Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: Skinheads inspire fear in Poland Date: Tue, 10 Nov 92 15:13:22 EST Message-ID: \SE A;WORLD \SS (WS) \HD Skinheads inspire fear in Poland \SH Frustrated youth attack foreigners, residents in socialist model city \BY Andrzej Stylinski \CR ASSOCIATED PRESS \DT NOWA HUTA, Poland NOWA HUTA, Poland - On streets where Solidarity demonstrators once reigned, a new underground movement is on the prowl - ugly, angry and terrifying. On Oct. 1, police say, eight skinheads descended on a German truck driver outside a Nowa Huta restaurant and beat him to death. Now there is real fear among this community's 220,000 residents and worry about how to combat the violence. "Solidarity" has replaced "Lenin" as the name of the main street in this gritty smokestack district. But little has improved for youths since the country cast off communist rule in 1989. The young have been set adrift in a changing Poland. The strong arm of communism kept a lid on restless young people for more than a generation. In Nowa Huta, that meant few prospects beyond a job in a steel mill and a decade to wait for a cramped apartment of one's own. Then came the new freedoms and, with them, new frustrations. For some young people, limited opportunities bred boredom, discontent and anger. They shaved their heads and began mimicking those vaguely political hooligans of the West known as skinheads. Although Poland was one of the chief victims of Nazism in World War II - the first country to be invaded outright by the Nazis - the youths see nothing strange about embracing neo-Nazism, violence and intimidation. They wear leather and heavy boots, sometimes even Nazi symbols. "Those youngsters now can feel more freedom and they do whatever they like," said Henryk Kaleta, a taxi driver who has stopped working at night out of fear. The eight arrested for the ambush of the German driver, whose companion was badly beaten, told police they were avenging attacks on Poles in Germany. But the political motive seemed to be an afterthought, police Supt. Jozef Gawlik said. That the drivers were German was "just a coincidence," he said, because earlier that day they had beaten two students. "They got drunk and they just went crazy," speculated Mateusz Wrobel, 18, who became a skinhead three years ago. Mr. Wrobel said many of his contemporaries feel lost. They latch onto subculture groups like the skinheads or the anarchists because "each offers them some kind of answer." Some are attracted by right-wing nationalist parties, while others just want to fight. Nowa Huta was built in the 1950s on the outskirts of the renaissance city of Krakow as a model socialist community, its centerpiece the huge Lenin steel works. Peasants attracted by relatively well-paid jobs migrated to the new city, but many keep their rough village ways. Many men, leaving families behind, lived in dismal worker dormitories where the recreation was drinking alcohol and fighting. Uprooted after generations on the land, many found the anonymous ranks of apartment blocks alienating. With democracy and capitalism came new threats. The steel mill is on the verge of bankruptcy, and unemployment is soaring. "There have always been a lot of hooligans in Nowa Huta, but I never was afraid to walk home after closing the restaurant late at night," said Piotr, 65, a retired waiter. "Now it is very dangerous." The driver's killing provoked outrage. Many residents laid flowers and lighted candles at the site on Solidarity Avenue, which, like most of the district's streets, is virtually empty of pedestrians by early evening except for a few drunks making laborious efforts to find their way home. "He was an innocent working man and they killed him without a reason," said Janina Zwierzynska, 60, a retiree who brought a bouquet. She said she thought too many young people "do not know what they really want." She recalled her first encounter with skinheads during a noisy demonstration several months ago: "I asked them what they represented. They told me: 'Freedom'! " Elzbieta Boron, 40, said many parents, trying to make ends meet, have no time for their children. "Besides, everything is so expensive and they cannot afford to go to a movie or invite a girl to a disco," she said. One of the few efforts to help came from a local theater director, Jerzy Fedorowicz, who spoke with skinheads and punks, rival groups that repeatedly were breaking bus windows in town. Mr. Fedorowicz made a deal: for a promise that the area near the Ludowy Theater would remain a "quiet zone," he would direct an amateur performance of Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet." The cast is skinheads and punks, aged 14 to 20. The show has heavy-metal music, skinheads in black leather jackets and startling haircuts for the punks. After a year, it is still a hit among young people, who even fill the theater for rehearsals. "It allows people to show what they are really like," said Mr. Wrobel, one of the leading players. "It is also proof that we can do something together without losing our identity." This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. 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