Sexual Outsiders In Nazi Germany

When considering the history of sexual outsiders in the Third Reich, it is tempting to assume that all individuals who did not conform to Nazi ideas of conventional sexuality were uniformly condemned and prosecuted. The proliferation of such assumptions is facilitated by the fact that research on the persecution of sexual outsiders has only begun in recent decades, and is thus somewhat limited. Analysis of the evidence, however, suggests that the treatment of sexual outsiders in Nazi Germany was far more complex than one may initially presume. This paper argues that although all sexual deviance was looked down upon in the Third Reich, there was no single, all-encompassing narrative of the experiences of sexual outsiders, beyond the climate

Between 5,000 and 15,000 ended up in concentration camps, where they were marked by a black dot and number 175, or a pink triangle. Their camp presence rose as harsher orders were delivered: by 1938, convicted gays could be sent directly to camps; by 1940, those having seduced many men must be sent there after prison; and by 1942, homosexuality convictions could warrant death. Within camps, treatment of gays was especially harsh. For example, in his account of his time in a concentration camp, Heinz Heger states that homosexuals “were totally isolated— consigned and doomed to the lowest among the damned, the so-called cesspool of the concentration camp. [They] were marked for extermination [and] were subjected to every form of torture inflicted by the SS and kapos.” Other accounts make similar claims, like that gays received the worst beatings, and were isolated from other prisoners. They were assigned to the worst labour tasks, like cement works, were often used for medical experiments, and were ostracized by

Unlike gays, lesbians faced little prosecution, and understanding why requires an examination of the threat lesbians were felt to pose. In Nazi ideology, men and women had natural gender roles they were to occupy, and they extended to sexual relations, where men were to play the active role and women the passive one. Simultaneously, manliness and toughness were held up as Nazi ideals, while weakness was despised. Within these parameters, women who took on active ‘male’ roles in sexual relations were less threatening than men who took on passive ‘female’ ones. While still deviant, lesbians at least exhibited the ideals of action and power, unlike homosexual men, who undermined all the qualities the Nazis