How I Learned To Hate Russians

I know some people are super shocked by all of the ethnic violence in the streets of Warsaw the other day between Russian fans and Polish fans, but anyone like myself who knows firsthand how much Polacks hate Russians with the fire of a thousand burning suns could probably have called the whole fiasco back in November when these two drew each other in the group stage of Euro 2012. Basically, on the day of Russia versus Poland some dipshit Russian fans thought it was a wise idea to stomp around celebrating “Russia Day” in the streets of the capital city of their mortal enemy, who by the way, they share a thousand years of relentless genocide, war, ethnic exterminations, and occupation with. Obviously that kicked off a series of stabbings and gang fights between hooligans, unquestionably motivated by ethnic hostility. For WASPs and Americans, ethnic score settling in Eastern Europe like this, is unexplainable barbarity; but lucky for them they’re not Polish, nor the progeny of my Dziadzia (granddad).

If there’s anything my grandfather taught me about being Polish, it was to hate the sneaky little fucks east of the Vistula. I can’t really blame the guy either. As a Polish soldier and political undesirable, my Dziadzia was told by the Soviets that if he returned to Poland following WWII, they’d cut his head off. And that was after they killed over 22,000 of his buds in a remote forest, burned his village to the ground, and secretly plotted the demise of Poland with the Nazis. In other words, to Poles like my Dziadzia, Russia is like that chronic case of gonorrhea that never stops pussing. To be fair, there’s an undeniably depressing laundry list of fucked up moves Russia has pulled over the years against Poland. Other than twice wiping their country out with the help of the Germans, they also forced them into sixty years of communism they didn’t ask for.

That’s not to say Polish animosity is either justified or logical. Besides spreading rumours about Russkies being in league with the devil and having a genetic predisposition for lying, cheating, murder, and rape, my grandfather would intentionally stop by the Russian embassy and spit on it. One of my earliest memories with him was explaining to a cop why he had just instructed his five-year-old grandson to hork on those “cock-sucking reds”.

He once offered an American diplomat his front lawn in the suburbs of Ottawa for the express purpose of stationing and deploying nuclear warheads against the Soviet Union, while threatening to pretty much deliberately crash into any Lada to cross his path. Coming from a guy who literally went hand-to-hand with Russian troops and broke out of a death camp eleven times, I never questioned his follow through.

And the continuing animosity between both peoples goes far beyond just some old, senile expat in Canada. Since communism ended there’s still a pretty uneasy relationship between both nations, highlighted by the Polish actually pursuing American warheads, which naturally freaks the Russians out. To make matters worse, in 2010 the Polish President and many of his staff were mysteriously killed on Russian soil in a plane crash that has solicited more than one conspiracy theory accusing the Russians of assassination. Put simply, Poland and Russia are the Israel-Palestine of Europe.

That being said, the 1-1 draw the game ended in is probably for the better, lest one of them gets a leg up and someone actually decides to bomb someone else. Then again, it wouldn’t have been the first time a war was started in Eastern Europe by a fucking soccer game.