Lech Walesa Shocks Poland With Anti-Gay Comments WARSAW, Poland
-- Lech Walesa, the Polish democracy icon and Nobel peace prize
winner, has sparked outrage in Poland by saying that gays have
no right to a prominent role in politics and that as a minority
they need to "adjust to smaller things." Some commentators are
now suggesting that Walesa, the leading figure in Poland’s
successful democracy struggle against communism, has irreparably
harmed his legacy. Walesa said in a television interview on
Friday that he believes gays have no right to sit on the front
benches in Parliament and, if represented at all, should sit in
the back, "and even behind a wall." "They have to know that they
are a minority and must adjust to smaller things. And not rise
to the greatest heights, the greatest hours, the greatest
provocations, spoiling things for the others and taking (what
they want) from the majority," he told the private broadcaster
TVN during a discussion of gay rights. "I don’t agree to this
and I will never agree