How the Nazis stroyed the first gay rights movement

Contents:

• THE COMMUNIST PARTY’S GAY PROPAGANDA
• 15 YEARS - PROPAGANDA GAY PARTY
• RSIA PASS LAW BANNG GAY 'PROPAGANDA'
• RSIAN LAWMAKERS MOVE TO TOUGHEN ‘GAY PROPAGANDA’ LAW, BANNG ALL ADULTS OM ‘PROMOTG’ SAME-SEX RELATNSHIPS
• GAY BERL
• RSIA PROPOS NEW “GAY PROPAGANDA” LAW
• WHAT TO KNOW ABOUT RSIA’S SO-CALLED ‘GAY PROPAGANDA’ BILL
• LGBTQ+ BERL – THE CY’S BT GAY BARS, CLUBS AND SNAS

THE COMMUNIST PARTY’S GAY PROPAGANDA

GAY. In Rsia, the topic of homosexualy is the news nearly every day at the moment. “Gay propaganda” is now an offense punishable by arrt and imprisonment.

Gay men have been murred for their activism.

15 YEARS - PROPAGANDA GAY PARTY

Last month, Rsian Orthodox Church’s Patriarch said that gay marriage Rsia uld spark a lolized apolypse.

And jt today, The Interpreter published a translatn of a news story about a journalist (and her iends, and hband) beg beaten a Mosw Bar for appearg homosexual, while thori looked on or refed to vtigate. Four Dutch gay rights activists have already been arrted unr this new law, sparkg even more ncerns the ternatnal muny that is set to send wav of athlet and tourists to Rsia.

Ivan Savve (Twter), a blogger at Out There Magaze, has sent his re-imagg of the patg light of Rsia recent crack-down on homosexuals and those who support LGBT rights.

RSIA PASS LAW BANNG GAY 'PROPAGANDA'

But would apply exclively to two gay men kissg or, as is the se pot here, two Communist lears sharg raly affectn? This is as much about ntemporary visual culture as is about ntemporary right-wg homophobic extremism perpetrated by the Rsian state.

RSIAN LAWMAKERS MOVE TO TOUGHEN ‘GAY PROPAGANDA’ LAW, BANNG ALL ADULTS OM ‘PROMOTG’ SAME-SEX RELATNSHIPS

As a gay man om Rsia, who happens to be an art historian and a b of a cultural & polil mentator, I fd this se to be particularly problematic, yet que a fertile ground for analysis. In 2017, Germany’s Cabet approved a bill that would expunge the nvictns of tens of thoands of German men for “homosexual acts” unr that untry’s anti-gay law known as “Paragraph 175.

That was jt before the Nazis me to power, magnified the anti-gay law, then sought to annihilate gay and transgenr Europeans. In the 1920s, Berl had nearly 100 gay and lbian bars or f.

GAY BERL

Vienna had about a dozen gay f, clubs and bookstor. In Paris, certa quarters were renowned for open displays of gay and trans nightlife.

Even Florence, Italy, had s own gay district, as did many smaller European ci. Films began pictg sympathetic gay characters. And media entreprenrs realized there was a middle-class gay and trans rearship to whom they uld ter.

Partly drivg this new era of tolerance were the doctors and scientists who started lookg at homosexualy and “transvtism” (a word of that era that enpassed transgenr people) as a natural characteristic wh which some were born, and not a “rangement. On the other hand, the greater “out-ns” of gay and trans people provoked their opponents.

RSIA PROPOS NEW “GAY PROPAGANDA” LAW

” The Berl police gmbled that magaz aimed at gay men – which they lled “obscene prs materials” – were proliferatg. A Parisian town uncilor 1933 lled “a moral crisis” that gay people, known as “verts” at that time, uld be seen public. Gay and trans people were an obv target.

When Nazi lear Adolph Hler need to jtify arrtg and murrg former polil alli 1934, he said they were gay.

This fanned anti-gay zealotry by the Gtapo, which opened a special anti-gay branch. Durg the followg year alone, the Gtapo arrted more than 8, 500 gay men, que possibly g a list of nam and addrs seized at the Instute for Sexual Rearch.

WHAT TO KNOW ABOUT RSIA’S SO-CALLED ‘GAY PROPAGANDA’ BILL

In Vienna, hled every gay man on police lists and qutned them, tryg to get them to name others. Italy, wh a fascist regime obssed wh virily, sent at least 300 gay men to btal mps durg the war perd, clarg them “dangero for the tegry of the race. Still, if they had been proment members of the gay and trans muny before the fascists me to power, as Berl lbian club owner Lotte Hahm was, was too late to hi.

In those mps, gay men were marked wh a pk triangle.

” One gay man attributed his survival to swappg his pk triangle for a red one – ditg he was merely a Communist.

LGBTQ+ BERL – THE CY’S BT GAY BARS, CLUBS AND SNAS

In 1929, Germany me close to erasg s anti-gay law, only to see strengthened soon thereafter.

(They really look like a happy gay fay).