Berlin was a liberal hotbed of homosexuality and a mecca for cross dressers and transsexuals where the first male-to-female surgery was performed - until the Nazis came to power, new book reveals (2014)

Daily Mail ^ | 11-25-2014 | CAROLINE HOWE

[dynachrome]

Think Liza Minnelli and Joel Gray in Carberet. Think West Hollywood, Greenwich Village and Provincetown and the Castro, known as hotbeds of homosexuality.

But they are nothing like the uninhibited urban gay sexual scene and vast homosexual subculture that flourished in Berliin under Germany's Weimar Republic.

Sexual experimentation between the same sexes and medical advances of helping genders ‘trapped within the wrong body’ in Germany more than one hundred years ago shaped our understanding of gay identity today.

The city's liberal years - before the rise of Hitler - are detailed in a new book, Gay Berlin.

The science of ‘transsexuality’ was founded in Berlin at the Institute of Sexual Science where the first male-to-female surgery was performed. The words ‘homosexual’ or ‘transvestite’ were German innovations. Male prostitution, homosexual bars and nightclubs, cabarets populated by gay men, lesbians and transsexuals flourished in a wild, incomparable sexual subculture that was exciting yet dangerous.

It was in Berlin where scientists concluded that ‘same sex love was a natural, inborn characteristic and not merely the perversion of a ‘normal’ sexual tendency’, author and scholar Robert Beachy writes in his compelling book, Gay Berlin: Birthplace of a Modern Identity by Knopf Publishers.

[PeterPrinciple]

I respect your point of view. I just don’t think it’s the state’s business. And enforcement is nigh unto impossible anyway.

---

Interesting that everyone thinks the only way to control or not control is through govt.

There are other options.

[jmacusa]

The South was the architect of it’s own destruction.

[DiogenesLamp]

He was a fascist thug and no one on this earth is going to convince me other wise.

Isn't fascism a sort of collusion between powerful corporate interests and government power?

[dfwgator]

Most of Europe was Authoritarian even before Hitler came to power, Franco wasn’t an outlier. And he did save Spain. Mainly because had the Republicans won the Civil War, Hitler may very well have invaded and occupied Spain. Franco kept Hitler away from that by throwing him a bone or two.

[NorthMountain]

Well ...

you could put a bumper sticker on your car:

Blue background, yellow lettering GAY = DEATH ... you know, mimic the blue/yellow “equals sign” sticker.

Illegal or not, sodomy should be unthinkable.

[DiogenesLamp]

Sodomy should be illegal.

It was for most of this nation's existence. It wasn't until the 1960s that this started to change. In the 1950s, you could be locked up for Sodomy. Most would get sent to an asylum.

[dfwgator]

Germany was having trouble, what a sad, sad story
Needed a new leader to restore its former glory
Where, Oh where was he? Where could that man be?
We looked around and then we found
The man for you and me.
And now it’s...........

[NorthMountain]

Indeed.

[dfwgator]

Yes, eventually all “fascists” kissed up to Hitler. One of the more tragic cases of this was Oswald Mosley in Britain, who eventually fell under Hitler’s spell, and allowed the BUF to turn anti-semitic, while it didn’t necessarily start out that way.

[DiogenesLamp]

And while we are on the topic, I ran across this idea which I consider rather interesting.

This was posted on the Instapundit open thread last night.

[dfwgator]

I just watched “Downfall”. Fantastic movie.

It is. I couldn't bear to watch the scene with the Goebbels children though, they couldn't help who their parents were.

[jmacusa]

I'll never forget when many years when ago I began to explore the history of Wiemar Germany and what a hotbed of depravity Berlin was I was stunned. Jazz music had taken it by storm.

Drug use was rampant, clubs catering to transvestites and homosexuals, child sex trafficking,, prostitution (which was legal until 1927) pornography the likes of which defied description.

Thousands of Berlin girls worshiped dancer Anita Berber who often performed nude. The place was a veritable madhouse.

[NorthMountain]

Well, now.

That’s a very interesting hypothesis, and fairly easy to test.

Treat with ivermectin any gay guy who wants to get out of “the lifestyle”. Can’t hurt him.

[DiogenesLamp]

"glöckl" means "festival"? I tried looking it up before and I couldn't find anything.

Thanks.

[DiogenesLamp]

The South was the architect of it’s own destruction.

Yes, it should have got out in 1787. It was foolishly naive regarding what the power houses of the North had in for it.

[NorthMountain]

pornography the likes of which defied description.

Ewetewb has many videos in which "actresses" from "the industry" are interviewed and describe some of the things they did, in front of a camera, in exchange for pay. It ain't just ordinary penetration, a lot of the stuff they describe is so disgusting as to beggar belief ...

[NorthMountain]

I’m sort of guessing, here.

“Glück” is “happiness”, so I’m riffing on that.

[DiogenesLamp]

That’s a very interesting hypothesis, and fairly easy to test.

Treat with ivermectin any gay guy who wants to get out of “the lifestyle”. Can’t hurt him.

That's what I was thinking. It seems like this is within the realm of possibility for someone to test this theory.

I don't know any "gay" people. If I did, I would make a point to stay away from them.

But perhaps someone out there who knows some could suggest the idea to them.

[windsorknot]

the scene with the Goebbels children< /i>

It was hard to watch. So tragic that children were sacrificed because their parents followed a lost cause.

[jmacusa]

“Gluck’’ can either mean ‘’happiness’’ or ‘’luck’’ in German.