About us

The mission of the Basta Foundation is to support the development of democracy and civil society, supporting LGBT+ people in their efforts for an equal society. 

We are the only organisation in Poland that conducts watchdog activities in the Polish media against the homophobic and transphobic hate speech on an ongoing basis. We are using innovative tools – both in monitoring and communication of the issues (heavy use of video, targeted social media etc.). Even with weak structure and virtually no budget we already have some initial successes in communicating our activities. We have our own legal and fact-checking support. Every day we have more and more data on homophobic hate speech in Poland and this will only grow. 

The Foundation’s priority tasks include:

• Media monitoring

Using the new entitlements resulting from the amendment of the Broadcasting Act, we want to counteract the homophobic hate speech that has dominated the public debate in recent years. In doing so, we aim to raise the level of public debate and secure the rights of LGBT+ people.  At this point we have reported nearly a dozen homophobic broadcasts and programmes. With each notification we send a press release to the media and publish the information on our website and our social media. Tier 1 media in Poland such as Gazeta Wyborcza, TOK FM and Newsweek Polska cover our activities.

• Supporting development of  LGBT+ activists

We support the development of non-governmental organizations and coalitions working for equality. We also want to give tools to professionalize LGBT+ activists so that they can effectively fight for the rights of the whole community.

The Foundation also works to report and monitor cases of Strategic lawsuits against public participation (so-called SLAPPs).

In its activities the Basta Foundation:

• is independent of state and political institutions
• does not replace the state and local authorities in performing their basic duties

The Foundation also carries out its own projects: it conducts social campaigns and advocacy activities, monitors the functioning of public institutions, organises conferences and debates, workshops and meetings, and issues publications.

The Foundation’s Council includes Renata Kim, a journalist for Polish Newsweek and an ally of LGBT people, Julia Maciocha, president of the Warsaw Equality Parade, Albert Judycki and Jacek Malarski, owners of the Warsaw chain of “Lukullus” patisseries, and lawyer Jakub Szymik.