2022-03-09
32 分钟Hello and welcome to Outlook on the BBC World Service, the home of extraordinary and life changing stories from around the globe.
I'm Robin Azhar.
In the summer of 2020, President Andrzej Duda of Poland's ruling conservative nationalist Law and Justice Party was running for re election.
And on the campaign trail.
A man.
Who wears his Roman Catholic faith on his sleeve.
President Duda successfully campaigned on a ticket of what he called protecting family values.
He called the promotion of LGBT rights an ideology more destructive than communism.
So unsurprisingly, many people refer to Poland as one of the worst places in the European Union to be gay.
But amongst all this hostility, every summer gay and trans people gather on the streets of Warsaw in defiance and celebration.
Today, Poland's Equality parade brings together tens of thousands of people.
But it hasn't always been this way.
Simon Niemitz is the man that really got things going with Poland's first equality parade back in 2001, I was in.
The mood that we need to change something, especially when we had meetings with the politicians, we had meetings with the political parties and everyone was telling us that we are not important and Poland is not ready for any rights.
So I was furious about that.
Simon is gay.
He's also a psychologist and a bishop too, with the United Ecumenical Catholic Church.
I was always very close to my religion and I think I had my calling from my early childhood.
Growing up in Warsaw without any siblings.
Simon spent a lot of time alone.