Poland Needs World Class Media, Not 'Festival of Lies and Russophobia'

Commenting on the Polish government's recent decision to create a Russian-language news agency to counter 'Russian propaganda', an article in the Polish online political science journal Obserwator Polityczny suggests that Poland needs to create a media resource the world can envy, instead of working to produce a "festival of lies and Russophobia."

Highlighting the importance of cross cultural ties between nations, the article explains that cultural and social ties between nations are easier to form today than ever before, thanks in large part to technologies like satellite television and the internet.

However, as the article points out, "such aspirations take on a whole new meaning in a situation where the Polish government, as well as other countries of the European Union, plan to create some sort of ephemeral, hate-based agitation and propaganda machine aimed at creating a festival of Russophobia and lies, in Europe, for a Russian audience."

The article laments that "in a poor country like Poland, where people sleep in the streets, and pensioners live on a pension [equivalent to] 180 euros, where getting to see a specialist doctor in a reasonable amount of time can border on the miraculous, the government seems intent on –and there is no other way of understanding the statements of [Foreign Minister] Grzegorz Schetyna, in some way contributing to the functioning of the mechanism of Western propaganda."

"If our state media had proved themselves to be on a reasonably high level, at least on a par with the state media of other countries, such as Germany or even Russia, [such a decision] could perhaps be understood as simply business." However, as the article notes, Poland's "state media has not been able to create a reasonable offering for Poles abroad, or something meaningful in the documentary and cultural sense."

The article notes that the territory of the European Union "has no shortage of world class media," from news broadcasters, to those specializing in culture, regional tourism, the popularization of historical knowledge, etc. "There is no shortage of models of public service broadcasting either, which until recently had set global standards in the functioning of media." Noting that this is true of some Russian broadcasters as well, the article suggests that "one must have a great deal of information to want to drown out" Russian media, especially "in the internal Russian media market."

"If we really do have the ambition to create a television channel, or even an entire spectrum of media of various kinds," the article continues, "we have to think about something eclectic and multifaceted, preferably in collaboration with Russian partners, with whom it would be possible to exchange programs and to work together to achieve contact between Russian and European audiences. It's worth noting that excellent examples of this type international television already exist (for example 3Sat). One only needs a little bit of good will, in the place of trying to make decisions which are contrary to the needs of the market and the expectations of viewers," the article urges.

"If we are going to spend public money on propaganda, let it at least be intelligent and objective, and at the same time valuable for ourselves. As for the strength of cultural ties, we can be sure that the Russians have nothing to be ashamed of," the article concludes.