First gay rights movement: Berlin's wild 1920s queer history
Key takeaways
- Before the Nazis took power, Berlin was a center of LGBTQ+ rights and queer culture, with research institutes, a flourishing nightlife and one of the earliest gay rights' movements.
- In 1871, Germany introduced Paragraph 175, which criminalized sexual acts between men.
- The law's initial implementation caused pushback from activists, doctors and writers, among others, leading to one of the earliest visible gay rights movements in Europe.
Why this matters: an international story with cross-border implications worth tracking.
Before the Nazis took power, Berlin was a center of LGBTQ+ rights and queer culture, with research institutes, a flourishing nightlife and one of the earliest gay rights' movements.
https://p.dw.com/p/5Bs Ia Queer clubs like Eldorado were well-established venues in Weimar-era Berlin Image: Leemage/IMAGOAdvertisement Today, Berlin is largely seen as one of the world's most queer-friendly cities — and that was also the case roughly a century ago, before the National Socialists took power in the early 1930s.
In the 1920s, during the era known as the Weimar Republic in Germany, Berlin became not only a haven for queer nightlife but also one of the world's most important centers for early LGBTQ+ research, activism and community building, helping to shape modern thought about sexuality and gender.