In Nazi Germany, transgender people were prosecuted, barred from public life, forciblydetransitioned, and imprisoned and killed inconcentration camps. Though some factors, such as whether they were considered "Aryan", heterosexual with regard to their birth sex, or capable of useful work had the potential to mitigate their circumstances, transgender people were largely stripped of legal status by the Nazi state.
Under theGerman Empire (from 1871 to 1918) andWeimar Germany (from 1918 to 1933), laws such asParagraph 183 existed which were used to prosecute transgender individuals. These laws were inconsistently enforced, often leaving transgender people vulnerable to the arbitrary decisions of individual police officers. In 1908, thanks to the advocacy ofMagnus Hirschfeld, Germany instituted the ability for transgender people to obtaintransvestite passes, which shielded them from legal consequences for being publicly transgender. From the end ofWorld War I until 1933, transgender people enjoyed previously unprecedented freedoms and rights. Large leaps were made intransgender medicine through theInstitute for Sexual Science, and transgender culture flourished inBerlin.
Following the1932 Prussian coup d'état and the Nazi seizure of power in 1933, transgender movements, gathering places and institutions, such as thefirst homosexual movement, theEldorado nightclubs, and theInstitute for Sexual Science were dissolved, often by force. Bothtrans men andtrans women were targeted under renewed enforcement of Paragraphs175 and 183, and their transvestite passes were revoked or ignored. Books and texts relating to transgenderexperiences ormedicine were destroyed as "un-German".
Transgender people were imprisoned and murdered inconcentration camps, though the exact number killed is unknown. According to theMuseum of Jewish Heritage, the German government "brutally targeted the trans community, deporting many trans people to concentration camps and wiping out vibrant community structures."
The termtransgender, anEnglish-Germancognate, was not coined until 1965 and not widely accepted as a universal term until the 1990s.[1] The German wordtranssexualismus (lit. 'transsexualism', adapted into English as the termtranssexual) was first coined in 1923 byMagnus Hirschfeld, but would not enter widespread use until 30 years later with the work ofHarry Benjamin.[2][3] Before these terms, in German the termtransvestit (lit. 'transvestite',masculine) was used to refer totransfeminine individuals, and the termtransvestitin (lit. 'transvestite',feminine) was used to refer totransmasculine individuals.[4] In part because no alternative term was widespread, mostWestern transgender people of this time period self-identified as "transvestites".[5][6][7] Modern literature on the subject largely uses the term "transgender" to refer to these individuals as a more accurate description of their gender identity.[8][7] According toJoanne Meyerowitz and other scholars of the topic, it is difficult if not outright impossible to know what pronouns transgender or transvestite people in these times would have preferred, and as such it is common practice to simply use the pronouns which align with what is known of theirgender presentation (i.e., he/him for individuals who present masculine, and she/her for individuals who present feminine).[4][9]
In theWeimar Republic, the government which ruled Germany from the end ofWorld War I in 1918 untilAdolf Hitler seized power in 1933, transgender people gained rights and freedoms unprecedented in Europe at the time, and much early progress was made intransgender medicine.[10][11] The key figure in these advancements wasJewish-Germanphysician andsexologistMagnus Hirschfeld, who founded both theScientific-Humanitarian Committee in 1897—the main organization devoted to thedecriminalization of homosexuality—and theInstitut für Sexualwissenschaft (Institute for Sexual Science) in 1919.[12][13][14] Other notable transgender rights activists of the period includeFriedrich Radszuweit, a publisher and author who founded theBund für Menschenrecht (Federation for Human Rights) to advocate for gay and transgender rights in 1920, andMax Spohr, a publisher among the first to print LGBT media.[15]
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Under theGerman Empire before World War I, there was no law which explicitly outlawed being transgender, unlike howParagraph 175 explicitly outlawed male-male homosexuality.[16]Paragraph 183 outlawed public crossdressing, which along with Paragraph 360 (apublic nuisance law) was sometimes used against transgender people; however, these laws could only be applied if a public nuisance was determined to have occurred.[16] Additionally, in practice these laws could not be applied to transgender people who were able topass as their preferred gender.[16] These qualities often led to uneven enforcement of the laws, and openly transgender or gender-queer people in Germany lived under constant threat of legal charges at the whim of individual police officers.[16][17][18] In 1908, Hirschfeld discussed the matter with theBerlin Police, and convinced them to allow transgender people to obtaintransvestite passes to avoid legal consequences for cross-dressing, one of the earliest known examples oflegal recognition for transgender people.[19][20][21]
In large part due to the less restrictive laws and LGBT-friendly culture of 1920s Berlin, known as the 'Golden Years',[22][23][24] transgender culture began to flourish in the city, and Berlin became known as the queer capital of the world.[23][24] In 1930, the world's first transgender magazine,Das 3. Geschlecht (The Third Gender), was published byFriedrich Radszuweit's publishing company in Berlin, as wasDie Freundin (The Girlfriend), a lesbian magazine which would often publish articles for transgender women.[22][25] In response to the advocacy of Hirschfeld and others of the first homosexual movement, theWeimar Republic even went so far as to permit legal name changes for transgender people.[26]
Berlin was also notable in this period for its queer nightlife and transvestite cabaret clubs, the most recognized of which were theEldorado clubs, but less famous venues such as theMikado were also popular places to watch transgender performers.[27] Eldorado was the name of at least five known clubs in Berlin which featured transgender performers, and were a popular gathering spot forBerlin's LGBT community, though heterosexual patrons were also welcome and common.[28] The first of these clubs was opened in March 1924 by Ludwig Konjetschni, who went on to own three locations under the Eldorado name, at least two of which are known to have catered to gay audiences specifically.[28] The Eldorado clubs were noted worldwide and drew international tourism to the city.[22] Though the clubs were heavily concentrated in Berlin, other similar clubs featuring transgender performers are known to have existed in most major German cities during this period:
In addition to more widespread cultural acceptance, Berlin also became a hotbed for research intotransgender medicine. TheInstitute for Sexual Science, located in Berlin, performed some of the first academic studies of transgender medicine,[31] and is credited with performing some of the firstgender affirming care, includinghormone replacement therapy.Ludwig Levy-Lenz,Erwin Gohrbandt and other surgeons associated with the Institute performedgender affirming surgery, including early versions offacial feminization surgery andsex reassignment surgery on trans women, as well asfacial masculinization surgery,chest masculinization surgery, andhysterectomy andoophorectomy on trans men.[32][33][34][35][36]Dora Richter, the firsttransgender woman known to have received sex reassignment surgery, received it through the Institute, as didLili Elbe,Toni Ebel,Gerd Katter and many other notable transgender people of this period.[37][38][2] Levy-Lenz is quoted as saying of his time at the Institute, "Never have I operated upon more grateful patients."[39]
The Institute collected extensive data on the transgender condition through interviews, surveys andclinical studies, and its research was some of the first to differentiategender identity fromsexual orientation.[40] In his research for the Institute, Hirschfeld referred to transgender people as "total transvestites" or "extreme transvestites" as early as the 1920s, notably differentiating them fromcrossdressers, as well as stating his belief that there naturally existed people who had "characteristics thatdid not fit into heterosexual or binary categories".[35][41][42] The Institute was also one of the only employers who would hire openly transgender people, and would often hire transgender people in need of work asreceptionists ormaids; bothToni Ebel andDora Richter found employment with the Institute in this way.[8]
The homosexual movement and Institute for Sexual Science were frequent targets of conservatives such as theNazi Party and bothCatholic andProtestant churches, which accused the movements of "degeneracy", going againstfamily values and promoting "un-German" ideas.[40][43] A particular target of conservative ire were LGBT publications and magazines, which were grouped withpornographic magazines as "filth literature".[44] Laws such as the 1926 Harmful Publications Act were pushed through by conservative movements to attempt to limit or regulate the contents of these publications.[44]
Hirschfeld himself was also targeted both politically and in the press.[45] After being physically attacked and beaten in Munich in 1921, a nationalist newspaper article celebrated, threatening that "the next time his skull might be crushed."[45] In 1929,Der Stürmer depicted him in a cartoon byPhilipp Rupprecht and attacked him for his ideas on sex, as well as his sexuality and Jewish background.[45]
The beginning of the end for the Golden Years of Berlin occurred on 20 July 1932, whenFranz von Papen orchestrated the1932 Prussian coup d'état and took control of theFree State of Prussia asReich Commissioner. Berlin was located in Prussia, and Papen, aconservativeCatholic, began more strictly enforcingParagraph 175 and other anti-homosexuality and anti-transvestitism laws in the region.[46] Papen's government attempted to shut down presses printing "filth literature" altogether, though the courts were unwilling to cooperate with any attempted convictions, and the effort to shut down the publications was temporarily halted.[47]
On 30 January 1933,Adolf Hitler, the leader of the Nazi Party, came to power asChancellor of Germany. His government cracked down on gay and trans movements within Germany. On 6 May 1933, a group of students belonging to theNational Socialist German Students' League, accompanied by abrass band, marched to theInstitut für Sexualwissenschaft.[48] After failing to find Hirschfeld,[48] who was abroad,[49] the students proceeded to shout"Brenne Hirschfeld!" ("Burn Hirschfeld!") while ransacking and vandalizing the Institute, tearing pictures from the walls, pouring inkwells onto carpets, and destroying exhibitions while the band played outside.[50][48] Some students posed for propaganda photos amidst the destruction.[48] That afternoon, theSturmabteilung (SA) arrived and systematically confiscated the Institute's materials, including thousands of books and documents from its library and archive.[49] The only documents spared were the thousands of medical questionnaires collected by Hirschfeld, either because the Institute's staff managed to convince the SA that the documents were simple medical profiles, or because there were physically too many to carry out of the Institute.[51]Dora Richter was long believed to have been murdered in the attack[40][52][53] until a paper trail of her life after 1933 was unearthed.[54]
The Institute was closed, and would never reopen.[50] Four days later, on 10 May 1933, as many as 25,000 of the Institute's books, many of which contained unique insights into transgender history and medicine,were burned in nearbyOpernplatz Square.[55][56][57][48][58] Hirschfeld remained in exile inFrance until his death in 1935 rather than return to face persecution as a gay, Jewish man.[59][60] His image would be subsequently widely reproduced for use inNazi propaganda, citing him as a prototypical Jew.[35][61] Following the closure of the Institute, some of its staff, such asLudwig Levy-Lenz (who was also Jewish), fled Germany.[35] However, a few of the Institute's former personnel, includingErwin Gohrbandt, collaborated with the Nazi regime.[35] Joining theLuftwaffe as a medical advisor, he later contributed tohuman experimentation in theDachau concentration camp,[35] where transgender people like the ones he once treated are known to have been imprisoned and murdered.[62][63]
Generally, Nazi ideology considered transgender,non-binary or othergender-non conforming identities as mental illnesses which could (and should) be cured.[64][7] One goal of the Nazi government was to restore and enforce traditional conservativegender roles within German society compared to the more open Weimar Germany, which meant suppressing transgender identities as well as gender non-conforming ones such asbutch lesbians andeffeminate gay men.[64] Within the legal system, transvestism or having a transgender identity was often considered anaggravating factor in a homosexuality case, causing transgender women to face even harsher sentences than if they had been considered homosexual men, though transgender people could face persecution even if Nazi authorities did not consider them to be homosexual.[18][65]
Though transgender women in Nazi Germany were treated as crossdressing men under the law and by law enforcement, and were often arrested tried under the sameParagraph 175 as homosexual men,[66][67]Laurie Marhoefer notes that "Nazi officials did not simply think trans women were gay men."[18] Bodie Ashton, a professor ofGerman andLGBT history at theUniversity of Erfurt, has called the Nazi government's understanding of transgender people "broadly inconsistent", and says that the Nazi government generally did not make attempts to understand transgender individuals beyond base assumptions about them.[65]
On 10 October 1936, theReichszentrale zur Bekämpfung der Homosexualität und der Abtreibung (Reich Central Office for the Combating of Homosexuality and Abortion) was created by decree ofHeinrich Himmler to establish guidelines on prosecuting homosexuality, and coordinating the prosecution of transgender people was generally also considered within its jurisdiction.[7] Specifically, the Reich Central Office for the Combating of Homosexuality and Abortion was designated responsible by the Nazi government for "collaborating in the design of the security police's treatment of sexual degenerates", such as "transvestites, fetishists, and others." However, theGestapo's homosexuality department retained some authority on the area of transgender people as well.[7]
According to theMuseum of Jewish Heritage, the Nazi government "brutally targeted the trans community, deporting many trans people to concentration camps and wiping out vibrant community structures."[68] Transgender people (in particularmale-to-female individuals) were often persecuted under the sameParagraph 175 widely used to target homosexuals, although there exist known instances of individuals being charged underParagraph 183 alone, a public indecency law which was used as prohibition ofcross-dressing.[69][70] The Nazi government shut down several magazines published by transgender people, though some such asDas 3. Geschlecht had already ceased by 1933 followingFriedrich Radszuweit's death in March 1932.[18] Undervon Papen's orders, in the summer of 1932, a series of raids had been carried out against gay, lesbian and transgender bars, and it was announced that these places would no longer be able to acquiredance permits.[71] By early 1933, theEldorado nightclubs are believed to have all shut down.[72][73] Under Nazi rule, the vast majority oftransvestite passes given to transgender people under Weimar rule were revoked, or in many cases simply ignored by the police.[18]
Race played a role in how transgender people were treated under the Nazi regime. According to historian Zavier Nunn, trans people could be spared the worst of the Nazis' violence if they were considered Aryan and not considered homosexual (i.e., they were exclusively attracted to the opposite of thesex assigned to them at birth).[74] Furthermore, their circumstances could be mitigated if they were capable of useful work.[74] Nunn provides a particular case study of atransgender lesbian known as R., who the Nazis considered to be Aryan, non-homosexual and a good worker, who was arrested in 1938 but released after two years in prison on the assumption that she woulddetransition.[18][75] R. reneged, continuing her non-conformist behaviors, and in 1941 re-arrested.[75] On 10 November 1941, R. was transferred to theBerlin-Wittenau Medical Center to undergoconversion therapy so she could "become a functioning member of theVolksgemeinschaft".[76] She remained in Wittenau until her death by suspected suicide on 12 March 1943.[77]
Due in part to the inherent difficulty in identifying transgender people who canpass as their preferred gender, as well as identifying gender non-conforming people who may conform when in public, the Nazi government relied heavily on reporting by private citizens (often neighbors) to persecute transgender people.[66][78][67] A widespread belief in Germany at this time held that transgender people were inherently deceitful, as they lived their lives "in disguise", which motivated some Germans to denounce them to the Nazi government.[79] During theFirst World War, this belief was so ubiquitous that transgender organizations urged members to wear clothes associated with their birth sex for the sake of their personal safety.[66] However, many Germans were simply motivated to denounce queer and transgender people due to their personal belief in Nazi ideology and desire to make the idealized Nazi state a reality.[80]
Many transgender people were imprisoned and murdered inNazi concentration camps, though it is unknown exactly how many were killed or died as a result of their mistreatment.[81][82] As straight transgender women were viewed by the Nazis as a subset or variation of homosexual men—a sexuality whose manifestations in Germany the Nazis aimed to completely suppress—they were particularly targeted. Even in cases where transgender individuals were not killed or imprisoned in concentration camps, they were, with few exceptions, barred from being transgender in public life, and there is at least one recorded case of a transgender German being driven to suicide due to their forceddetransition.[18] Individual precincts and districts are also known to have taken specific action against transgender people. For example, on 11 November 1933, the city ofHamburg ordered its police department to "observe the transvestites in particular, and as required to send them to concentration camps".[83][18]
According to historianLaurie Marhoefer "the Nazi state reserved its worst violence for trans women."[18] A gay prisoner and survivor of theLichtenburg concentration camp named Kurt von Ruffin recalled that camp officials often treated trans people with particular contempt.[63] Incoming transgender women to the camp would be "stripped out of their women's clothes and then humiliated, insulted and beaten."[63] Ruffin recalled hearing of one occasion where a transgender woman was forced to undress, then had her head forcibly shoved into a dirty latrine until she drowned.[63]
Lucy Salani was the only known Italian transgender person known to have survived imprisonment in the concentration camps, including theDachau concentration camp. She died in 2023.[62][84][85] At least oneAustrian trans woman, referred to as Bella P., is known to have been imprisoned in a concentration camp after a sentence under a law targeting "unnatural fornication".[86] Another trans woman, known only as "H. Bode" is known to have been killed in theBuchenwald Concentration Camp.[73]
In one notable example, German transgender woman and sex workerLiddy Bacroff submitted a request for a 'voluntary' castration on 4 April 1938, following an arrest for crossdressing and being on a date at a restaurant with a man.[65][87] A repeat violator of German anti-homosexuality and anti-prostitution laws, includingParagraph 175, Bacroff requested "to be cured of my sick passion which has led me onto the path of prostitution".[87] She was examined by Wilhelm Reuss, a medical examiner from the Hamburg Health Department, who concluded that "H.[b] is a transvestite to his [sic] core. Accordingly his [sic] entire habitus is feminine and infantile, the voice eunuchoid".[65] He further speculated that castration would only embolden Barcroff, as she was never thepenetrating partner in her sex work.[65] Reuss's report was effectively a death sentence.[87][65] Bacroff was subsequently remanded to prison, and in late 1942, transferred to theMauthausen concentration camp, where she was killed on 6 January 1943.[87][88][65]
Transgender men are also known to have been targeted in Nazi Germany, though their treatment differed in some regards from transgender women, and some were even able to continue their lives publicly. One trans man, known by the masculine nicknames"Kleener"[c] and"Dicker",[d] was arrested for crossdressing in August 1940, but was released after promisingto wear women's clothing in public.[89] A postal worker known as Gerd W., who was a transgender man, petitioned in 1940 to have his transvestite pass restored after unhappily attempting to live as a woman. Although his pass was not restored, he was given permission to dress as a man so long as he did not have sexual relations with women.[90] Another transgender man, Gerd Kubbe, had his transvestite pass revoked in 1933. He was arrested in January 1938 for crossdressing into "protective custody" on the orders ofReinhard Heydrich and imprisoned at theLichtenburg concentration camp.[91][7] However, in October 1938, he too was released, his transvestite pass restored, even granted special permission from theGestapo to continue wearing men's clothes and use a masculine name, though he was barred from using public restrooms or baths while wearing men's clothing.[91][18]
There exist many open questions about the imprisonment of transgender people inNazi concentration camps. It is unknown, for example, exactly how many transgender people were killed in the concentration camps.[92] Some records pertaining to the transgender people sent to the concentration camps are vague and open ended. In the case of German trans woman and club proprietor Toni Simon, her file's final document calls her a "danger to youth" and recommends sending her to a concentration camp as "absolutely necessary", without any further information on her fate.[18][73] Fritz Kitzing, an individual who wasassigned male at birth but presented as both female and male at different points in their life, was denounced by one of their neighbors in 1935 as transgender and was imprisoned without trial inLichtenburg and laterSachsenhausen after being labeled "a transvestite of the worst kind" by theGestapo.[93] They were briefly released in 1938, but were rearrested on a charge of "atrocity propaganda" for sending a letter detailing their experiences in the concentration camps to a friend inLondon, after which no further records of them are known to exist.[94]
"Transgender" became widely recognized as an identity beginning only in the late 20th century, and the fight forlegal recognition and rights for transgender people is anongoing movement.[95] In 2023, historianLaurie Marhoefer noted, "Up until the past few years, there had been little research on trans people under the Nazi regime."[73] It was not until the 2010s and 2020s that transgender people began to be recognized asvictims of the Nazis and the Holocaust.[73]
On 23 June 2017, theBundestag voted to compensate victims ofParagraph 175. Those affected by the law had their convictions rescinded, and were given reparations of €3,000 ($3,350 in USD) plus an additional €1,500 ($1,675 in USD) for each year spent in prison.[96]
On 27 January 2023, the German government dedicated its annual Holocaust memorial commemoration tolesbian, bisexual, gay and transgender victims of the Holocaust. This marked the first time the German government had granted official recognition to transgender people as victims of the Holocaust.[97][98] In a speech given at the commemoration, GermanBundestag PresidentBärbel Bas stated "For our remembrance culture, it's important that we tell the stories of all victims of persecution, that we make their injustice visible, that we recognize their suffering."[97] Transgender people have also been recognized or commemorated as victims of the Holocaust by theHuman Rights Campaign,[99]Amnesty International,[100] theEuropean Parliament,[101] theMuseum of Jewish Heritage,[68] and theUnited Nations.[102]
In 2022, the Regional Court ofCologne ruled that denying that transgender people were victims of the Nazis qualifies as "a denial of Nazi crimes", which in Germany may beprosecuted as a crime.[73][103][104] The ruling was an outcome of the civil libel suit of German biologist Marie-Luise Vollbrecht, who alleged libel against the German Society for Trans Identity and Intersexuality over their response to comments she made calling transgender people not "true victims" of Nazi crimes.[104][105][106] The court ultimately ruled that she had to accept the response made to her comments labelling her as a denialist.Laurie Marhoefer gave an expert statement on the case that was not ultimately presented to the court, writing "though there is a bit of variation and disorganization, and race matters, we see a pattern of state violence and oppression here, motivated by a hostility specific to transgender people."[18]
On 13 March 2024, authorJ.K. Rowling tweeted a series of responses to an anonymous critic, who argued that Rowling was upholding Nazi ideals for herviewpoints of transgender rights, in which Rowling contended that transgender people were not targeted in the Holocaust. These tweets caused some, including civil rights attorneyAlejandra Caraballo,[107] to accuse her ofHolocaust denial.[108][109][110] On 14 March 2024, Rowling responded to the accusations in a post on her personal website, calling them "baseless and disgusting" and stating that she had "always been a staunch supporter of the Jewish community".[111]
In 1919 – under the more liberal atmosphere of the newly founded Weimar Republic after World War I – Hirschfeld founded the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft (Institute of Sexual Research). The Institute, in a building near the Reichstag, housed his immense archives and library on sexuality and provided educational services and medical consultations.
In 1919, Hirschfeld founded the Institute for Sexual Science...
LG Köln zu Holocaust-Leugnung/Vollbrecht: Laut spiegel.de (Armin Himmelrath) hat das Landgericht Köln entschieden, dass ein Tweet der Berliner Biologie-Doktorandin Marie-Luise Vollbrecht als Leugnen von NS-Verbrechen bezeichnet werden darf. Vollbrecht hatte als Reaktion auf einen Artikel zum Thema "Transidentität/Transsexualität im Nationalsozialismus" getwittert: "Ich hasse dieses Narrativ. Es verspottet die wahren Opfer der NS-Verbrechen", woraufhin sie in einem Tweet als Leugnerin von NS-Verbrechen betitelt wurde. Gegen das Urteil des Landgerichts wird sie vermutlich Berufung einlegen, so ihre Ankündigung.
