Berlin inaugurates memorial to Nazis' gay victims

[NYadgal]

Posted: 5/27/08 at 9:53pm

BERLIN - Germany unveiled a memorial Tuesday to the Nazis' long-ignored gay victims, a monument that also aims to address ongoing discrimination by confronting visitors with an image of a same-sex couple kissing.

The memorial — a sloping gray concrete slab on the edge of Berlin's Tiergarten park — echoes the vast field of smaller slabs that make up Germany's memorial to Jewish victims of the Holocaust, opened three years ago just across the road.

The pavilion-sized slab includes a small window where visitors can view a video clip of two men kissing.

Berlin's openly gay mayor, Klaus Wowereit, said the monument was a reminder of the ongoing struggles that still confront gays.

"This memorial is important from two points of view — to commemorate the victims, but also to make clear that even today, after we have achieved so much in terms of equal treatment, discrimination still exists daily," Wowereit said as he inaugurated the memorial alongside Culture Minister Bernd Neumann.

Nazi Germany declared homosexuality a threat to the German race and convicted some 50,000 homosexuals as criminals. An estimated 10,000 to 15,000 gay men were deported to concentration camps, where few survived.

"This is a story that many people don't know about, and I think it's fantastic ... that the German state finally decided to make a memorial to honor these victims as well," said Ingar Dragset, a Berlin-based Norwegian who designed the memorial along with Danish-born Michael Elmgreen.

The commemoration "unfortunately comes too late for those who were persecuted and survived in 1945," said Guenter Dworek, of Germany's Lesbian and Gay Association. "That is very bitter."

He said the last ex-prisoner that his group knows of died in 2005.

Wowereit echoed his regret over the time it took to honor the Nazis' gay victims.

"That is symptomatic of a postwar society which simply kept quiet about a group of victims, which ... contributed to these victims being discriminated against twice," he said.

Few gays convicted by the Nazis came forward after World War II because of the stigma attached to homosexuality. The law used against them remained on the books in West Germany until 1969, and Dworek said there were 50,000 convictions under the legislation after the war.

Not until 2002 did the German parliament issue a formal pardon for homosexuals convicted under the Nazis. One reason it took so long was because the legislation had been linked to a blanket rehabilitation of 22,000 Wehrmacht deserters — a move many conservatives opposed.

The effort to get a memorial built started in 1992, and a 1999 parliament decision to build the memorial to the Holocaust's 6 million Jewish victims also called for "commemorating in a worthy fashion the other victims of the Nazis." In 2001, Jewish and Gypsy leaders backed an appeal for a monument to the gay victims.

After lawmakers approved its construction, a jury picked the winning design in early 2006 out of 17 design proposals.

The federal government financed the $945,660 building costs, while Berlin's city government provided the site.

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Full article and pictures

[NYadgal]

Posted: 5/27/08 at 10:04pm

The article continued...

The designers' original plan to feature only a video of two men kissing ran into criticism that lesbians were left out. Last year, a compromise was reached to change the memorial's video every two years, allowing lesbian couples to be shown in the future.

The first film — a repeating clip of two men kissing, shot at the site of the memorial before it was built — was done by photographer Robby Mueller and directed by Denmark's Thomas Vinterberg.

"It was quite important to have a direct imagery of a love scene, a passionate scene ... because that is the main problem in homophobia," designer Elmgreen told AP Television News. "You can get acceptance on an abstract level, but they don't want to look at us."

Germany has allowed gay couples to seal their partnerships at registry offices since 2001, although the law stops short of offering formal marriage. Berlin has a large gay community, as do other major German cities, such as Cologne and Hamburg.

The memorial to the Nazis' Jewish victims and the new monument will soon be joined by a third memorial honoring the Roma and Sinti, or Gypsy, victims. Some 220,000 to 500,000 Gypsies were killed during the Holocaust.

Work begins this year on that memorial, also in Tiergarten park.

"We stand stunned before the brutality with which the Nazis threatened, persecuted and destroyed all those who did not correspond to their inhuman ideology," Neumann said.

"The experience of war and Holocaust, state terror and tyranny, puts on us Germans a special responsibility to protect freedom and human rights."



Well done, Berlin!

[jaystarr]

Posted: 5/27/08 at 10:06pm

Its about time! and thanks for posting that, NYadgal!

J*

[PalJoey]

Posted: 5/27/08 at 10:09pm

The law used against them remained on the books in West Germany until 1969,

The same year as Stonewall, Judy Garland's death, and the year I was bar mitzvahed.

In 2001, Jewish and Gypsy leaders backed an appeal for a monument to the gay victims.

I remember that being a big deal in 2001. For decades, most spokespeople for the Jewish and gypsy victims of the Holocaust were uncomfortable including gays in the groups of victims.

It's so German that the memorial had to include a video of two men kissing--"It was quite important to have a direct imagery of a love scene, a passionate scene ... because that is the main problem in homophobia. You can get acceptance on an abstract level, but they don't want to look at us"--and that every two years the video will alternate between two men kissing and two women.

[jaystarr]

Posted: 5/27/08 at 10:24pm

The Memorial

[Trekkie2]

Posted: 5/27/08 at 10:40pm

About damn time.

[Elphaba]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 12:37am

It's too bad it could not be a part of the Jewish Memorial.....something that touched me as much as Auschwitz did. (I mean closer to it)
Sadly the gay memorial was not open when we were there last month.

[YouWantitWhen????]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 1:10am

This is going to sound weird, I think...

But one thing that has always bothered me is that my fellow Jews have owned the Holocaust as though they were the only ones that suffered, or were targeted by the Nazis. Granted, Jews were the biggest target, but were only half of those exterminated by the Nazi regime.

It is as though the Jewish identity has become synonymous with the suffering of the Holocaust to the exclusion of others who have suffered.

When I was at the Holocaust museum, I remember someone telling me "Never Again" to which I responded, "It already has happened again - in Cambodia, in former Yugoslavia, and in other countries" to which he responded "it is not the same."

For the other six million who were killed, their suffering needs to be recognized and mourned. We Jews need to share the burden and the pain of the Holocaust, and embrace all of those who were targeted by the Nazis.

For the Communists, the Gypsies, the Homosexuals, the Catholics, and all others who were targeted along with the Jews - we need to say as a society "Never Again" and then make sure it does not in fact happen once again ... which no one has had the courage or will, to do.

Back on topic - I remember seeing documentaries of the thriving gay community in Germany post WWI, and how it was destroyed and decimated by the Nazi regime. I am glad that they are being remembered and their suffering recognized.

Updated On: 5/28/08 at 01:10 AM

[WickedRedX]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 2:07am

A fictional gay man's thoughts on the subject.

"It's a big rock. I can't wait to tell my jewish friends. They don't have a rock this big."

[artscallion]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 8:12am

When they say homosexuality remained illegal until 1969, what that means, but doesn't say, is that because of that law, when the camps were liberated, homosexuals were not set free. They were transfered to regular prisons. Interestingly, lesbianism was not included in the law and was not considered a crime.

[munkustrap178]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 9:58am

Sorry, but that's hideously ugly.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 10:11am

You miss the (German) point, Munk. It matches the design of the previous series of memorials throughout that park to Jewish victims of the Holocaust.

In contemporary German culture, the event is considered too unspeakably evil to have a memorial that is aesthetically "attractive."

It's considered a necessary corrective, the way that they consider denying the holocaust to be a crime.

So the response of the designer to your comment that it's "hideously ugly" would be "As it SHOULD be. So was the Holocaust."

Updated On: 5/28/08 at 10:11 AM

[Roscoe]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 10:39am

I like the design of the memorial, but I'm not crazy about the little video loop that plays inside it. It just seems kind of silly. Couldn't they have come up with something else?

[DG]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 10:49am

I don't find the video 'silly' at all. It highlights what many consider to be the most intimate exchange between people. A kiss is NOT just a kiss, to some people.

[papalovesmambo]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 10:58am

i agree with them, pj.

[Roscoe]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 11:21am

I can't put my finger on what it is that bugs me about the video, but it bugs me nevertheless. Point taken about the kiss being more than a kiss, though.

[NYadgal]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 11:28am

Roscoe, I think this quote from the article sums up perfectly why the video is included:

"It was quite important to have a direct imagery of a love scene, a passionate scene ... because that is the main problem in homophobia," designer Elmgreen told AP Television News. "You can get acceptance on an abstract level, but they don't want to look at us."


Thanks to all of you for your informative, thoughtful and interesting comments.

[Elphaba]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 1:05pm

the Jewish memorial is anything but ugly......it is simply overwhelming, block after block......just seems to go on forever.
I also do not find the gay one ugly, for the very reasons Joey stated.

I had an issue with the video, until I read Addy's post, and now it makes sense to me.

[yellibean2]

Posted: 5/28/08 at 8:15pm

I was in Berlin a month ago and really was not a fan of the Jewish memorial. While I think what the city has done for it is a really nice gesture, I felt that the monument itself represented the concept of the Holocaust much more than the individual stories, which can be nearly as dehumanizing as the Holocaust was in the first place. I didn't get to see this new one, but it also seems like it's along the same idea.

On the same note, I also saw the monument to homosexual victims of the Holocaust in Amsterdam, which I believe (correct me if I'm wrong) is the first of its kind.