Poland’s LGBT ideology-free zones

In July 2020, EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen emphasised strongly the equality of sexual minorities and explained why several financial support requests from Polish municipalities were rejected due to LGBT ideology-free zones on the part of the EU in the preceding months. The Swietokrzyskie province in southern Poland near Krakow finally took a U-turn on its symbolic anti-LGBT designation and voted to abolish the resolution last week, which was first passed in 2019 by dozens of Polish municipalities.

It is a step into a more equal, fairer future for the country, as it is the first time a region in Poland has abandoned the declaration of being an LGBT ideology-free zones. Around 100 cities and regions had declared themselves LGBT ideology-free. Although the declaration of these zones has merely a symbolic meaning and couldn’t be legally executable, they led to yet another realm of marginalisation and stigmatisation of the LGBT community. As a response to this deeply misanthropic, discriminating initiative and to the rejection of every individual straying from a sexual identity norm, the European Commission stopped providing post-pandemic recovery funds for the province. The pressure worked and LGBTQ rights activists all over Poland have embraced the current development and expressed their gratitude to the EU for initiating the elimination of these symbolic zones.