For non-Germans/Europeans
there was in some parts of Germany (for example in Prussia) before
1871 a paragraph of the penal code which criminalised sex between
two males. It was adopted throughout Germany as Paragraph 175
on the unification under the Prussian King in 1871. The scope
of what was punished was extended and punishments sharpened in
1935 as part of the Nazi population policy. C. M-S.
The following
is rather some of the more interesting things said than a real
report of the colloquium held in February 2000 on Homosexuals
under the Nazis, organised by the Heinrich Boell-Foundation
and the Pink Triangle Coalition.
 n
the evening of 16th June 1938 Erich Starke waited in
the room of his friend August Hünfeldt. Hünfeldts landlady had let
him in the room and said that Hünfeldt would be back soon. Herta
V (the landlady) locked Starke in the room and fetched the police,
who arrested Starke and took him to the police station on suspicion
of unnatural sexual acts. The landlady and her husband had been
watching for weeks through the window above the door Hünfeldt (and
Starke) having sex. ...
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The
slogan seen over the gates of every concentration camp: "Work
makes you free"
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Heinrich Erich Starke is one of the circa 3,500 men, who were condemned
during the Nazi period for same-sex activity. ... Starke was not
a prominent homosexual in the Weimar Republic.
After a three year prison sentence Starke was sent to the Neuengamme
concentration camp. He did not survive the nazi terror. The Neuengamme
records show he died on 20th June 1942. ...
Denunciation by members of the public were a considerable proportion
of the reasons why same-sex loving men fell into the hands of the
machinery of persecution.
(Stefan Micheler, who also spoke at the colloquium.)
In mid February to coincide with the European Premier of the film
Paragraph 175 the International Gay & Lesbian
Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC), the Pink Triangle Coalition and
Heinrich-Boell Foundation organised an international colloquium
on the theme homosexuals under the Nazis. Among the speakers from
the USA were Prof. James Steakley (Uni. of Winsconsin), Prof. W.J.
Blumenfeld (Uni. of Massachusetts) Rainer Hoffschildt (Hannover
Gay and Lesbian Archive), Allison Murchie (Imperial War Museum,
London), as well as Dr. Claudia Schoppmann and Dr. Günter Grau (Berlin).
Shimon Samuels (Simon-Wiesenthal Center, Paris) and Jack Gilbert
(World Congress of G-L-Bi Jewish Organisations, London) also spoke
to the meeting, but a special feature of the colloquium was the
presence of two of the victims of the Nazi persecution Pierre Seel
(France) and Gad Beck (Berlin) who answered questions.
Research & perspectives
Rainer Hoffschildt:
”After the liberation by the Allies the persecution of homosexuals
in Germany on the basis of the Nazi version of the Paragraph 175
continued. They were as in the past degraded as criminals and
not recognised as victims of the Nazi terror. There was no scientific
examination by historians of the persecution by the Nazis. Homosexuals
do not belong to the forgotten victims but to those deliberately
ignored. Only after the change of law in 1969 (which reduced the
severity, but still left man-man sex contacts punishable –
C.M-S..) and the rise of the gay movement in the federal republic
[1970’s – C.M-S] were attempts made to cope with this
shortcoming. ”
This deliberate neglect and the social taboos around the theme
made research, naturally much more difficult, and is one reason
why false numbers and too high figures for victims are quoted. The
work is arduous and slow. At first the records of the large
camps were dealt with, since then much valuable information has
been found in smaller camps and prisons. But many of these records
were destroyed before liberation or ”spirited” away to
Moscow in the period 1945 – 48.
Hoffschildt:
"It has become clear that even in the prisons there was
a horrifyingly high death rate (for homosexuals). What also makes
the research difficult is that as a prisoner was sent from prison
to prison to camp his papers sometimes no longer indicate his
status – why he was imprisoned. "
Erik N. Jensen in a contribution examining the interplay
of various identities ...
... "Unlike knowledge of Jewish persecution, which emerged
immediately after the liberation camps, as survivors talked and
wrote about their experiences and as communities mourned their
loss, knowledge of homosexuals did not, for the most part, emerge
until several decades after the end of the war. ... because so
few gay survivors have come forward to tell their stories, the
memory of gay and lesbian persecution exists partially in a vacuum
– a 'test-tube' memory ..."
... Unlike the collective memory of Jewish persecution, which
has achieved the broadest resonance within the German population
... the memory of gay and lesbian persecution remains embedded
in the gay and lesbian community itself and depends almost wholly
on gay and lesbian leaders for its perpetuation."
Dr. Thomas Rahe:
"If you take the permanent exhibitions of the German memorial
sites as an indicator then it becomes clear ... that "the homosexual
victims of the Nazis do not receive much attention. It is however,
possible to see a positive development (there) ... Whereas in
the exhibitions it is principally a case of documenting the information,
the symbolic remembrance outside the exhibition buildings, on
the sites of the former camps, is in contrast an ethical-political
assessment, and demands the public recognition of the status of
homosexuals as victims in a way similar to that of other victim-groups."
....
This may not only lead to conflict between the institutions and
homosexual organisations demanding the recognition of their victims,
but even to conflict with other groups of victims.
At the end of the two day colloquium during the strategy session
for the Pink Triangle Coalition (which has the two fold purpose
of collecting and spreading information about Nazi persecution of
gay men and lesbians, and ensuring the representation of these victims
in relation to the new funds which are being created) - a catalogue
of political demands on the basis of a Lesbian & Gay Association
of Germany (LSVD) suggestion was discussed – and extended.
The current demands now include:
"The participants of the International Colloquium
.... demand the rapid and complete legal rehabilitation of the
homosexual victims of the Nazi judicial system. We call upon the
German federal government and the German Bundestag (Lower House)
to take immediate action in this regard.
... In June 1998, the German Bundestag passed a “Law
to Annul Unjust Sentences Imposed During the National Socialist
Administration of Criminal Justice.”
"Two groups were excluded from the wholesale annulment
of unjust Nazi sentences: deserters and homosexuals. This gap
in the Nazi Annulment Law must now finally be closed. The sentences
imposed on homosexual victims by the Nazi judiciary pursuant to
§§ 175 and 175a, No. 4, RStGB (Reich Criminal Code) must likewise
be officially set aside in a wholesale manner.
... We call upon the Bundestag, the German government,
and the other German states to support those initiatives and translate
them into action. Those who refuse to do this are perpetuating
injustice."
Paragraph 175 retained validity, in its exact 1935 version,
... until 1969. As such, even following the end of the Nazi dictatorship,
it has gravely affected perspectives of the lives of homosexuals.
We demand that the German Bundestag apologise for this
injustice and gives collective reparation, e.g. by the restoration
of a Magnus Hirschfeld Institute on Sex Research in Berlin. We
demand individual rehabilitation and compensation for all victims,
anyway, if the injustice was sustained before or after 1945."
Colin de la Motte-Sherman
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