Pump your breaks there kid - the only thing that is being denied is that occupied Poland had anything to do with the installment of the holocaust by the Germans (they were next in line to the chimney). As much as I don't like the asshats from PiS, I do understand where they are coming from, after seeing "Polish concentration camps" in the western press on a monthly basis. To your other point - most of the polish judiciary has roots in the communist prosecution apparatus and is actively shielding all of the assholes that had a soft landing after the "toppling" of the communist government. Fuck'em.
> most of the polish judiciary has roots in the communist prosecution apparatus and is actively shielding all of the assholes that had a soft landing after the "toppling" of the communist government
I was under the impression that most of the people that were working as judges during the Soviet occupation are now dead or retired..?
He didn't say they were all judges. He said they had roots in the Communist establishment (his focus is on the deeply embedded secret police, but it goes beyond that). You also have Communist/post-Communist dynasties and clans where power is inherited and shared through ties and nepotistic practices stemming from the Communist period.
It's nice to think that the fall of Communism automatically led to the wholesale liquidation of the Communist establishment, but that's fabular, and after you think about it, quite a silly thing to expect. It would be disastrous to simply remove them without having prepared to replace them. When a certain establishment had been running the state for half a century, with all its ties and knowledge and competencies, you couldn't just expel them all just like that. They and they alone have been running the state for almost 50 years! (Especially given that the pre-War elites were either exterminated by the Nazis and the Soviets, or fled the country, or whatever, but outsiders unless they joined the ranks of the People's Republic).
So, unless you manage this transition somehow with the end goal of reducing if not disrupting the continuation of that corrupt establishment[0], an establishment known for profiting for its own selfish gains[1] and trained by Moscow to function as essentially colonial puppets of foreign interest, you still have a problem.
[0] Not everyone in that establishment was corrupt, of course.
[1] Hence the actual way in which state assets were privatized, often for funny money to foreign owners, sometimes for liquidation and removing domestic sources of competition, and in ways where former party apparatchiks and the like profited from their sale.
Would you compare the change from being part of the USSR to a republic to a change of government from Monarchy to republic? I think you just start over.
I'm not Polish so I don't know the situation exactly, but it's also been 30 years. I live in Poland and I see nothing even remotely resembling communism (besides the ugly Soviet buildings they haven't demolished yet). I think the government is using this as a scapegoat to push their agenda, but that's just an impression.
Poland was a part of the Eastern Bloc, not the USSR.
It is incredibly naive to think that a regime change somehow means all of the social and status networks just magically change. That is as silly as believing that a change in President == a change in bureaucracy.
I dream of living in Poland, or Czechia, someday. I know it isn't perfect, but it seems honest.
Most of the supreme court judges still hail from the old system (not sure of the average age but it's got to be around 70). Communism/socialism was in a slow decline when they started their careers, but that does not change the fact that they swore their fealty to the communist party.
So you really think that because they swore to the Communist party 30 years ago they still push that agenda, even though it was a foreign power, that doesn't even exist anymore..?
... which means you had a shitty tandem instructor . Shortly after a tandem pair leaves the door the instructor chucks a drogue which slows your terminal velocity to that of a single person and basically suspends the whole setup. Once that happens getting out the belly to earth position is basically impossible. The whole pulling back and description of your experience gives me an impression you were at a really sketchy drop zone.
Interesting question; I did not think anyone would interpret my quote of JK in the way you seem to have. But yours is certainly a valid possible interpretation, though not the right one, IMO.
To make it clear: I do not think he meant it at all in the way you think - your interpretation is something like the burning of the Library of Alexandria or other such vandalizing acts. I am pretty sure JK meant it something like this:
Do not (slavishly) rely on books to form your opinions; think (critically) for yourself.
Nothing else.
Buddha is supposed to have said much the same - per a book I read:
Appo deepo bhava
which is Pali or Prakrit for:
Be a light unto yourself.
Edit: orasis (sibling comment) probably said it better than me; it's just that in Indian thought, knowledge (jnana) is supposed to be one of the paths. Bhakti (devotion, e.g. Meera) and karma (action, e.g. Arjuna) are two among some others.
Just that knowledge itself isn't the end. Knowledge is just a thing, not "Truth" in and of itself. Thinking and knowledge simply obscure the perfect Truth that is this moment.
.. exactly - you have done them just fine - but have you tried getting good at any of those activities ? I ski and jump competitively (on the bush league level) and I can honestly say that I did not enjoy either until I devoted a shitload of time and money to get decent .
