulates those changes than the new Palikot Movement. The philosophy student turned entrepreneur turned politician has upended conventional wisdom and ignored a tradition of tiptoeing around the church. He has campaigned to create civil unions for gay people, to legalize abortion and even to end religious education in state schools.

The sensation of the night, however, was Mr. Palikot and the loose alliance that gathered under the umbrella of his famous — or infamous — name. “There is a growing culture of change in Poland thanks to the fact that millions of Poles work in the European Union, and thousands more study abroad in European countries", Mr. Palikot said.

Political analysts interpreted the parliamentary vote Sunday as a signal that Poland would continue down the road of openness rather than slipping back into the insularity and conservatism of the past, a development that Mr. Palikot said he welcomed.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/11/world/europe/polands-palikot-movement-signals-a-changing-society.html?_r=1&ref=europe

Nice to see that Poland's integration into the EU is going so well and contributing to fundamental changes in Polish political and cultural attitudes.