Recognition at Last
The horrors of Hitler’s “Final Solution” and the slaughter of six million Jews were well documented. Jewish survivors of the Holocaust were encouraged to bear witness. Shortly after the war, monuments and days of remembrance were established to ensure that the world would not forget what had happened to Jews under Nazi rule. It took almost forty years for the first plaque acknowledging the suffering of gay men as victims of the Nazis to be erected.
The gay community was not even allowed to participate in the memorial services held at concentration camps or at war memorials. In 1970 gay activists in Amsterdam arrived at the National War Memorial in Dam Square with a lavender wreath to honor the gay men who had perished. The activists were arrested, and the wreath was removed and denounced as a disgrace.
In the 1980s, mounting pressure from activists, a greater awareness of the plight of homosexuals during the Nazi period, and a more tolerant attitude toward the gay community in general resulted in the first memorials to homosexual victims. In 1984 an official monument was unveiled at the former concentration camp at Mauthausen, Austria. A plaque in the shape of a pink triangle was mounted on the prison walls with the wording, “Put to death, Put to silence – for the homosexual victims of National Socialism.”
In Dachau in 1985, another pink triangle plaque was displayed at the former concentration camp. A memorial sculpture made up of triangles of many different colors had been previously created in the camp, but had excluded the pink triangle. In 1990, at Buchenwald, a plaque appeared stating, “In memory of the homosexual men that suffered here. There were 650 Rosa Winkel (pink triangle) prisoners in the Buchenwald concentration camp between 1937 – 1945. Many of them lost their lives.”
The gay community in Amsterdam was persistent in its demands for recognition of the suffering of homosexuals during the war. In 1987, seventeen years after the arrests at the National War Memorial, the Homomonument was opened. Close to the Anne Frank house, the monument is meant to “inspire and support gays in their struggle against denial, oppression, and discrimination.” It is one of the largest monuments in the world honoring gay men and women.
In 1989 in Berlin, in the part of the city that housed many of the gay bars and clubs, including the famous Eldorado (which is once again a thriving gay club), a pink granite plaque in the shape of a triangle was placed outside the Nollendorfplatz subway station stating: “Killed and forgotten, the homosexual victims of National Socialism.”
In Sydney, Australia, in San Francisco and Alaska in the United States, in both Rome and Trieste in Italy, in Montevideo, Uruguay, and, most recently, in Barcelona, Spain, monuments have been erected to remember the homosexuals who were victims of the Nazi regime. They make people consider the past, and encourage greater understanding of sexual diversity and the dignity of gay men and women.
Berlin’s pink granite tribute is outside a subway station in the area of the city where gay culture was celebrated in the years before the rise of the Nazi regime.
In 2008, the Memorial to Homosexuals Persecuted under Nazism was unveiled in Berlin, across the street from the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. Visitors to the monument look inside a small window to watch two alternating videos: either two young men kissing or two women kissing. It is a monument distinctly different from others.
The video and the monument act as a strong reminder that these two young men certainly would have been arrested and would possibly have died if they had lived during the Nazi period. The wording on a nearby plaque concludes:
Because of its history, Germany has a special responsibility to actively oppose the violation of gay men’s and lesbians’ human rights. In many parts of the world, people continue to be persecuted for their sexuality; homosexual love remains illegal and a kiss can be dangerous.
With this memorial, the Federal Republic of Germany intends to honor the victims of persecution and murder, to keep alive the memory of this injustice, and to create a lasting symbol of opposition to enmity, intolerance, and the exclusion of gay men and lesbians.
Even in the bleakest weather people come to
view the video in the monument.