LGBTQ culture in Berlin

Nevertheless, with roughly 180 years of LGBTIQ+ history, and a very large community made up of members with very varied biographies, it is hard to find a place in Berlin completely without LGBT culture past or present.

Though there are earlier German proponents of decriminalization and de-stigmatization of romantic love and sex between men (Karl Heinrich Ulrichs (1825-1895) is often mentioned in this context), the WHK was the first to do so in a collaborative and organized fashion.

Bars, cabarets, and ballrooms offered same-sex dancing, cross-dressing, racy shows, exotic dancers, and prostitutes seemingly willing to satisfy any imaginable desire to regulars and diversion seekers just coming to look, marvel, and titter.

But also ideas about living together change radically: The labor movement calls the bourgeois family model into question from a leftist perspective, while liberal minded bosses and industrialists begin to see the charm of women in the work force from a business management point of view.

The mysterious Reichstag fire gave the now NSDAP lead parliament the wherewithal to suspend civil liberties, and parliamentarianism indefinitely, essentially making Adolf Hitler the Generalissimo of the Reich.

Communists, social democrats and other dissidents, and those who by NS standards had been labeled "undesirables" had been either tortured to death by the SA [de] in cooperation with the regular police force, incarcerated, or had fled the country.

Those who had punished under the broader version of Section 175 in effect until 1969, and many of whom had suffered imprisonment, and an entry under their names in the national criminal record leading to life-long consequences for their employment and housing situations, were not rehabilitated until 2017.

The initial emergence of AIDS as a public health crisis began in the early 1980s, a period characterized by a lack of awareness and understanding of the disease, particularly within the gay community, which was disproportionately affected.

In the West the affected people’s voices were highlighted through grassroots activism from the gay community to initiate AIDS education campaigns, while East Berlin's efforts were more state-directed and medically oriented.

The contemporary queer scene in Berlin is characterized by a strong emphasis on critical engagement with inclusivity and intersectionality, reflecting an understanding of LGBTQ identities that encompasses various gender expressions and sexual orientations.

Similarly, Boiler Sauna and gay bars alike put up signs telling their patrons to keep careful watch of the drinks with an image of GHB being dropped into a cup with a vial.

A hand drawn map from 1938 (5 years after the begin of Nazi rule) shows no fewer than 57 active or former gay and/or lesbian friendly spots hugging Nollendorfplatz and extending eastward down Bülowstraße.

[41][42] The area from the southern end of Friedrichstraße well into the district of Neukölln was known at the time for its inexpensive bars and café where people loitered in the hope of being picked for odd jobs, bartered and traded on the unofficial market, and engaged in prostitution.

To Auden and Isherwood, both from upper class British backgrounds and educated in England's most prestigious schools, this relatively permissive and inexpensive atmosphere, where you could have a group of young men entertain you in the hope you might buy the next round of beer, must have felt like a manner of El Dorado.

During the ensuing NSDAP rule of the German Reich (1933-1945) the neighborhood's nightlife was all but halted but for a few night spots left open to ensnare, and turn over to the police and Gestapo, those who according to the sharpened Nazi version of Section 175 of the German Criminal Code, "objectively offended the general sense of shame, and subjectively, the debauched intention was present to excite sexual desire in one of the two men, or a third" (objektiv das allgemeine Schamgefühl verletzt und subjektiv die wollüstige Absicht vorhanden war, die Sinneslust eines der beiden Männer oder eines Dritten [zu] erregen).

The founding meeting and naming of the Homosexual Action West Berlin (HAW), one of Germany's most influential lesbian and gay groups, took place on November 21, 1971, in the hand drugstore [de; fr], Motzstraße 24, a cooperatively run space for young adults.

There is very little left of the original atmosphere of anarchism around Nollendorfplatz, nor of the raucous punk, alternative, rock and new-wave clubs that existed here up until the new underground club-scene in the eastern boroughs of Prenzlauer Berg, Friedrichshain, and Mitte became the places to be.

Against the backdrop of an on-going factional dispute within the LGBTIQ* movement that dates back to the mid-1970s (see Tuntenstreit [ast; de; es]), and with tempers flaring over Landowsky's most recent remarks, the organizers of the larger CSD event decide that beginning that year there would be an entry fee for vehicles and floats taking part in the Berlin pride parade.

At a meeting in Club SO36 a group of queer activists decided to construct their own float, dress as rats, and equipped with plenty of mud for the throwing, to pay an unannounced visit to the 1997 Pride Parade.

She was an educator, trans* rights pioneer, and the creator of the Gründerzeutmuseum [de] (Gründerzeit - a period of rapid industrialization and economic growth in the German Reich between 1873 and 1890) in the former manor house in Berlin-Mahlsdorf.

remains an important event, information, and counselling center for lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, and trans* people, and for all allies and other interested parties.

[51] The implication of the housing dilemma for queer people in East Germany, was however that chances of moving out of the parental home were in direct conflict with the possibility to live a non-heteronormative life.

It was possible to squat, stay with other similarly minded people, while remaining officially residing with one's parent or spouse until a work-around (for which all aspects of life in the GDR were renowned) could perhaps be found.

The former East Berlin borough of Friedrichshain has a queer history somewhat similar to Prenzlauer Berg, to which it is somewhat analogous in many ways, were it not for the Stalin era prestige project Karl-Marx-Allee (1949-1961 Stalinallee) which runs north–south through the neighborhood, dividing it down the middle.

[56][57][58] The slogan reverses a derisive remark made publicly by West German politician Franz Josef Strauss in 1970 in which Strauß expressed his conviction it would be better to be a Cold Warrior.

The general tendency in the official historiography to down-play the role of East Germans in the events of the time in favor of praise for the deeds of (primarily Western) politicians and invocation of the ostensible inevitability of this "End of History" as it is sometimes framed, pertains to LGBT East-Germans in manifold fashion.

Eduard Stapel veröffentlichte 1999 eine persönliche Auseinandersetzung mit seinem Engagement in der Schwulenbewegung und den Maßnahmen des Ministeriums für Staatssicherheit.

Emblematic for this process, which has not lost its actuality to this day, was the struggle between the residents of Mainzer Straße and rent-seeking land lords represented by the local authorities and law enforcement.

A good overview of which businesses actively advertise in the LGBTIQ+ community can be found in Germany's eldest (first issue: April, 1984), most widely read, free of charge, LGBTIQ+ publication, Berlin's queer monthly, the Siegessäule.

[72] After his outing, Wowereit received a lot of support from fellow party colleagues and the wider public and eventually won the Berlin State Elections of 2001 and remained Governing Mayor of the city for nearly 13 years.