June 11



USA//TEXAS:

Gay persecution subject of new Holocaust exhibit -- As Houstonians
celebrate Pride 2004, museum unveils exhibit about homosexuals living
under Hitler's Third Reich


They were only numerals, three of them, but the very mention of 175 could
instill fear in the hearts of gays living in Nazi Germany.

Paragraph 175 of the German Criminal Code was all the authorities needed
to detain homosexuals, throw them in prison, send them to concentration
camps, conduct medical experiments on them and even kill them.

A new exhibit that opens today at the Holocaust Museum Houston offers a
glimpse into what life was like for gay men in Adolf Hitler's Third Reich.

The story of homosexuals in Nazi Germany is told through photos and
through the words of survivors like Harry Pauly:

"When the Nazis came to power, they closed the gay bars," he recalled.
"Some homosexuals, especially those who were Jewish, were killed by Nazi
hooligans; my friend 'Susi,' a drag queen, was stabbed to death."

Collin Keel, director of changing exhibits at the museum, said Paragraph
175 was already in force when the Nazis, under Adolf Hitler, strengthened
it in an effort to eradicate gays along with others considered to be
counter to the goal of creating a master Aryan race.

The Nazis considered homosexuals to carry a "contagious degeneracy" that
threatened the New World Order they were building.

"The Nazis rewrote 175 in 1935 when the persecution began," he said.

Prior to that time, Keel said, homosexuals thrived in Germany's larger
cities, frequenting gay nightclubs and living more openly than they dared
after the codes revision.

The story of Richard Grune, whose artwork is a visual representation of
the persecution of homosexuals, is also recounted in the exhibit. He was
arrested in 1934 and imprisoned for being a homosexual.

After his release, he was arrested again and sent to Sachsenhausen
concentration camp. Transferred to another camp in 1940, he managed to
escape shortly before liberation.

One-third of gays arrested

Of the estimated 350,000 gay men and lesbians living in Germany during
World War II, Keel said, about 100,000 were arrested for being homosexual.

Thousands died in captivity either through forced labor programs that were
so intense and debilitating they led to death or though the Nazis systemic
campaign to eliminate those considered undesirable.

Though most who died were gay men, Keel said, five women were known to
have died in captivity because they were identified as lesbians. One of
them was Henny Schermann.

Schermann, a 24-year-old Jewish shop girl living in Frankfurt, was
arrested in 1940 and deported to the Ravensbrueck concentration camp for
women.

Written on the back of her prisoner identification are these words: "Jenny
(sic) Sara Schermann, born February 19, 1912, Frankfurt am Main. Unmarried
shopgirl in Frankfurt am Main. Licentious lesbian, only visited such
[lesbian] bars. Avoided the name 'Sara.' Stateless Jew."

She was gassed at Bernberg in 1942.

For the most part, Keel said, the Nazis didnt pay much attention to
lesbians. In a state that glorified blue-eyed, blond-haired, muscled men,
women didn't matter.

When the concentration camps were liberated at the end of World War II,
Keel said, there was no liberation for homosexuals. Paragraph 175 remained
in force.

No liberation for homosexuals

"At the liberation in 1945, the homosexuals remained in prison to serve
out their terms," Keel said. "They weren't given any reparations for what
they had been through."

It wasn't until 1995, 40 years after the wars end, that homosexuals
murdered by the Nazis were recognized.

"On the 40th anniversary, a monument was set up in Germany for homosexual
victims of the Holocaust," Keel said. "In 2002, the German parliament
pardoned all homosexuals."

With a hint of sarcasm in his voice, Keel added, "It only took 60 years."

The exhibit in Houston is on loan from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum
in Washington, D.C. "We've never done an exhibit about this topic," Keel
said.

Musuem organizers are encouraging Houston gays to see the exhibit for an
alarming look at the terror homosexuals in Germany experienced at the
hands of right-wing fanatics.

"Homosexuals have long been targets of systematic hatred and
discrimination. These images and the stories they tell document a horrible
time in the history of mankind and remind us that prejudice still exists
in both subtle and overt ways even today," said Coy Tow, executive
director of the Greater Houston GLBT Chamber of Commerce.

(source: Houston Voice)