Polish radio station protests fine from regulator for “Hitler Youth” critique of school textbook

A leading radio station, Tok FM, has criticised a decision by Poland’s broadcasting regulator to fine it for “inciting hatred” during a programme in which, the station argues, it was in fact criticising hate speech in a controversial school textbook authored by a former politician from the ruling conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party.

Tok FM’s editor-in-chief has suggested that the National Broadcasting Council (KRRiT) was seeking to “protect the good name of PiS” by “distorting the meaning of the broadcast”, during which a presenter had suggested the government-approved textbook came across as if it had been written for the Hitler Youth.

Her station has described the fine as an “assault on independent media” and pledged to challenge it in court.

On 28 April, the chairman of the KRRiT, Maciej Świrski – a conservative figure appointed to his position by the PiS majority in parliament – announced that he had decided to fine Tok FM 80,000 zloty (€17,500) for a broadcast in June last year that discussed the textbook, History and the Present, written by Wojciech Roszkowski.

“It was established that the programme humiliated and violated the dignity of the victims of the Second World War, including Jews,” wrote the KRRiT. “There was discriminatory content and incitement to hatred based on political views. Insults and stigmatising terms were used against Roszkowski.”

This, said the regulator, was a violation of Article 18(1) of the Broadcasting Act, which stipulates, among other things, that “broadcasts may not contain content inciting hatred or discriminating on the grounds of…political or any other opinion”.

“Journalists have the right to describe events that may outrage the public,” said Świrski. “However, this must be done with professional care and integrity in the gathering and use of material.”

During the programme, presenter Piotr Maślak and a guest, history teacher Paweł Nawrocki, had discussed History and the Present, which was introduced into Polish schools last year as the accompanying reading material for a new subject of the same name.

The textbook has drawn controversy for its conservative content relating to topics like family life, sexual and gender minorities, the Black Lives Matter movement, and the European Union. One section referred to the “decay to the institution of the family” caused by “medical advances and the offensive of gender ideology”.

Children are being brought into the world “separately from the natural union of man and woman, most preferably in a laboratory”, it asserted, with sex being treated “as entertainment and the sphere of fertility as human production, one might say breeding”. It then asks: “Who will love the children produced in this way?”

That section was ultimately removed by the publisher, Biały Kruk, following a backlash. That decision occurred after the discussion on Tok FM in June 2022 (when the book had not yet been published).

During the programme, Maślak said, having read excerpts of the book published online, he “had the impression that the aim is to convince young people…to – I don’t know – exterminate non-heteronormative people because maybe they are a threat to the healthy social fabric”.

“It reads a bit like a textbook – sorry for the comparison – for the Hitlerjugend [Hitler Youth] at times, not everywhere, but at times,” he continued.

That prompted an angry response from the head of Biały Kruk, Leszek Sosnowski, who said it was “slanderous” to suggest they were “propagating fascism among young people”. He announced that the publisher had notified the KRRiT because “such things must not be allowed to go unpunished”.

In response, Tok FM informed the KRRiT that the opinions expressed by Maślak “did not exceed the limits of journalistic freedom”. It also argued that the reference to the Hitler Youth “was an apt metaphor emphasising the propagandistic nature of the work”.

However, in February this year, Świrski decided to initiate formal proceedings against Tok FM. At the end of April, he announced that this had concluded with the fine of 80,000 zloty.

Tok FM immediately announced its intention to take legal steps to challenge the decision, which it described as “an absolute assault on an independent medium that is a platform for the exchange of opinions in a socially relevant public debate.”

That was followed yesterday by a statement from the station’s editor-in-chief, Kamila Ceran. She noted that, during her 11-year tenure, the station has never previously been fined by the regulator.

But now, she continued, “the president of the KRRiT has accused us of using hate speech because we criticised hate speech”. Ceran pointed to the fact that Biały Kruk had chosen to remove some parts of the textbook highlighted in Tok FM’s programme.

Ceran also noted that Świrski had only belatedly introduced a completely new accusation, which was that Tok FM had “incited hatred due to political views…by referring to the political affiliation of the author of the handbook – indicating the Law and Justice party”.

“In addition to defending the good name of Prof. Roszkowski, [Świrski] also undertook to protect the good name of PiS by misrepresenting the meaning of the broadcast, which was not political in any part,” added Ceran.

The editor-in-chief suggested that the case against Tok FM may be used as a pretext to not renew the station’s broadcasting licence, which is expiring this year. Another liberal broadcaster often critical of the government, TVN, has recently faced problems renewing its licence.

The decision to fine Tok FM was also criticised by a member of the KRRiT, Tadeusz Kowalski, who was appointed to the regulator by the opposition-controlled Senate.

He noted that Świrski had made the decision alone, without consulting the rest of the council, something that as president he is entitled to do but which goes against previous practice.

Kowalski told news website Wirtualna Polska that he believes Świrski’s decision was “biased, arbitrary and selective” and that Tok FM’s discussion of the textbook had been “in the public interest”.

Main image credit: M. Śmiarowski / KPRM (under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

Anna Hackett

Anna Hackett is an assistant editor at Notes from Poland. She is a recent graduate of European Studies from Trinity College Dublin and has had previous journalistic experience with the Irish Independent News & Media group.