When I was presented with an opportunity to write this text, I thought for a long time what it should include. After all, it is a simple matter. For me it is simple and clear, but not necessarily for people living abroad. I started going to the Independence March in 2013, when my views were still quite vague. I watched the mainstream left-liberal media and there everyone said that there was something wrong with the march itself and the idea behind it. I heard that fascists, bad people who want to start a civil war in Poland, take part in this march. As young journalist, I decided to go on this march and see with my own eyes whether fascists, dangerous individuals, are really taking part in it, as I heard on television.
Marching towards the march
For years the Independence March has almost always started in the same way. All participants meet on November 11th on Polish Independence Day at 2 p.m. at the Roman Dmowski roundabout (one of the fathers of Polish independence) and proceed in accordance with a route marked out and previously agreed with official services and the capital city magistrate. Every year the march takes place under a specific slogan, referring to important aspects of history or national identity. Religious matters are strongly emphasized in the form of banners and emblems referring to the thousand-year history of Christianity in Poland. Many participants of the march start the day with a holy mass. When on this memorable day, 11 November 2013, I reached the place I was quite surprised because on the march alone I saw many families, mums with dads and their little ones in strollers. There were a lot of young people wearing white and red scarves, with banners draped around them. There were elderly people and veterans in World War II uniforms prominent amongst them. All laughing and smiling, they looked joyful and happy to be able to take part in the event. I asked myself: Where are the mythical fascists I've heard so much about on TV and radio?
In search of the mythical "fascists"
For some unknown reasons, the march stood still for a long time, even though it was supposed to start long ago. The people began to get impatient, I was at the end of the march so I decided to move to the front. It wasn't easy because there were tens of thousands of people assembled. Going straight to the front I started talking to the participants: families, teenagers, elderly people and veterans. From what these people told me, I deduced that they are normal Polish patriots and not any fascists. They talked about how they live in Poland, how often they struggle to make ends meet, how badly someone was treated by the Polish judiciary, how they are stigmatised in schools because they wear sweatshirts with images of Polish national heroes. I decided that they are often right and that the good of our homeland really matters to them.
After all these conversations with the participants of the Independence March, my head was swimming. I felt really cheated. Politicians, the media and various pseudo-authorities that had been promoted for years, simply lied to us. I felt an inner rage, why do they cheat and slander these families with children, these young people, these veterans, who also fought for "their" freedom? I understood that we all witnessed some huge mystification, that it was disinformation, that something else was going on. That's when the rumour began. People started to run away, I saw the smoke and heard screaming from afar.
People started to scatter, and suddenly I saw a lot of strangely dressed, masked men. Bricks started to fly over our heads, in the distance I saw masked men fighting with the police, it was also significant that from second to second there were more and more policemen in helmets and full riot gear. However, I could not get a certain image out of my head. Some of those masked guys who looked like football supporters were coming out from the streets where the police were standing, and not only that – some of them were talking to each other. I thought, what's going on? After all, they were just fighting, the police were shooting rubber bullets at them and now they were talking to each other like good friends, like nothing happened. What was going on here?
Somehow I managed to escape and returned home safely. Immediately after entering the apartment I turned on the TV and only then did it start.
The news service of one of the left-liberal stations showed a burning guard box in front of the Embassy of the Russian Federation. Pictures of fights with the police, fighting and hooliganism in the streets of Warsaw were being shown. In the background, an “authority” guest on the show said that it was all the fault of the right wing, and that Nazism was being reborn in Poland. As if he had ever been here. I thought to myself how pathetic they are by slipping these lies and slandering the participants of this march in one way or another. I was there, I talked to these people, they were not fascists or Nazis. "These are normal Polish patriots" I shouted in front of the TV as if I wanted them to hear me!
Time of peace
Years later, it turned out that the burning of the guard booth at the Russian embassy was also staged. So-called "tapes of truth" appeared and in them we heard the entire truth about the power that ruled over us. However this is a subject for a different text. After these perturbations the government changed and again I decided to go to the Independence March. Tens of thousands of Polish patriots, a sea of white and red flags. There was a lot of police around and, strangely enough, it was calm. People marched proudly carrying Polish flags. There were also our friends from Hungary and other countries who walked in this march congratulating us on this initiative. How have we been deceived so throughout all these years? How could we have been shown in such bad light? It was 2015 and I recorded a reportage from the march for the viewers of wRealu24 TV station. When I returned, a group of elderly people approached me and handed me a book about Józef Piłsudski and a white-and-red flag. They thanked me for showing the truth, for saying things how they really are, often against the flow of the official narrative and their subordinate media. I understood that this was that phenomenon. People are the phenomenon of the Independence March. These wonderful Polish patriots, who often come from all over the world to walk together on November 11th to demonstrate their pride in being Polish. Over and above political divisions, despite differences of opinion, they go together and sing: "POLAND HAS NOT YET PERISHED, SO LONG AS WE STILL LIVE...".
Marcin Rola
Journalist for wRealu24 TV station