E.U. countries, including Poland, are introducing Bolshevik reforms to education: Rozwadowski
10/01/2025
Mariusz Paszko, portal fronda.pl: How does the traditional approach to education differ from the Marxist vision, as well as the ideas propagated by the reformist trend?
Dariusz Rozwadowski, author of the book "Cultural Marxism. 50 Years of the Fight against Western Civilization": The traditional approach to education is associated with the belief that education and upbringing are closely related and interpenetrate. This is the traditional understanding of these issues. The aim of education is to educate a person. First of all, it is to train cognitive abilities, i.e. reason, memory, imagination and senses, in such a way that a person learns to use them. The next step is to provide these abilities with positive information that may be needed in life. Education and upbringing are of key importance for upbringing, because without some basic knowledge there is no upbringing. It must always be based on elementary knowledge, which an uneducated mind will neither assimilate and understand, nor retain in memory, nor - when it needs to be developed and supplemented - will be able to do. Therefore, spreading education is absolutely indispensable for upbringing. The development of cognitive abilities, diversifying them and enriching them with useful information, is a great effort and requires persistent and systematic work. Without education of a person's desires, these efforts will be in vain, and education carried out at an uneven pace, lacking perseverance, half-hearted or even negligible will bring no results.
It should be emphasized that learning itself has educational value, because it provides information useful for education, and also forces systematic and persistent effort. However, in order to develop positively, it must be based on constant educational work, without which it will never overcome the difficulties that are closely related to every learning: laziness, inattention and lack of concentration. Therefore, there should be no doubt that education and upbringing are two processes closely related to each other and, if they develop harmoniously, they constantly interact with each other. They also have many common features. Every learning is always, to a greater or lesser extent, self-education. Similarly, upbringing is also, to some extent, self-education. However, what characterizes traditionally understood education and upbringing is the awareness of the need for help from the teacher and educator. Their presence is necessary. Any emphasis on self-education or self-teaching over learning under the guidance of a teacher is considered dangerous and harmful. The teacher should be the main source of knowledge and authority in the classroom. The role of the student is to absorb information provided by the teacher and to perform tasks in accordance with his instructions. Education does not take place by shaping attitudes and values through good example and introduced discipline. Both in teaching and upbringing, the teacher's help is also intended to show how the student should conduct the internal process of education and upbringing on their own and, if necessary, motivate them to greater or more persistent effort if some problems appear along the way. Traditional school is based on a certain form of coercion, places great emphasis on structure, hierarchy and discipline. School is a place where certain rules apply, and following them is crucial for the order and effectiveness of teaching. Education includes teaching obedience, respect for authority and social coexistence. Curricula in the traditional model are usually established by central educational authorities and are uniform for all students. They focus on imparting knowledge from various scientific disciplines, with an emphasis on facts, rules and standard procedures. Education also includes developing civic and moral virtues. Methods in traditional education are often based on lectures, written exercises, repetition of material and tests. The teacher is the main speaker and the students are the listeners. Education emphasizes character formation through behavioral patterns and moral teachings. In the traditional model of education and upbringing, assessments play a key role in monitoring the progress of the student. Assessment is based on tests, exams and academic results, which are an indicator of educational success. The family, in the traditionally understood education, plays an important role in the upbringing process,supporting the values conveyed by the school and cooperating with teachers in shaping the child’s attitudes and behaviours.
The Marxist and neo-Marxist vision expressed in the trends of reformist pedagogy is completely different. The main goal of such education is change, the creation of a new man and society, and the complete rejection of traditional education and upbringing. The trends of reformist pedagogy based on the neo-Marxism of the Frankfurt School are used to destroy traditional education and upbringing. First of all, critical pedagogy should be mentioned. Critical pedagogy and critical education are extremely politically engaged. They pursue a specific goal that neo-Marxists have set for themselves. These are specific tools for the destruction of traditional culture and the entire prevailing system. The point of all this is to create a new man who will reject the values of his ancestors and will be able to radically reconstruct the world, of course in the Marxist spirit. However, before this happens, the old world must be destroyed. Another neo-Marxist trend is anti-authoritarian pedagogy. Representatives of this pedagogical trend oppose all authorities, principles of obedience and conformism. They are characterized by extreme permissiveness, i.e. unlimited, excessive tolerance towards other people, including children. Anti-authoritarian pedagogues reject hierarchical relations and authoritarian control over children, emphasizing their autonomy, freedom and co-decision-making. Children are perceived as individuals capable of independent thinking and action, and the task of adults is to support their development through dialogue and creating a friendly environment free from coercion. Teachers and parents act as guides, not imposing their will, but helping children understand the consequences of their decisions. This sounds harmless, even extremely positive, but in fact the lack of clear rules and boundaries leads to chaos and difficulties in functioning in more organized groups. The child stops following all the norms and rules governing social life. In education, anti-authoritarian pedagogy emphasizes the decentralization of authority and supporting the child's autonomy, which reflects leftist ideas of opposition to domination and subordination. It instills critical thinking towards traditional social norms, undermining the role of authorities such as family, school, church or state. Pedagogical trends based on neo-Marxism will always attack patriotism, religion, family and tradition, and their goal will be to create a new man and a new communist society.
What conclusions can be drawn from the educational experiences of communist systems, such as the Polish People's Republic or the USSR, in the context of contemporary reforms?
We should go even further back, to Bolshevik Russia. It was the Bolshevik reforms implemented right after the October Revolution of 1917 that are being implemented today in European Union countries, including Poland. There are such great analogies here that it is impossible not to mention them. Namely, the Bolsheviks first removed religion from the curriculum and all subjects associated with classical education, such as Latin and Greek, and Russian history was taught in such a way as to arouse contempt and hatred for the tsarism and the culture that grew on its basis. Sexualization also played an important role, to which the entire Russian society, including children and youth, was subjected. In Bolshevik Russia, free abortion on demand was also promoted on a mass scale, in the form of contraception, and carried out on an industrial scale. Education was used to instill all these ideas into the minds of young people. The authority of the teacher was destroyed. They were legally called school workers. They were forbidden to reprimand students, assign homework, grade and examine. Similar solutions were introduced in Hungary in the Hungarian Soviet Republic established by the communists. There, too, a radical program of sexual education was introduced to schools, war was declared on patriotism and Hungarian history, the traditional family was considered a thing of the past and a fight was launched against religion.
The introduction of such education caused society to begin to disintegrate. In Russia, people lost their motivation to work and became depraved. The social consequences were dire, which is why Stalin withdrew his earlier educational reforms after coming to power. Education in the USSR and the people's democracies after World War II was to serve the communists, acting as a tool for indoctrination. Objective truth was of no importance, because the interests of the party came first. Despite obvious distortions and saturation with Marxist propaganda, education retained its cultural dimension. Students acquired skills and knowledge that allowed them to perform specific work, whether in agriculture or industry. Discipline and the leading role of the teacher as the main guide in the teaching process were also maintained in schools. Indoctrination carried out through education was not entirely successful, because the family home and the Catholic Church still remained places of alternative education and upbringing, based on truth and love.
Can emancipatory and critical pedagogy be perceived as a threat to traditional values in the Polish education system?
Yes, this is a great threat. Critical pedagogy is closely related to emancipatory pedagogy. Both are needed because they strive to weaken the dominant culture to the maximum extent, to dissolve it in the melting pot of multiculturalism. This is one of the key assumptions of neo-Marxists and their product, critical theory. The basic goal is to destroy Western culture, along with Christianity and the system of values that grew on its basis, and to create in its place a new man completely devoted to the idea of communism. Native cultures are to dissolve in the melting pot of multiculturalism, to be destroyed. In this regard, critical theory stands in extreme opposition to traditional theory. It is a destructive force whose main task is to criticize culture and society, leading to radical change. It has no creative programs, it does not want minor changes or repairing the existing world order, but its complete transformation. This goal is directly served by critical pedagogy, which derives from critical theory. It is intended to instill in students a critical attitude defined by the Frankfurt School as a constant, total negation of everything. It is a negation that excludes the formulation of any positive conclusions beyond the postulate of constant change. Emancipatory pedagogy, in accordance with this idea, seeks not only to impart technical and practical knowledge, but above all to develop in students the ability to reflect on their place in the world, the social structure and the human condition. At the center here is the idea of education that not only adapts to reality, but also questions and transforms social conditions in order to promote greater freedom and equality.
Emancipatory pedagogy draws on the theories of the Frankfurt School, primarily its critique of culture, ideology, and instrumental rationality, developing educational tools that allow individuals not only to recognize these mechanisms but also to actively strive to overcome them in the name of social emancipation.
Emancipatory pedagogues, drawing on Marxist thought, see education as a space for the struggle for social justice and the pursuit of transforming society towards greater equality and justice. They believe that education should not only impart knowledge but also develop a critical consciousness, thanks to which people will be able to recognize the mechanisms of oppression and, acting collectively, strive to overthrow them. Both critical pedagogy and emancipatory pedagogy are aimed at native culture and strive to destroy it.
What changes are Donald Tusk’s government and minister Barbara Nowacka planning to introduce into the Polish education system?
The Ministry of National Education has announced a major education reform. It should be emphasized that its primary goal is to prepare Polish schools to join the European Education Area. All the changes announced by Minister Nowacka should be considered in this context. The Ministry of Education has announced the so-called slimming down of the core curriculum. The argument given was that it was necessary to relieve poor young minds who have too many responsibilities. Information was given about the reduction of curricula in all subjects by at least 20%. The cuts therefore included subjects such as Polish, history, social studies, mathematics, biology, chemistry, geography and physics. In the case of history and the present and education for family life, it decided to completely eliminate the subject, while religious education classes will be limited to one hour a week with the possibility of combining children in groups not only between classes but even between schools. Ultimately, religion is to completely disappear from schools, and the neo-Marxists from the Ministry of Education have not yet removed it only because of the still binding concordat. The fight against the Catholic Church has always been on the banner of the communists and this time is no different. The actions of the new government are unequivocal in this respect. As befits ardent neo-Marxists, they are making great efforts to eliminate any influence of the Catholic Church on the teaching and upbringing of the young generation. Hence all the cuts in the content of the core curriculum, which mention the extremely important meaning and role of the Church in the history of Poland. In addition to cutting the core curriculum and fighting religion, Minister Nowacka signed a regulation banning compulsory homework. This decision clearly suggests analogies with what the Bolsheviks did after the October Revolution. In Bolshevik Russia, one of the first decisions in the field of education was the elimination of homework.
As befits neo-Marxists, the new administrators of the education system want to remove from the core curriculum those contents that constitute the Polish cultural code. When we analyze what is to be cut from the content of teaching Polish language and history, it is clear that we are dealing with an attempt to denationalize young Poles. However, only Polish patriotism is to be eliminated, because in its place will be introduced community patriotism, i.e. European patriotism. This is to be taken care of by the new subject, i.e. civic education. In addition, the Ministry of National Education plans to introduce type B sexual education according to WHO standards as part of the new subject, which will be health education. It is therefore clear that the Ministry of Education is introducing solutions characteristic of education in communist regimes.
Can integration with the European Education Area influence Polish national identity and traditional values in schools?
Joining the European Education Area is de facto the end of school as we have known it so far. It will mean the complete eradication of Polish identity, history and faith. School will no longer teach, and certainly will not teach young Poles patriotism, history, Polish literature, religion and the broadly understood Polish cultural code. On the other hand, new subjects will appear, the task of which will be to shape a new identity, European, based on neo-Marxism. Education is therefore to be a weapon in building a new man, an exemplary citizen of a European superstate. Young Poles are to be simply deprived of their Polish identity, they are to cease to be Poles and become Europeans.
What role does education play in promoting a neo-Marxist cultural revolution, and what actions can be taken to protect Polish schools from this influence?
Neo-Marxists were among the first to understand the great importance of education in shaping and transforming reality. This knowledge had of course been known since antiquity, but it was the neo-Marxists who were able to draw the appropriate conclusions from it and mastered the system of upbringing and education. Starting in the late 1960s, they began a march through institutions, and one of its key elements was the march through institutions of science. Like other spheres of cultural and social life, they also took over education and upbringing in an unnoticed way and today can shape human behavior from birth and early childhood. This is very visible in Western countries.
Currently, the contemporary trends of so-called reformed pedagogy, as already mentioned, are basically the seedbed of a cultural revolution. They strive to change and completely reject the traditional model of teaching and upbringing. The complete takeover of education by neo-Marxists is necessary to instill in the young generation the belief that the good of the planet requires voluntary renunciation of property. In this way, the words spoken during one of the World Economic Forum summits will come true - "you have to have nothing and be happy".
A totalitarian system is being created before our eyes. Stopping this process seems extremely difficult. In fact, there is no time left. Only organic work and work at the grassroots level can give some hope. We need to rebuild unity, strength, faith and patriotism. We need to follow the example of our ancestors, who in the 19th century effectively opposed attempts to denationalize. Today, we find ourselves in almost the same situation as them. We need to defend children and young people from indoctrination with all our might. Parents cannot allow the system to tear their children away from them and deprive them of influence over their education and upbringing.
Thank you very much for the interview.