On this occasion, the Lesbian and Gay Federation Berlin-Brandenburg (LSVD) and the Foundation Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe will hold a commemoration ceremony at the Memorial to the Homosexuals Persecuted under the National Socialist Regime in Berlin-Tiergarten. The ceremony will start on January 27, at 11:30 a.m. Anja Kopfbinger, board member of the LSVD Berlin-Brandenburg, will give a speech. Numerous German MPs and members of the Berlin House of Representatives will be taking part in the occasion. At the end of the ceremony, there will be the opportunity to lay down flowers and wreaths.
Under the National Socialist regime, homosexuality was seen as a »perverted predisposition« (»widernatürliche Veranlagung«) for a »plague« (»Seuche«) that would hurt the German people (»Volkskörper«) and therefore had to be eradicated (»ausgerottet«). Shortly after the National Socialists’ coming into power, the gay and lesbian bars of Berlin were closed in March 1933. The entire infrastructure of the first German homosexual movement, bars, associations, publishing houses, and magazines were disintegrated, shattered, and destroyed. The fall of 1934 marked the beginning of the systematic persecution of homosexual men. More than 100,000 men were registered by the police, about 50,000 of them tried according to Paragraph 175. About 10,000 gay men were deported to concentration camps, humiliated with the »Rosa Winkel« (Pink Triangle), and tortured. Many of them were mistreated to death or murdered.
Memorial ceremony for the homosexuals persecuted under the National Socialist Regime
Thursday, January 27, 2011, 11:30 a.m.
Memorial to the Homosexuals Persecuted under the National Socialist Regime, Ebertstraße, near Hannah-Ahrendt-Straße, Berlin-Tiergarten
www.berlin.lsvd.de
