The Left in Poland is at times hilariously and even primitively infantile. Once, Left MP Anna Maria-Żukowska publicly complained that the dog of the daughter of communist general Wojciech Jaruzelski peed in her shoe. Another left activist proclaimed that the time for rebellion had come and glued herself to the doors to parliament.

The issue is that the Polish Right, by seeing the young Left through the prism of groups like Antifa or other such infantile acts, is making a terrible mistake that may lead to it losing power in the near future.

In 2015, the supporters of the Right in Poland were able to strip power away from the destructive and inept reign of the liberal-left PO-PSL government. This was accomplished mainly with the help of the votes of young people. Today, close to six years after those elections and after the United Right’s second victory, we can state that there is a problem.

The Polish Right, satisfied with its 2015 victory and pushing the liberal-left government out of power (and especially with the financial benefits coming from the media, business and social environments associated with that government), is losing touch with the youth. It is unable to speak about politics with the youngest generation and is not trying to understand the problems and expectations of the youngest voters.

Publicists, commentators and politicians of the Right are becoming increasingly senile and un-cool for the youth. Increasingly often, they are being associated with dishonesty, failure and greed, just like the PO-PSL politicians used to be in the past. It is not that important how true these evaluations are, but what is very important are the evaluations imposed by the liberal-left environments dominating the public space.

By receiving the praise and votes of the young, who as we know are interested in politics in a very limited way, the Left is also obtaining the support necessary to conduct a radical, borderline Bolshevik social revolution: full legalization of abortion, removing religious lessons from school, removing the Catholic Church from the public space, the country’s secularization, LGBT marriage and adoption of children by gay couples in the future.

The biggest error the Right can make today is to underestimate the noticeable turn of the young generation to the Left, to consider them unimportant and “entitled brats.” The conviction — and such voices can be heard on the Right — that all that needs to be done is to increase religion and history lessons is a path to defeat.

After the 2019 elections, Jarosław Kaczyński, who was dissatisfied with the result, stated that there are groups of people whom his party had neglected in previous years. This includes the co-authors of the United Right’s 2015-2019 election successes – young people. Today, the Right can still fight for their votes.

But first, the Right must stop caring only for itself and the quarrels within its coalition and fighting over positions in the government. The Right must listen to the voice of the young, including those who are so vulgarly opposing the government and breaking pandemic restrictions. It must create authorities attractive to youth because it has not done so in the last six years.

The Right has to start speaking about the issues of the young generation using their own language, which means speaking about the climate, terrible junk work contracts, supporting education and providing financial support for their future.

Finally, the Right must use the tools that the government has at its disposal and the opposition does not, which involves presenting and introducing serious policy and action that meet the expectations of the youth.

Title image: “Future-is-now” Left convention in Warsaw last Saturday, February 20, 2021, source: lewica.org.pl