Polish Courts Annul LGBT+ ‘Free Zones’, Finds Them Unconstitutional
Polish courts have annulled two of the “zones free of LGBT+ ideology” in Poland, finding they violate the constitution which bans discrimination and requires equal treatment.
The court found that the phrase “LGBT ideology” in fact refers to LGBT+ people and has a discriminatory effect on them by excluding them from the community due to their sexual preferences and gender identity, reports ‘Notes From Poland’.
“Ideology is always associated with people; the dictionary definition states that it is a system of ideas professed by individuals or groups of people,” said one of the judges, Krzysztof Wujek.
Declaring somewhere “a zone free from” LGBT+ ideology 'de facto refers to people from this LGBT group'”, continued the judge. “Saying that it is an ideology, not people, is turning a blind eye to reality.
“It is harmful and strengthens a sense of threat against these people,” concluded Wujek. “These are the strongest arguments which made the court feel obliged to declare the resolution invalid.”
The court noted that the anti-LGBT+ resolution violated Article 32 of Poland’s constitution, which stipulates that “all persons shall be equal before the law” and “have the right to equal treatment by public authorities”, and that “no one shall be discriminated against in political, social or economic life for any reason whatsoever”.
The judges also found that the resolution violated the right of people to raise their children in accordance with their beliefs by limiting the scope of subjects that could be taught in schools.
“Human sexuality is the subject of scientific research, one of the branches of medicine,” found the court. “Science cannot be considered inappropriate for curricula.”
Anna Błaszczak-Banasiak from the office of Poland’s commissioner for human rights, Adam Bodnar, welcomed the ruling, stating: “This is the first such ruling in Poland. It is a precedent, which will definitely go down in the history of the fight for human rights in Poland.”
“The justification of the court was crushing,” she declared. “It not only shared all substantive arguments of the commissioner recognising that these resolutions violate the constitutional rights and freedoms of the LGBT community, but [also] pointed out that they were harmful and discriminatory.”
Karolina Gierdal, a lawyer representing Poland’s Campaign Against Homophobia (KPH), said she had “not been this happy for a long time”.
The court could have just declared the resolution invalid, said Gierdal. But instead it went further, declaring that “there is no such thing as LGBT ideology, there are simply LGBT people”.
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