The “Damy Radę” Association was founded in 2004 in protest against the liquidation of the Alimony Fund. It is known in Poland for numerous social campaigns (“Stop Domestic Violence”) and charitable initiatives (the Emergency Assistance Bank for Families with Children). It is also one of the initiators of provisions protecting victims in the government’s draft amendment to the Act on Counteracting Domestic Violence.
Each year, the Association’s chapter awards statuettes to the people and institutions that have contributed most to combating social exclusion. This year, it was awarded to Piotr Roman – “Residents of Bolesławiec most often come to me with family problems and complain about the lack of permanent employment,” the mayor said. “These are issues affecting many social groups, and they are what I hear about most often during Monday meetings with residents. The most common problem is the progressing breakdown of the family and the related family problems and emerging pathologies, resulting in social exclusion.”
“Social exclusion affects many areas of social life and many social groups,” spokesperson Agnieszka Gergont adds. “Several of the mayor’s initiatives that help counteract exclusion should be mentioned. These include establishing a homeless shelter in Bolesławiec, doubling the number of sociotherapy centers, creating new facilities for people with disabilities (the Rehabilitation Center and the Self-Help Center on Parkowa Street), building additional social housing and roads in the Kościuszki housing estate, providing social work for adult residents and children of the estate, and systematic cooperation with institutions and organizations working to support people in need (the Polish Red Cross and abstinence associations). The latest initiative is the construction of a social care home.”
The “Damy Radę” Association highlights and rewards all efforts to prevent exclusion and seeks to integrate diverse communities—not always in agreement about how assistance should be provided. The Association was harshly criticized by radical right-wing organizations. They claimed that the provisions proposed by “Damy Radę” activists in the amendment to the Act on Counteracting Domestic Violence were harmful to the family. They also protested against the message of the poster advertising the Association’s “Stop Domestic Violence” campaign (the poster showed a beaten woman with a child, with a raised male fist in the background and the words: “and that I will not leave you until death”). Defenders of Christian values claimed that the poster aimed to deprecate marriage as a sacramental union.
Helping people socially excluded is an exceptionally difficult task because it involves changing the way society functions and the established norms. That is why every form of assistance is so important.
Grażyna Hanaf