Nazi Persecution of Lesbians Deserves Recognition

Should the victims of Nazi persecution only be memorialized if they were killed in large numbers?

A row has erupted in Berlin over plans to include lesbians in a Holocaust memorial dedicated to the persecution of homosexuals during the Holocaust. An estimated 5 to 15,000 gay men were killed by the Nazis, but historians argue that lesbians were not systematically killed, and thus including them in the memorial "distorts history."

Lesbians might have escaped this unfortunate fate, as they were labeled as "asocials" by the Nazis and summarily persecuted. Indeed, living openly as a lesbian during the Third Reich was not a viable option, and the Nazis frequently raided and shut down bars and meeting places in order to rid German society of the homosexual "illness," and lesbians identified by the Nazis were forced to wear the symbol for "asocials," the black triangle. Women were already considered second-class citizens by the Nazis, expected to quietly and obediently serve the needs of the macho men, and so lesbians were pushed to the margins of society for rejecting this role. And who knows how many were arrested and beaten in Nazi raids and general social policing practices -- abuse of the lesbian population is not very well documented.

The point of including lesbians in a Holocaust memorial exhibit is to draw the links between continued prejudice against lesbian populations in our own society, and the violent repression and social cleansing of the Nazis. Hitler's vision of Germany was of a "pure" and homogenized society, utterly intolerant of all forms of difference. People today would do well to recognize the strains of this hatred and prejudice in their own societies.

Photo credit: Michael F. Mehnert