Poland: Warsaw's Controversial (and Frequently Set Ablaze) Rainbow Statue to Be Removed

[link to time.com (secure)]

On most days, the rainbow sculpture in Warsaw’s Savior Square stands peacefully — a tangle of wires and plastic, colorful flowers, fashioned into an arch stretching across a traffic circle in front of an old church. The simple structure, burned down six times by nationalist groups decrying its supposed pro-gay symbolism, has been a magnet for controversy and cultural commentary in the three turbulent years that it has stood.

Later this month, it’s being taken down indefinitely, leaving behind a complicated legacy and an uncertain future. Conservative groups campaigning openly against homosexuality have demanded the structure’s permanent removal for years, while the Adam Mickiewicz Institute, the cultural organization that owns it, insists that they are negotiating a new location after their temporary exhibition license expires in the fall.

Poland has in many ways grown more Western and liberal in recent years, embracing a free-market economy and even electing a trans member of Parliament. But experts say that the vocal protests against the rainbow suggest that many Poles are still prejudiced against homosexuality, and, for that matter, anything alien to orthodox Polish culture. More socially liberal citizens worry that the growth of violent nationalist groups, largely responsible for the burning of the statue, is indicative of an overall slide in tolerance in this