Nina Littel. 'Was auch immer käme, er würde nirgendwo ganz dazugehören das dritte Geschlecht!'

“WAS AUCH IMMER KÄME, ER WÜRDE NIRGENDWO GANZ DAZUGEHÖREN. DAS DRITTE GESCHLECHT!” Non-normative sexualities and gender identities in the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany

NINA LITTEL

“WAS AUCH IMMER KÄME, ER WÜRDE NIRGENDWO GANZ DAZUGEHÖREN. DAS DRITTE GESCHLECHT!” Non-normative sexualities and gender identities in the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany

©2018 NINA LITTEL EEN UITGAVE VAN REDACTIE OPMAAK OMSLAGFOTO

UITGEVERIJ JONGE HISTORICI TOBIAS VAN DER KNAAP WOUTER WOUDA KOGELSTOOTSTER HEIDI KRIEGER BEHAALD DE EERSTE MEDAILLE VOOR DE DDR. BRON: WIKIMEDIA COMMONS BUNDESARCHIV, BILD 183-19860826-036 / THIEME, WOLFGANG / CC-BY-SA 3.0

JONGEHISTORICI.NL

Contents

Introduction

5

CHAPTER 1

Activism, legalization and infiltration: the struggle for gay and lesbian rights in EastGermany 12 The first step towards liberalization Early gay activism in Berlin Continuing activism and new commemorations Repression and concessions in the final years of the GDR

CHAPTER 2

13 16 18 22

The West German lesbian and gay movements: from social revolutionaries to pragmatic activists The debate on legalization in the Federal Republic The emergence of an early gay movement New activism and controversies during the 1980s

25 27 30 32

CHAPTER 3

Transsexual experiences in a divided Germany 36 3.1 Transsexual experiences in the German Democratic Republic

38

3.2 Transsexual experiences in the Federal Republic of Germany

45

Oppressive enforced gender roles in public and at home Berlin, a safe haven?

The problems with getting surgery Relationships and self-acceptance A troubled youth Support groups and the search for surgery A hostile society and sensationalist reporting Narratives of West-German transsexuals

38 40 41 43

47 50 53 55

Conclusion 57 Bibliography 64 Primary sources: Secondary sources:

64 66

Introduction At the mention of transsexuality in the German Democratic Republic (GDR), the first –if any– figure that comes to mind is shot-putter Andreas Krieger.

In the GDR, sports were a source of national pride.1 However, it turned out that many East German successes were the result of a state-sponsored doping regime, which had far-reaching medical consequences for athletes.2 One such athlete was Krieger, formerly named Heidi and assigned female at birth. Krieger was the 1986 European women’s shot-put champion. The extensive doping with anabolic steroids amplified Krieger’s confusion about his already uncertain sexual identity. He had genital reconstruction surgery in 1997.3 Krieger’s story inadvertently frames transsexuality as a distressing consequence of performance-enhancing drug abuse under an oppressive regime that was only interested in achievements. This is unfavorable, because whilst Krieger’s is the most famous case of transsexuality in the GDR, it is at the same time an exceptional story. Perhaps, without the doping, Andreas would have simply been a part of the neglected history of transsexual figures in the German Democratic Republic.

Studying the history of sexualities and gender identities that defy the cisgender4 heterosexual societal norm helps deconstruct the prevalent myth of a universal, timeless, natural, and self-evident heterosexuality. This het1 2 3

4

M. Fulbrook, A concise history of Germany (Cambridge 2004) 242.

L. Harding, ‘Forgotten victims of East German doping take their battle to court’ theguardian.com (1 November 2005) <https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2005/nov/01/athletics.gdnsport3>, last accessed 2 June 2017.

J. Longman, ‘DRUG TESTING; East German Steroids’ Toll: ‘They Killed Heidi”, nytimes.com (26 January 2004) <http:// www.nytimes.com/2004/01/26/sports/drug-testing-east-german-steroids-toll-they-killed-heidi.html?_r=0>, last accessed 2 June 2017.

Cisgender is a term to describe people that identify with the gender they were assigned at birth.

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eronormativity obscures the experiences of everyone outside these restrictive boundaries, resulting in a distorted and limited body of knowledge.

Moreover, gender and sexual expression are important arenas where people can resist existing power-relationships.5 As such, there has been a growing historiography on gay and lesbian movements within the German Democratic Republic and Federal Republic of Germany (Bundesrepublik Deutschland, or BRD). However, transsexual history has been neglected. This is regrettable, not just because of the ongoing marginalization of transgender people in both past6 and in current LGBT+ movements and representations7, but also because transgender experiences are neither reducible nor equivalent to the experiences of gays and lesbians. Whilst some problems were shared, transsexual people faced their own specific issues and treatment by the state and society. To neglect this history is to reinforce the dominance of gays and lesbians within LGBT+ movements.

This thesis focusses on this history in divided Germany during the Cold War period. After the Second World War, Germany was split into different zones of occupation; British, French and American zones in Western Germany, and a Soviet Eastern zone. In 1949, the western zones formed a politically stable and prosperous capitalist democratic state, the Federal Republic of Germany. The Soviet zone became the German Democratic Republic, the most economically productive state in the communist bloc.8 In contemporary perceptions then and current perceptions now, certain myths were assigned to both republics. The Federal Republic of Germany was seen and is remembered as a wealthy, westernized, consumer-oriented society with the clean atmosphere of a well-maintained environment and material plenitude. The German Democratic Republic was seen and is remembered as a dull and polluted society, with mediocre cars, cobbled roads, poor housing, and a restricted choice of low-quality goods in shops.9 These perceptions of Western and Eastern Germany carry through in perceptions of sexuality. According to Donna Harsch, in popular imagination 5

D. Healey, Homosexual Desire in Revolutionary Russia: the regulation of sexual and gender dissent (Chicago – London 2001) 2-9.

6 PQ Monthly Staff, ‘The historical oppression of transgender people within the LGBTQ movement’ pqmonthly. com (21 August 2014) <http://www.pqmonthly.com/historical-oppression-transgender-people-within-lgbtqmovement/20426>, last accessed 2 June 2017.

7 M. Talusan, ‘45 Years After Stonewall, the LGBT Movement Has a Transphobia Problem’, prospect.org (25 June 2014) <http://prospect.org/article/45-years-after-stonewall-lgbt-movement-has-transphobia-problem>, last accessed 2 June 2017 – J. Weiss, ‘Reflective Paper: GL Versus BT: The Archaeology of Biphobia and Transphobia Within the U.S. Gay and Lesbian Community’, Journal of Bisexuality 11-4 (2011) 498-502.

8 Fulbrook, A concise history of Germany 206-212.

9 Ibidem, 230.

6

West Germany was a socially repressive place that grew more permissive after the sexual revolution, which started in 1968. Many West Germans assumed that the Communist regime was as repressive sexually as it was politically. And yet, East Germans look back on the German Democratic Republic with Ostalgie10, remembering it as a liberated sexual culture, encouraged by the socialist state.11 The idea of a static society in the German Democratic Republic is incorrect; the changes that took place in East German sexuality were revolutionary. However, the perception that communism encouraged and enabled intimacy is likewise highly contested.12 A more nuanced vision, going beyond these opposing stereotypes, is necessary.

Harsch wants to dig the history of the two Germanys out from under the popular legends. A comparison between the two republics can deconstruct the binary divisions (controlling and liberalizing, moralistic and tolerant, traditional and modern) assigned to them. The perceived opposite tendencies actually coexisted and were intertwined in ideologies, policies and practices.13 The main question of this thesis is ‘What are the similarities and differences between transsexual experiences in the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany during the period of 1945-1990, and how do these experiences fit within the broader gay and lesbian history of their respective countries?’ A comparative approach helps to undo the aforementioned perceived dichotomy between the states, and makes the binary division between East and West more nuanced and complicated. Often, the German Democratic Republic and Federal Republic of Germany are studied separately and in different contexts, on the Eastern and Western sides of the Iron Curtain. However, this thesis follows a recent trend of cross-Iron Curtain analysis. In addition to the hitherto emphasized differences –which are often taken for granted– this also illuminates surprising similarities between the two Germanies. This kind of research invites us to reflect on the powerful metaphor of the ‘iron curtain’ and asks whether ‘iron’ is the most fitting material to describe the relationship between the East and the West. Iron makes for a heavy impenetrable divide, explains György Péteri, but the curtain was not as impenetrable as it seems. Information and ideas still crossed the border. Therefore, Péteri proposes a ‘Nylon Curtain’, empha-

10 Nostalgia for certain aspects of life in the GDR. 11 D. Harsch, ‘Eroticism, Love, and Sexuality in the Two Postwar Germanys’, German Studies Review 35-3 (2012) 627628 – J. McLellan, Love in the time of Communism: Intimacy and Sexuality in the GDR (Cambridge 2011) 9, 21.

12 McLellan, Love in the Time of Communism: Intimacy and Sexuality in the GDR 2, 21.

13 Harsch, ‘Eroticism, Love, and Sexuality in the Two Postwar Germanys’ 628.

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sizing the transparency of the curtain and the international embeddedness of communist systems. Global knowledge about culture, goods and services went across the systematic divide.14 The comparative approach of this thesis helps to point out the complexities of the East-West division.

I will pay extensive attention to the gay and lesbian movements and emancipation in the first two chapters, through an analysis of secondary literature on the subject, so that I may place the transsexual experiences into context. Not only is there more literature available on this subject, but it is an excellent point of departure for the discussion of transsexual experiences. Then, in the third and largest chapter, I will analyze transsexual experiences in the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany, mostly based on primary sources.

My main primary source is Messer im Traum: Transsexuelle in Deutschland (1994), by journalist and writer Holde-Barbara Ulrich and photographer Thomas Karsten.15 This 170 page book contains thirteen life histories of four Female-to-Male (FTM) transsexuals, and nine Male-to-Female (MTF) transsexuals. Of these thirteen, four lived in the German Democratic Republic and nine in the Federal Republic of Germany. Ulrich describes that her motivation for writing the book was to help transsexual people find their own diaspora, and to inspire seemingly ‘normal’ people to help transsexual people and all others who are different.16 It should be kept in mind that there are several layers of interpretation and selection between the reader and the experiences of the respondents. Ulrich started by selecting people she wanted to speak to, and was only able to speak with those willing. She then decided which information she wanted to use and which she wanted to exclude from her story. Respondents drew from memory and their answers were influenced by potentially guiding questions. Based on their answers, Ulrich wrote thirteen stories detailing the life histories of each of her respondents. She used the decorated language of a novelist and only occasionally used direct quotes from her respondents. Despite this, the source still offers valuable insights. The subjectivity of the respondents is actually useful for this research which focusses on experience, which is by definition subjective.

We cannot make any generalizing statements on the life of transsexual people in the GDR and BRD based on this, but the source does give important 14 G. Péteri, ‘Nylon Curtain – Transnational and Transsystemetic Tendencies in the Cultural Life of State-Socialist Russia and East-Central Europe’, Slavonica 10-2 (2004) 113-116.

15 H.B. Ulrich ed., Messer im Traum: Transsexuelle in Deutschland (Tübingen 1994).

16 Ibidem, 9.

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insight in the life of some transsexual individuals, which can be built upon with further research.

To add to the testimonies from the German Democratic Republic, I will analyze Andreas Krieger’s story.17 With this source as well, layers of interpretation by interviewers should be kept in mind, in addition to the fact that the story is often used to illustrate the abuse of the GDR doping system.

Additionally, I will analyze the story of Renate Anders18, a MTF-transsexual from the Federal Republic of Germany. She wrote a 185 page autobiography, based on the diaries she kept throughout her life. Renate explains the book was published in response to her mother’s scorn towards Renate’s decision to live as a woman, to make her mother understand what she went through.19 Readers should be cautious that some information may have been omitted or changed either purposefully or by lapse of memory. Keeping this in mind, Renate’s subjective narrative does give wonderful insights into the life of a transsexual person in the BRD. There is an imbalance between the amount of sources I have gathered on transsexuality within the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany. Nevertheless, this relative scarcity of sources on transsexuals in the GDR does not mean that the sources that are accessible should be neglected. I have chosen to present them here to show that there is a transsexual history within the GDR, and to break through the tradition of academic silence on the subject. However, this skewed balance must be kept in mind when comparing the situations in the two republics. The statements I make in this study are not meant to be generalizing.

I will analyze the case-studies by discussing the recurring themes, namely: childhood isolation, family relationships, abuse, romantic/sexual relationships, sexual violation, suicidal tendencies, the LGBT+ scene, the transsexual community, religion, interaction with the state and interaction with the medical world (doctors, psychiatrists and the sex change operation).

Furthermore, I will place the transsexual narratives within a broader theoretical framework on transsexual narratives, using the influential theories

17 Longman, ‘DRUG TESTING; East German Steroids’ – Midnight Lightning Radio (5 February 2016) Lost World of Communism: East Germany [Video file] 34:30 – 37:10. Retrieved from: <https://youtu.be/sg98dUQoUzs?t=34m30s>, last accessed 30 May 2017 – U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (19 November 2015) Andreas Krieger: Heidi’s Farthest Throw [Video file]. Retrieved from: <https://youtu.be/KQhUjaiveAg>, last accessed 30 May 2017.

18 R. Anders, Grenzübertritt. Eine Suche nach geschlechtlicher Identität (Frankfurt am Main 1984).

19 Ibidem, 9-10.

9

of Dean Spade and Sandy Stone.20 Next to the case-studies, I will use several primary and secondary sources I gathered in the Spinnboden Lesbenarchiv und Bibliothek21 and the Schwules Museum22 in Berlin. These detail the legal circumstances for transsexuals in the BRD23, a research of the Evangelische Akademie Tutzing of 198824 on the medical causes of transsexuality and the position of transsexuals in society, as well as several academic and non-academic articles on transsexuality from the 1980s.25 Far more than I am able to do in this study can be done with the material gathered in these archives.26 In this thesis, I use the term ‘transsexuals’. The common definition of transsexuality concerns people that do not identify with the gender they were assigned at birth and desire to permanently transition into the gender they identify as, through surgery.27 In practice, this is a little less clear-cut, as not everyone is able to –or desires to– ‘fully transition’. Nowadays, it is more common to use the term ‘transgender’, since the term ‘transsexual’ has strong medical connotations and the definition is limited. However, using ‘transgender’ for this research would be anachronistic. The term ‘transsexual’ was common during this period among transsexual people, the state and medical institutions, so this is what I will use. Likewise, instead of the often used ‘sex change’ or ‘sex reassignment surgery’ I will use ‘genital reconstruction surgery’, since surgery changes only one’s genitalia. Authors often use the pronouns fitting the gender that was assigned at birth up until the moment of medical transition, after which they switch to the pronouns 20 D. Spade, ‘Mutilating Gender’, in: S. Stryker, S. Whittle eds., The Transgender Studies Reader (New York 2006) <http:// www.makezine.enoughenough.org/mutilate.html>, last accessed 2 June 2017 – S. Stone, ‘The ‘Empire’ Strikes Back: Posttranssexual Manifesto’ (1991) in: S. Stryker, S. Whittle eds., The Transgender Studies Reader (New York 2006).

21 Spinnboden Lesbenarchiv und Bibliothek, <http://www.spinnboden.de/>.

22 Schwules Museum, <http://www.schwulesmuseum.de/>.

23 M.S. Augstein, Vom Verbot zur Gleichberechtigung. Die Rechtsentwicklung zu Homosexualität und Transsexualität in Deutschland. Festschrift für Manfred Bruns (Berlin 2012) – S. Rauner, Transsexualität, Informationen, Erfahrungen, Kontakte (Berlin 1998).

24 Evangelische Akademie Tutzing, Auf der Suche nach meiner Identität: Transsexuelle in der Gesellschaft (Tutzing 1988).

25 H. Schwenk, ‘Junge in Frauenkleidern: Keine Aufregung- ganz normal!’, Ärtzliche Praxis 21-3 (1988) – A. Dröge, „Männer’, ‘Frauen’ und andere Menschen: über Normen, Abweichungen, Frauenfeindlichkeit, Schwule, Transsexuelle, Tunten, kesse Väter und andere ungeliebte Familienmitglieder”, Frauenpolitik (1977) – D. Mittler, “Leben zwischen Spott und seelischer Not: Eine Beratungsstelle in Köln bietet Transsexuellen Rat und praktische Hilfen”, Süddeutsche Zeitung 120 (1988) – I. Zimmermann, ‘Wann ist ein Mensch eine Frau’, Süddeutsche Zeitung 117 (1988) – E. Schibber, ‘Transsexualität’, Naturwissenschaft und Technik (1982) –Schwules Museum, Berlin, ‘Sammlung Trans*’ (Sammlung ‘Rebro’).

26 More material on transsexual experiences in Germany should be in the Lili Elbe archiv for Inter- Trans- and Queer History, but this archive unfortunately remained unresponsive to my requests to access their collection. (Lili Elbe archive, <http://www.lili-elbe-archive.org/>).

27 B.L. Bilodeau, K.A. Renn, ‘Analysis of LGBT Identity Development Models and Implications for Practice’, New Directions for Student Services, Special Issue: Gender Identity and Sexual Orientation: Research, Policy, and Personal 11 (2005) 29-31.

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fitting the gender the person in case actually identified with. This positions the genital reconstruction surgery as the specific moment when one’s gender changes, even though dis-identification with the assigned gender often started sooner and surgery was not obtainable for everyone. Therefore, I will be using the pronouns corresponding to the gender that the case-studies identified with throughout their entire narrative.

In the last several decades there has been a wave of research on the history of sexuality in German studies, which has recently reached the historiography of the Cold War era.28 Recent studies have shown the importance of resisting the binary conceptions of repressive versus permissive in the two Germanys, instead focusing on continuity and change as dynamic processes.29 They reject the rigid periodization of liberation and repression that earlier authors, such as Dagmar Herzog30, used. Josie McLellan rejects Herzog’s theory that East Germany, unlike West Germany, did not have a sexual revolution. Although public discussion of sexuality was more limited in East Germany, the Eastern and Western sexual revolutions were very similar. Changes in East German sexual behavior were sometimes more radical than those in the West. McLellan shows that the East German sexual revolution took place ‘from below’, instead of being shaped by legislators, radicals, entrepreneurs and sexual theorists. However, the dramatic changes in attitudes do not signal a sexually permissive society; the East German sexual revolution was an uneven phenomenon. The fact that it took place in absence of freedom of speech and a free market has implications for its nature.31 There was a liberation of heterosexuality, but this was not the case for homosexuality.32 As we shall see in this thesis, the same can be said for the Federal Republic of Germany.

This historiography focusses on heterosexuality and –to a lesser extent– homosexuality, in the German Democratic Republic and Federal Republic of Germany. In my thesis I will attempt to create a place for transsexual experiences within those histories.

28 Harsch, ‘Eroticism, Love, and Sexuality in the Two Postwar Germanys’ 627-628.

29 McLellan, Love in the Time of Communism: Intimacy and Sexuality in the GDR – J.V. Evans, Life among the Ruins: Cityscape and Sexuality in Cold War Berlin (London – New York 2011) – E. Heineman, Before Porn Was Legal: The Erotica Empire of Beate Uhse (Chicago – London 2011) – S. Steinbacher, Wie der Seks nach Deutschland kam: Der Kampf um Sittlichkeit und Anstand in der frühen Bundesrepublic (Munich 2011).

30 D. Herzog, Sex after Fascism: Memory and Morality in Twentieth-century Germany (Princeton – Oxford 2005) – Herzog, ‘The East German Sexual Evolution’, in: K. Pence, P. Betts eds., Socialist Modern: East German Everyday Culture and Politics (Ann Arbor 2008) 71-95.

31 McLellan, Love in the Time of Communism: Intimacy and Sexuality in the GDR 9-11.

32 Harsch, ‘Eroticism, Love, and Sexuality in the Two Postwar Germanys’ 632-633.

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CHAPTER 1

Activism, legalization and infiltration: the struggle for gay and lesbian rights in East-Germany ‘Raus aus den Toiletten, rein in die Straβen! Freiheit für die Schwulen!’33 – R. von Praunheim, M. Dannecker, S. Wurl, Nicht der Homosexuelle ist Perverse, sondern die Situation in der er Lebt, [Film] Werner Klieβ Produktion (1971)

In Germany, male homosexuality had been forbidden under Paragraph 175 of the Criminal Code since 1871. Attempts to reform the law in the Weimar Republic failed, and under Nazism Paragraph 175 was altered so that not only penetrative sex was punishable, but any sexual contact between men.

Paragraph 175a was added, which entailed a particularly harsh punishment for four forms of male homosexual activity; rape, abuse of a position of power, prostitution, and indecency committed by a man over twenty-one with a man under twenty-one. The last provision marks the beginning of the pervasive idea that young men needed special protection from homosexuality.34 The end of the Second World War brought an especially favorable climate 33 ‘Out of the toilets, into the streets. Freedom for gays!’

34 G. Taylor, ‘The East German Contribution to Equal Gay and Lesbian Rights in Germany’, American Journal of Legal History 54 (2014) 306-307.

12

to reform or repeal this law in the German Democratic Republic (GDR). The Sozialistische Einheitspartei Deutschlands (SED) that came to power was the result of the forced merger of the former communist and social-democratic parties, the former of which had supported homosexual rights in the Weimar Republic.. Moreover, the Allied Control Council declared that all regulations issued by the Nazis were invalid, but Paragraph 175 was held to be considered.35

The first step towards liberalization In the first postwar years, a series of conflicting court decisions on the matter were made in different provinces, resulting in a confusing judicial situation.

On 28 March 1950, the Supreme Court declared the Paragraph invalid on the grounds that it was a Nazi law and had been used for the persecution of opponents. The Paragraph was restored to its pre-1935 form, so that only penetrative male homosexuality was illegal.36 In 1952, a Law Commission of the Ministry of Justice made a draft for a new Penal Code, which decriminalized consensual homosexuality. Before this draft could be discussed, the June Rebellion of 1953 halted the progress. After the revolt was suppressed, the SED leadership developed a socially conservative policy, with a strong focus on family, pronatalism, and respectability. Along with this came the regime-propagated idea that homosexuality was a result of capitalism and linked to fascism. The rhetoric was used to purge political opponents of SED leader Walter Ulbricht. In the East German press, this rhetoric of homosexuality as capitalist decadence proliferated well into the 1960s.37 In 1955, the Supreme Court affirmed the validity of Paragraph 175a in its Nazi form,38 arguing that it did not contain ‘typical Nazi content’, but ‘defended sexual integrity and thus the healthy development of the youth’.39 The SED operated under the idea that bourgeois homosexuality would lose its social basis in a socialist country, but until then homosexuality had to be suppressed to avoid its popularization. However, the intensity of prose35 McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 138 – G. Grau, ‘Return of the Past: The Policy of the SED and the Laws Against Homosexuality in Eastern Germany Between 1946 and 1968’, Journal of Homosexuality 37-4 (1999) 3, 10 – U. Sillge, ‘Lesben, Schwule, Bisexuelle, Transgender in der DDR,’ docplayer.org (unknown) 1 <http://docplayer. org/19125958- Lesben-schwule-bisexuelle-transgender-in-der-ddr.html.>, last accessed 31 May 2017.

36 Taylor, ‘The East German Contribution to Equal Gay and Lesbian Rights in Germany’ 308-309.

37 Fulbrook, A concise history of Germany 214 – Grau, ‘Return of the Past’ 11-13 – J.V. Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’, Feminist Studies 36-3 (2010) 556-557 – Taylor, ‘The East German Contribution to Equal Gay and Lesbian Rights in Germany’ 309-311.

38 Taylor, ‘The East German Contribution to Equal Gay and Lesbian Rights in Germany’ 308-309.

39 Grau, ‘Return of the Past’ 7 – Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 556.

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cution was lessened, because the police and public prosecution had shortages in personnel and needed to prioritize in crimefighting. A 1958 draft for a new Penal Code recommended the decriminalization of consensual homosexuality. The commission of the Ministry of Justice did not adopt this recommendation, finding the effects of decriminalization unpredictable and because the Deputy Military Prosecutor firmly resisted.40 These decisions fit well with the general mindset of the postwar years. The GDR struggled with a perceived moral vacuum, created by displaced populations, the destruction of families, and the mass rape by the Red Army. Many had fled the country, so the youth was seen as the bearer of hope. Population growth was important to reconstruction. The state encouraged early marriage, young parenthood and thus a socially responsible form of heterosexuality, guiding sexual pleasure towards reproduction to help with the collective struggle.

Homosexuality was a social obstacle, and needed to be regulated for the sake of social stability and political normalization in times of postwar chaos.41 This makes it seem extremely surprising that in the new Criminal Code of 12 January 1968, homosexuality was decriminalized.42 However, decriminalization did not mean liberalization. Paragraph 175 was removed but Paragraph 151 was added, in which the age of consent was set at eighteen for homosexuals, whereas for heterosexuals this was fourteen. Because of its gender neutral language, lesbianism became punishable for the first time.43 Historically, in many countries lesbianism had been treated differently than male homosexuality. Since lesbianism took place within the private sphere and was thus less noticeable, it was often not illegal. This also had to do with the fact that, unlike men, women were not considered full citizens. Where male homosexuality was criminalized, lesbianism was often pathologized and fell within the medical domain.44 Paragraph 151 was the legal basis for impris40 Grau, ‘Return of the Past’ 7-17 – T. Smith, ‘The Archive and the Closet: Same-sex Desire and GDR Military Service in Stefan Wolter’s Autobiographical Writing’, Oxford German Studies 45-2 (2016) 199.

41 Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 554-555 – McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 51 – Evans, Reconstruction sites: Sexuality, citizenship, and the limits of national belonging in divided Berlin, 1944–1958 (Binghamton 2001) diss. iv-vi, 244-246.

42 D.K. Bryant, Locating the lesbian socialist subject: Absence and presence in East German fiction, sex discourse, and personal narratives (Michigan State University 2005) diss. 8 – McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 117.

43 Taylor, ‘The East German Contribution to Equal Gay and Lesbian Rights in Germany’ 313-314 – McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 117.

44 S. Karlinsky, ‘Russia’s Gay Literature and History’, Gay Sunshine 29-30 (1976) 360 – R. Moeller “The Homosexual Man Is a ‘Man,’ the Homosexual Woman Is a ‘Woman’”: Sex, Society, and the Law in Postwar West Germany’, Journal of the History of Sexuality 4-3 (1994) 396-417 – L. Essig, Queer in Russia: A Story of Sex, Self, and the Other (Durham - London 1999) 4 – N. Nartova “Russian Love,’ or What of Lesbian Studies in Russia’, Journal of Lesbian Studies 11-3 (2008) 314 – L. Engelstein, The Keys to Happiness: Sex and the Search for Modernity in Fin-de-Siècle Russia (Ithaca London 1992) 59.

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oning many homosexuals after homosexuality was technically legalized, and resulted in additional scrutiny towards the sexual actions of the youth. Meanwhile, consensual homosexuality between adults moved from the legal to the medical realm. In the 1960s psychiatrists and psychotherapists attempted to find causes of homosexuality, in order to prevent it.45 The SED still morally condemned homosexuality fervently, and other newly established paragraphs of the Penal Code could prevent its ‘popularization’. It prohibited political organization and banned gay and lesbian media, denying homosexuals access to public space.46 The invisibility gays and lesbians faced led to complete isolation in their teenage years. Meeting likeminded people was incredibly difficult, and many committed, or attempted, suicide. To fight this, during the 1970s they attempted to create a public space for themselves.47 Discrimination was still a daily occurrence. When people came out of the closet they were denied positions within the police, the party, the state bureaucracy, the military, and mass organizations. Many of these institutions denied the existence of homosexuality in its ranks, but at the same time the Ministerium für Staatssicherheit (Stasi) investigated the military extensively for cases of homosexuality. Unmarried enlisted men were carefully documented to make certain they were not homosexual. After decriminalization, homosexuals were still considered unsuitable for military careers. Furthermore, many gay men and lesbians were denied party status because they had to work in a substratum of society.48 When coming out of the closet to friends, family or colleagues, they were often met with incomprehension or rejection. Coming out was therefore usually a first step towards activism.49 In 1986, the central advertising agency dropped all gay and lesbian advertisements.50 Even letters from women looking for pen pals became forbidden. This was a hard hit for lesbians, who were reliant on them. Before, they interacted through contact ads and letters with coded language in the weekly post. Whilst gay men could meet in parks, bathrooms and restaurants, these ‘cruising areas’ were not available for lesbians. Access to groups and gatherings was only possible for them if they 45 Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 560-561.

46 Bryant, Locating the lesbian socialist subject 9 – McLellan, ‘Glad to be Gay Behind the Wall: Gay and Lesbian Activism in 1970s East Germany’, History Workshop Journal 74 (2012) 109 – Grau, ‘Return of the Past’ 18-19.

47 McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 118-119 – Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 564.

48 Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 564 – Smith, ‘The Archive and the Closet’ 199 – McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 134.

49 McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 119.

50 Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 564-565.

15

were already out of the closet, and had made contacts. The lack of publications on homosexuality limited the access to information on the subject, so books and magazines were illegally imported and circulated.51 Despite ongoing suppression, decriminalization was a first step towards liberalization, because it was an important precondition for gay activism in the 1970s. People could assert themselves as homosexual without fear of prosecution. There was also a loosening of the sexual norms that gave sexual minorities more confidence to assert themselves.52 Erich Honecker’s ascension to power led to a thaw period that lasted until 1976.53 In this period, the regime tried to accommodate popular expectations of greater political freedoms. At the same time, the Ministry of Health, Justice, and Education saw homosexuality as risky behavior that needed to be treated and prevented.

However, this did lead to a greater public discussion of homosexuality.54

Early gay activism in Berlin The influence of West Berlin was important for the formation of the first Eastern gay activist group. The Eastern and Western gay scenes in Berlin were relatively well linked to each other. There were not many gay bars in East Berlin, but around the Friedrichstrasse station there were three. These were tolerated by the authorities as long as they did not openly advertise themselves as gay meeting points. East Germans often only found them by chance or through contacts, but Western gay tourists were well aware of them; allowing a stream of information across the border. In 1971, a movie aired in West Berlin, titled Nicht der Homosexuelle ist Pervers, sondern die Situation, in der er Lebt (not the homosexual is perverse, but the society in which he lives) which was made by Rosa von Praunheim and Martin Dannecker. The movie called for a publicly politicized homosexuality with the message: ‘Out of the toilets, into the streets. Freedom for gays!’ After seeing the movie, Michael Eggert and Peter Rausch founded the Homosexuellen Initiative Berlin (HIB).55 Later, the HIB did cooperate with Western groups, but often ideological dif51 Sillge, ‘Lesben, Schwule, Bisexuelle, Transgender in der DDR,’ 2 – McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 120.

52 McLellan, ‘Glad to be Gay Behind the Wall’ 108 – Ibidem, ‘From Private Photography to Mass Circulation: The Queering of East German Visual Culture, 1968-1989’, Central European History 48-3 (2015) 405.

53 Taylor, ‘The East German Contribution to Equal Gay and Lesbian Rights in Germany’ 313 – McLellan, ‘Glad to be Gay Behind the Wall’ 212 – Fulbrook, A concise history of Germany 219.

54 Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 562-563.

55 McLellan, ‘Glad to be Gay Behind the Wall’ 109-110 – Ibidem, Love in the time of Communism 120 – Sillge, ‘Lesben, Schwule, Bisexuelle, Transgender in der DDR’ 2.

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ferences and state monitoring stood in the way of real collaboration.56 Six months after the foundation of the HIB, Peter Tatchell, an Australian member of the British Gay Liberation Front, decided to use the opportunity of the Tenth World Festival Games to spread the message of gay liberation. A million young East Germans and 25,000 foreign delegates gathered in celebration of socialist internationalism, a unique occurrence that was part of the cultural thaw of the early Honecker-era. At the Games, Tatchell spread leaflets that called for the abolishment of capitalist sexual morals and the oppressive heterosexual institution of marriage, which insinuated that accepting homosexuality was inherent to socialism, a daring message in East Germany. At the closing ceremony of the Games, HIB members held a sign calling for homosexual liberation, chanted gay liberation slogans, and distributed literature. Later on, this story became an important founding myth of East German gay and lesbian activism, and a symbol of their ability to publicly embarrass the regime.57 The HIB had three goals. Firstly, it sought to provide support and companionship for its members, with an emphasis on small-scale sociability in an affectionate group that could replace the traditional family. Secondly, it wanted to educate the general public on homosexuality. Thirdly, the HIB wanted to engage with the socialist state. The HIB was not a revolutionary party, and wanted to improve gay and lesbian lives under socialism. One of its chief aims was official recognition by the state, which was necessary to organize public events. The group forced themselves into the public sphere to assert a public presence of homosexuality.58 Crucial for the HIB was that they could use Charlotte von Mahlsdorf’s private museum, to gather for Sunday meetings. Von Mahlsdorf was a famous transvestite who made a unique contribution to German culture by preserving cultural artifacts, and by writing an autobiography which was subsequently made into a movie. She was a celebrity in the gay and lesbian spheres, but they were unaware that she had been a Stasi informant herself.59 56 McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 122 – Ibidem, ‘Glad to be Gay Behind the Wall’ 114-120 – Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 562.

57 McLellan, ‘Glad to be Gay Behind the Wall’ 111, 125 – Ibidem, Love in the time of Communism 121 – Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 563.

58 McLellan, ‘Glad to be Gay Behind the Wall’ 112-118 – Ibidem, Love in the time of Communism 121.

59 J. Giersdorf, ‘Why Does Charlotte von Mahlsdorf Curtsy? Representations of National Queerness in a Transvestite Hero’ GLQ: A Journal of Lesbian and Gay Studies 12-2 (2006) 171-196.

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The HIB attempted to reach out to gays and lesbians in the provinces and other big cities, and their meetings attracted a large and diverse crowd.60 However, the state did not want to accommodate the needs of the HIB. They tolerated individual bars or the private lives of gays, but they were wary of groups that were critical of an aspect of the system. Thus, the HIB came under Stasi surveillance. In 1978, Ursula Sillge attempted to organize a GDRwide meeting of lesbians, but the police blocked the event and forbade Von Mahlsdorf from holding events at her museum. HIB members petitioned the People’s Chamber and the League of Culture for a new meeting place, but this request was denied by the Council of Ministers in September 1979.

Thoroughly demotivated, the HIB dissolved itself. Its members went their own ways, becoming active in the new gay movements of the 1980s. Behind closed doors, the authorities did engage with the issues, organizing a selfhelp discussion group for lesbians by the House of Health, though many lesbians were dissatisfied with this attempt.61

Continuing activism and new commemorations The thaw period ended in 1976, bringing a period of renewed constraint in most cultural spheres. There was one exception; the Lutheran Protestant church (Evangelische Landeskirche) reached a modus vivendi with the state in 1978, which consolidated their role in society as the only social institution that was not coordinated by and subordinated to the Party. The church provided a protected space for the discussion of alternative views, and offered activist groups room to meet and use their equipment. Because of this, the East German gay and lesbian rights movement gained momentum again in the early 1980s. The state wanted to prevent radicalization of these groups by integrating them through the church.62 The church paper, Die Kirche, published articles that preached tolerance, and in 1982 the Evangelical Academy Berlin-Brandenburg held a public conference on homosexuality. The goal was to use insights of modern sexology to diminish prejudice around homosexuality, and to provide a framework for lesbians and gays to meet and further self-acceptance. Working groups with gay and lesbian members 60 McLellan, ‘Glad to be Gay Behind the Wall’ 123.

61 Sillge, ‘Lesben, Schwule, Bisexuelle, Transgender in der DDR’ 2 – McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 122 – Ibidem, ‘Glad to be Gay Behind the Wall’ 123-124 – Bryant, Locating the lesbian socialist subject 9-10.

62 D. M. Sweet, ‘The Church, the Stasi and Socialist Integration: Three Stages of Lesbian and Gay Emancipation in the Former German Democratic Republic’, Journal of Homosexuality 29-4 (1995) 352 – Fulbrook, A concise history of Germany 219-228 – Sillge, ‘Lesben, Schwule, Bisexuelle, Transgender in der DDR’ 6 – Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 566.

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were formed.63 In the mid-1980s, gay activism in the church reached provincial cities, leading to a nationwide meeting in 1986.64 This did not go without resistance from prominent factions within the Lutheran church, who agitated against the groups. Moreover, the groups were heavily infiltrated by the Stasi. In all major cities there was a Stasi office surveilling the church groups, coordinated by the Stasi Office for Homosexual Affairs in Berlin. Informants were a massive presence in the working groups; one group estimates that in hindsight 60% of its members were Stasi informants. Gay men often spied on their friends in these groups, partly because it earned them 500 marks a year, but also out of genuine patriotic feelings to serve the government. The Stasi was afraid of ‘politically negative and adversarial forces’ within the groups, and gave their members instructions on how to destroy groups from within by sowing mistrust and suspicion that other members were Stasi spies.65 The church groups continued to seek for a public space, by attempting to commemorate the gay and lesbian victims of the Nazi regime. In 1984, the group Lesbians in the Church tried to lay a wreath in Ravensbrück, but they were informed that they could only honor the victims of fascism if they did not do it as an organized group. When they attempted this in 1985, the riot police arrested the women and treated them harshly. The removal of their wreaths and book entries in Ravensbrück shows that the state wanted to erase the group from civil society, without direct confrontation. When direct confrontation did occur, lesbians were acknowledged in the public space and took advantage of this visibility by resisting the police, singing, and calling out to onlookers. Afterwards they drew parallels between their trials in the GDR and the victims of Nazi persecution, reinforcing their own victim status. A year later, the group finally laid a wreath and wrote an entry in the book, and a pink triangle was added to the museum’s collection.66 In the summer of 1984, church groups from all of East Germany attempted coordinated wreath laying ceremonies at Buchenwald and Sachsenhau63 F. Jörgens, ‘‘East’ Berlin: Lesbian and Gay Narratives on Everyday Life, Social Acceptance, and Past and Present’ in: R. Kuhar, J. Takács eds., Beyond the pink curtain: Everyday life of LGBT people in Eastern Europe (Ljublijana 2007) 119 – Sweet, ‘The Church, the Stasi and Socialist Integration’ 351-355.

64 Groups from Berlin, Dresden, Karl-Marx-Stadt, Erfurt, Halle, Leipzig, Magdeburg, Jena, Rostock and Brandenburg attended. McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 123 – Bryant, Locating the lesbian socialist subject 10 – Sillge, ‘Lesben, Schwule, Bisexuelle, Transgender in der DDR’ 6 – Sweet, ‘The Church, the Stasi and Socialist Integration’ 355.

65 Sweet, ‘The Church, the Stasi and Socialist Integration’ 352-359.

66 McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 124 – Sweet, ‘The Church, the Stasi and Socialist Integration’ 357 – Bryant, Locating the lesbian socialist subject 120-148.

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sen on Christopher Street Day, the German gay pride. The official response was coordinated by the Stasi, who agreed with veterans organizations and the management of the concentration camp sites that homosexuals could not be recognized as victims of fascism. Persecuted homosexuals had been ‘criminals’, not opponents of the Nazi regime. The groups were allowed to visit the camp only as individuals, and the ribbons on the wreath that mentioned homosexuality needed to be removed. The Stasi was heavily present on the day of remembrance. In the evening there was a church service for the gay and lesbian victims of Nazism, led by prominent activist Eduard Stapel. 150 people showed up, and Stasi reports mentioned that the limitations on that day only made activists more determined.67 In laying wreaths, two political traditions came together; anti-fascism, which was an important part of the rhetoric and self-understanding of the GDR, and the gay liberation activism of the West. It also linked the movement to an early attempt in the 1950s by Rudolf Klimmer to commemorate gay and lesbian victims of Nazism. Gays and lesbians tried to recover their obscured history as their own cultural anti-fascist inheritance, but the state wished to uphold a socialist heterosexual hegemony. Allowing gays and lesbians in public space by letting them lay wreaths would risk the ‘queering’ of civil society and anti-fascism. Furthermore, only communists were recognized as victims of Nazism, and commemorating homosexuals would trivialize or humiliate their sacrifices. McLellan speculates that since there was a lot of sexual activity between heterosexual inmates of concentration camps, remembrance of homosexual victims would be awkward for heterosexual-identifying communist veterans that had joined in such sexual activity. Besides, in camps there had been a prisoner hierarchy, with gay and lesbians in a low stratum and communists way higher up; something the official rhetoric of the state did not want to focus on.68 Despite these difficulties, the church’s gay rights movements grew quickly, but did not attempt to be an united front. The groups were often male dominated, so lesbians created their own groups with a feminist and gay rights political agenda. However, there was a large amount of cooperation between gay men and lesbians, and gay groups tried to be inclusive towards women.69 The church groups proclaimed openly that they were against the 67 McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 124-125 – Grau, ‘Return of the Past’ 7-8.

68 McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 126-127.

69 McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 127.

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system. A large proportion of the ‘Lesbians in the Church’ eventually left the GDR.70 When the GDR had signed the Helsinki Accords of 1975, it committed itself to human rights provisions which granted its citizens the right to emigrate. Applications were denied in overwhelming majority, but bureaucrats had a set of guidelines with various criteria for granting permission to emigrate, one of these criteria being ‘homosexuality’.71 Less militant and anti-system was the Sonntags-Club, the first secular group after the HIB, founded by Sillge in 1987. The Sonntags-Club wanted to integrate gays and lesbians into socialist society. They lobbied for changes in legislation, a space to meet in, contact ads, housing rights and public depictions of homosexuality. Despite the differences between the secular and church groups, there was a large amount of collaboration and people were often members of both. The Sonntags-Club attempted to put itself in a broader international framework, working with the International Lesbian and Gay Association, though they were hindered by restricted travel possibilities.72 In 1989 there was a surge in the growth of the secular and church groups. By the time of the Wende73, there were a total of fifteen secular groups through the country.74 The RosaLinde Free German Youth Group in Leipzig was the first gay youth group to receive official support. In 1988, all secular groups came together in Berlin. Together, they proclaimed their goals to combat prejudice towards homosexuality, arrange more information on the topic, change the regulations of the army, and fight to have contact ads in the printed media.75 Lesbians were attempting to build their own community against the socially and politically accepted heterosexuality. Motherhood and traditional ideals of womanhood were heavily emphasized, and compulsory heterosexuality was strongly undergirded by pronatalist strategies from the government. The Muttipolitik, introduced in 1972, encouraged women to embrace motherhood and bound women to childcare and the reproductive process.

It made lesbianism inconceivable, since the concepts of mother and lesbian were seen as mutually exclusive, even though many lesbians were married 70 Sillge, ‘Lesben, Schwule, Bisexuelle, Transgender in der DDR’ 5.

71 Sweet, ‘The Church, the Stasi and Socialist Integration’ 353.

72 Sillge, ‘Lesben, Schwule, Bisexuelle, Transgender in der DDR’ 5 – McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 128-129 – Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 567 – Bryant, Locating the lesbian socialist subject 10.

73 During the Wende in 1989/1990 the GDR changed from a dictatorship into a parliamentary democracy.

74 Bryant, Locating the lesbian socialist subject 11.

75 Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 567 – Sillge, ‘Lesben, Schwule, Bisexuelle, Transgender in der DDR’ 3.

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and had children before coming out as lesbian, due to the typical GDR lifecourse of marrying early. The GDR women’s movement was critical of the patriarchal structure and promoted equality, but still emphasized the family and childcare. This created an implicit structural homophobia, even though many of the members of the movement were lesbians.76

Repression and concessions in the final years of the GDR Problems remained despite growing activism: a rising amount of right-wing skinheads participated in gay bashing, and officials were often dismissive and uncomprehending. At the same time there was a liberal tendency in the state, especially among academics, doctors, and in the cultural sphere.

In the 1980s, there was a growing academic interest and collaboration with gays and lesbians. The state had two answers to the gay and lesbian activism. On the one hand, it responded with excessive Stasi surveillance.

A Stasi Operative, Gerhard Fehr, wrote a dissertation in 1983 which gave the Stasi ways to better identify homosexuals. The text was inspired by the rising wave of applications to leave the GDR, an increase in suicides, and the threat of AIDS. Fehr warned for the internal threat of homosexuals to the security of the GDR. Despite its homophobic attitude, the Stasi did welcome lesbians and gays as informers, describing them as skilled in espionage.77 On the other hand, the state responded with limited concessions. In 1985, a position paper from the Humboldt University reached Politburo members. It argued that it was time for a public transformation of the normative opinion through media discussion, academic research, and education. Gays and lesbians needed to be integrated into socialist life. The age of consent needed to be equalized, and gays and lesbians should be allowed contact ads and housing. The paper cited the problems that might occur when gays and lesbians were forced underground: suicide, disease transmission, increased contacts with foreigners, clique building, cruising, seduction, and blackmail.

Thus, many suggestions of the article were undertaken.78 The Sonntags-Club was officially recognized and allowed its own newspaper, and contact ads were permitted again. There was an unprecedented discussion of homosex-

76 Bryant, Locating the lesbian socialist subject 11-13 – McLellan ‘From Private Photography to Mass Circulation’ 422.

77 Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 565-571 – Bryant, Locating the lesbian socialist subject 10 – McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 130-135.

78 McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 135 – Taylor, ‘The East German Contribution to Equal Gay and Lesbian Rights in Germany’ 330-331 – Evans, ‘Decriminalization, Seduction, and ‘Unnatural Desire’ in East Germany’ 566.

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uality in the media, focused on tolerance and integration.79 A documentary, ‘Die Andere Liebe’, and a feature film, ‘Coming Out’, were allowed to air and reach a mass audience. In Coming Out, homosexuality finally gained its place in the dominant state rhetoric of anti-fascism. Because Coming Out premiered on 9 November 1989, the same night that the Berlin Wall opened, it did not have as much effect as expected. However, it was significant that the Politburo allowed it, believing that it was a politically necessary film.80 Corresponding to this more tolerant attitude, in 1989 the age of consent was equalized. For both heterosexuals and homosexuals, the age of consent was now fourteen. State enforced liberalization was a strategic concession, out of fear that gay and lesbian demonstrations, unrest, and radicalization might otherwise threaten the regime. Liberalization might also have been inspired by the threat of HIV/AIDS. In the GDR, AIDS was not as big of a problem as in Western Europe and the US, because of the restricted movement of population and because there was no possibility for a big drug scene. Still, the Western television kept people in the GDR informed, which led to public concern that verged on panic about the disease. This led to a higher profile for gay issues, and the position paper of 1985 argued that continued repression could lead to an increase of cases of AIDS.81 Liberalization was cautious and incomplete; there was no publicity around the legal change, and police surveillance continued. The liberalization that did occur led to increased possibility to organize and to find positive information on homosexuality. However, the publications on homosexuality did not reach outside of the cities, and isolation, especially for provincial lesbians, was still a big problem. The GDR tight-knit communities, that many straight people saw as one of the best things of communism, served to exclude and isolate gays and lesbians. Homophobia was still widespread among the East German population. After the equalization of the age of consent, the military even developed secret guidelines in order to continue dismissing gay men from full-time military careers.82 The unification with the BRD in 1990 led to a strange situation; the age of

79 Bryant, Locating the lesbian socialist subject 81 – Taylor, ‘The East German Contribution to Equal Gay and Lesbian Rights in Germany’ 329.

80 McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 135-138 – Ibidem, ‘From Private Photography to Mass Circulation’ 405, 422 – Smith, ‘The Archive and the Closet’ 198-199.

81 Taylor, ‘The East German Contribution to Equal Gay and Lesbian Rights in Germany’ 322-338 – McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 138-141.

82 McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 139-143 – Smith, ‘The Archive and the Closet’ 199.

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consent was not equalized in the BRD.83 The East German legal system was disposed of in favor of that of the West, but the equalized age of consent still applied to the eastern part of the country, by special exception in the unification treaty. Greg Taylor argues that this pressure led to equalization of the age of consent for the western part of the country as soon as 1994.84

83 Sweet, ‘The Church, the Stasi and Socialist Integration’ 364.

84 Taylor, ‘The East German Contribution to Equal Gay and Lesbian Rights in Germany’ 303.

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CHAPTER 2

The West German lesbian and gay movements: from social revolutionaries to pragmatic activists ‘ Der Unterdrückung der Homosexualität ist nur ein spezial fall der Sexlunterdrückung’85 – a motto of the three-day national demonstration organized by the Homosexuelle Aktion Berlin.86

For many people in the Federal Republic of Germany (Bundesrepublik Deutschland, or BRD) the earliest postwar years were a period of extreme insecurity and hardship. However, after surviving Nazi persecution, for the gay community this period brought a sense of enormous relief. The legal and social chaos, preoccupied police and officials, and uncertainty about the fate of Paragraph 175 offered them freedom.87 This exceptional freedom ended when in the late 1940s economic and political stability re-emerged. The three western zones were unified and a new constitution, the Grundgesetz (Basic Law) was drawn 85 ‘The oppression of homosexuality is only a particular example of the general oppression of sexuality!’

86 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 81.

87 Grau, ‘Return of the Past’ 10 – C. Whisnant, Male Homosexuality in West Germany: Between Persecution and Freedom, 1945-69 (Basingstoke – New York 2012) <https://books.google.nl/books?id=vGIOL02R8G4C&hl=nl &source=gbs_ navlinks_s>, last accessed 16 June 2017.

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up. In 1949, Konrad Adenauer was elected Chancellor, and the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) entered a coalition with the liberal Free Democratic Party. The Protestant and Catholic churches were the only national institutions that had remained intact after the war, and worked closely with the state.

They held moral purity campaigns against the ethical decline and immorality of the times, focusing especially on the protection of young Germans.88 The dominant notions of gender-roles and sexual order, and anxieties about the development of the youth, gave new justifications for legal prosecution and social stigmatization of homosexuality. One of the main collective memories of the Second World War was the sexual and gender disorder and the erosion of the family. This suggested that, to rebuild society, one had to restore the German family. Adenauer’s government deeply committed itself to this Familienpolitik, which could demonstrate West Germany’s moral superiority to East Germany. A growing population was seen as essential to the post-war reconstruction, leading to a policy of pronatalism and a focus on reproductive heterosexuality. Because Paragraph 175 remained in force, the social stigmas around homosexuals as criminals gained legitimacy and continued to influence West German culture well into the 1960s.89 A spread of scientific knowledge on sexuality in the 1950s also brought on a powerful conceptualization of homosexuality as an illness.90 Despite the sexually conservative Adenauer-era, an expansion of the urban gay scenes occurred during the late 1950s, as well as a limited debate about decriminalization of homosexuality. The Paragraphs remained in force, but the post-1945 legal principles ensured that police enforcement changed drastically, which was critical for the rebirth of the West German gay scenes.91 The homophile92 movement –whose main strategy was to show respectable masculine behavior in order to gain social acceptance– managed to revive the destroyed homosexual scene of the Weimar republic.93 In the big cities, the gay scene made a reappearance in bathrooms, parks, streets, bars, and clubs. In 1949 the Association for Humanitarian Lifestyle was 88 Whisnant, Male Homosexuality in West Germany – Harsch, ‘Eroticism, Love, and Sexuality in the Two Postwar Germanys’ 630 – Moeller “The Homosexual Man Is a ‘Man,’ the Homosexual Woman Is a ‘Woman” 419, 424.

89 Whisnant, Male Homosexuality in West Germany – Evans, Reconstruction sites iv-v – Moeller, “The Homosexual Man Is a ‘Man,’ the Homosexual Woman Is a ‘Woman’” 422-424 – R. van Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? Gay Liberation and the Left in West Germany, 1969-1989 (Stony Brook University 2014) diss.

29-30.

90 Grau, ‘Return of the Past’ 11.

91 Whisnant, Male Homosexuality in West Germany.

92 The word ‘homophile’ was chosen instead of ‘homosexual’, in order to put less emphasis on sexuality.

93 Whisnant, Male Homosexuality in West Germany – Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 6, 14.

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established to provide legal support to homosexuals. Homosexual men could seek information and contacts through foreign organizations, and despite their illegality, in the early 1950s homosexual magazines and publications were increasing. Nevertheless, homophile organizations had a hard time gaining legitimacy in the eyes of the German public. The organizations were often conflicted about their purpose and objectives. In 1953, the Society for Human Rights was founded, which acquired over 3000 members. Most other organizations had fewer members, and maintained low visibility to avoid legal confrontations. Prosecution continued, and between 1954 and 1963, the police reported 98.700 violations of the Paragraph, out of whom almost 38.000 were found guilty and sentenced. This is a higher amount of prosecutions than in twelve years of Nazism.94

The debate on legalization in the Federal Republic In 1957, the Federal Constitutional Court investigated the constitutionality of Paragraph 175 because two prosecuted gay men claimed it embodied Nazistic principles and went against the Grundgesetz, which said that each individual had the right to develop their own personality. The Grundgesetz also guaranteed equal rights for men and women, and the Paragraph did not prosecute lesbians: a sexual double standard. The Court decided that because the Allied forces of occupation and the West German parliament had shown no intention to reform the paragraph, it was proven legitimate. After consulting a team of panel expert witnesses, they decided that there was no sexual double standard, because women would, through their reproductive instincts and maternal duties, eventually come back to procreation. Additionally, there was no threat of seduction of young women, because lesbians would be drawn to older women. Nor were they a threat to society, since they were less visible in public. Therefore, ‘lesbian love and male homosexuality appear[ed] as non-comparable in a legal sense’.95 Furthermore, despite the fact that sexual relations between consenting adults fell into the private realm, where the state had no right to intervene, the court decided that bedrooms of male homosexuals were spaces on the border of private and social

94 Moeller, “The Homosexual Man Is a ‘Man,’ the Homosexual Woman Is a ‘Woman’” 427 – Ibidem, ‘Private Acts, Public Anxieties, and the Fight to Decriminalize Male Homosexuality in West Germany’, Feminist Studies 36-3 (2010) 530 – Whisnant, Male Homosexuality in West Germany – Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 27-31.

95 Moeller, “The Homosexual Man Is a ‘Man,’ the Homosexual Woman Is a ‘Woman’” 417.

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spheres as a threat to morality.96 Likewise, the Court rejected the claim that criminalization of homosexuality was at odds with the western world and went against the 1950 European Convention of Human Rights, arguing that a commitment to human rights did not mean that laws for the protection of health and morality had to make way for the ‘protection of the rights and freedoms of others’.97 In future debates on reform of the Paragraph, opponents of reform always referred to this decision. People thought that lessening criminal penalties would lead to the public organization of homosexuality and the entry of homosexuals in same-sex institutions, such as the military and the police, which would directly endanger the larger society.98 Liberal jurists tried to reform Paragraph 175, arguing that homosexuality was an inherent human characteristic. Hans Giese, for instance, differentiated between ‘positive’, ‘normal’ homosexual types, and ‘negative’, ‘abnormal’ ones. These arguments unintentionally contributed to a further pathologizing of non-conformist homosexuals, which helped homophobic rhetoric and was copied by the homosexual community as well.99 Homophile organizations also petitioned the government to repeal Paragraph 175 and were met with rejection and setbacks during the 1950s and ‘60s.100 In 1962, a new draft law made some alterations to Paragraph 175, in order to avoid seeming unwilling to deal with the Nazistic legacy. Still, penalties were maintained for ‘coitus-like behavior’. Courts could decide which sex acts were meant by that. It left in place the higher age of consent and criminal penalties for men who used their superior position in the workplace to coerce another employee into homosexual activities. However, the draft law was put on hold, because new parliamentary elections were coming up. Seven years later, when it was picked up again, a lot had changed. A progressive movement had triumphed and pushed for modernization. The SPD had come to power in 1969 with a parliamentary majority of liberals and Social Democrats. The latter had supported decriminalization of homosexuality since the 1890s, and with the Christian Democrats removed from power, Christianity was less influential in politics. In addi96 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 30 – Moeller “The Homosexual Man Is a ‘Man,’ the Homosexual Woman Is a ‘Woman’” 396-421.

97 Moeller “The Homosexual Man Is a ‘Man,’ the Homosexual Woman Is a ‘Woman’” 421 – Ibidem, ‘Private Acts, Public Anxieties, and the Fight to Decriminalize Male Homosexuality in West Germany’ 530-531.

98 Moeller, “The Homosexual Man Is a ‘Man,’ the Homosexual Woman Is a ‘Woman’” 422.

99 Ibidem, ‘Private Acts, Public Anxieties, and the Fight to Decriminalize Male Homosexuality in West Germany’ 531-541 – Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 36-39.

100 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 39.

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tion, after fifteen years of prosperity there were no longer demographic or economic anxieties.101 The decisions of other nations on the topic had been influential: several Western countries had already decriminalized homosexuality, and so had the German Democratic Republic. The Protestant Church too had been calling for decriminalization since the 1960s.102 In 1968, a national meeting of German lawyers decided sexual activity between consenting adults should be decriminalized. The mature citizens could formulate moral judgments themselves, without the state’s interference. Instead, the state should protect the ‘sphere of intimacy.’ A year later, a majority in the Bundestag voted in favor of decriminalization.

Still, the anxiety that young men would be seduced into homosexuality led to a higher age of consent (twenty-one) for homosexual men, which was lowered in 1973 to eighteen. The language of the reformers was still deeply homophobic. They argued that decriminalization was not the same as acceptance of homosexuality, and that the suspension of Paragraph 175 would lead to a decrease of homosexuality, since homosexuality was most widespread in prisons that held violators of Paragraph 175.103 Significantly, the state was unwilling to consider that Paragraph 175 had embodied Nazi racial teaching. Only at the end of the decade did political pressure from the gay liberation movement and the Green party lead to the inclusion of homosexuals among the ‘forgotten victims’ of Nazism, but their material compensation was very limited.104 Homophobic attitudes continued because, a family-centered, soft masculinity had become normative. This masculinity was juxtaposed against the image of the corrupting homosexual. There was an anxiety that soft masculinity might turn too soft, which made it important to police the border between heterosexuality and homosexuality. The sexual revolution of the 1960s led to a growing acceptance of different sorts of families both in state politics and in society, but only

101 Moeller, ‘Private Acts, Public Anxieties, and the Fight to Decriminalize Male Homosexuality in West Germany’ 534-537.

102 Moeller, ‘Private Acts, Public Anxieties, and the Fight to Decriminalize Male Homosexuality in West Germany’ 534-538 – Taylor, ‘The East German Contribution to Equal Gay and Lesbian Rights in Germany’ 322.

103 Moeller ‘Private Acts, ‘Public Anxieties, and the Fight to Decriminalize Male Homosexuality in West Germany’ 541 – C. Griffiths, ‘Sex, Shame and West German Gay Liberation’, German History 34-3 (2016) 447 – Whisnant, Male Homosexuality in West Germany – Jörgens, ‘‘East’ Berlin: Lesbian and Gay Narratives on Everyday Life, Social Acceptance, and Past and Present’ 119.

104 Moeller, “The Homosexual Man Is a ‘Man,’ the Homosexual Woman Is a ‘Woman’” 427.

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for heterosexual people. Public opinion still severely morally condemned homosexuality.105

The emergence of an early gay movement Liberalization did lead to the emergence of bars, organizations, and attempts to form homosexual associations, which had as goal to integrate into society.106 Liberalization was a prerequisite for the emergence of a homophile commercial gay press, which dealt with the dilemma of keeping a clean and respectable image while simultaneously satisfying the readers’ desires to see their sexuality affirmed and emboldened.107 While liberalization enabled the development of a larger gay subculture, it was not able to launch a gay pride movement.108 This only happened after 1971, when the movie ‘Nicht der Homosexuelle ist Perverse, sondern die Situation in der er Lebt’ by Von Praunheim and Dannecker aired.109 This movie was a visual manifesto for the movement, and shaped the views of activists. The goal of the film was to transform the understanding homosexuals had of themselves, and to launch a movement that would transform what they saw as a materialistic, hypocritical, and oppressed subculture. The film argued that gays needed to stop copying a heterosexual society and form deeper non-monogamous relationships with other gay men, as well as their own communities. They needed to work together with women and other oppressed minorities against discrimination. The movie also challenged the idea of the ‘respectable homosexual’ of the homophile movement, one that needed to be ‘sanitized’ in order to fit into society. Rather, the movie called for a confrontation with the heterosexual bourgeois society responsible for their oppression.110 Capitalism produced neurotic pathological gay men, and through the process of coming out, homosexuals could fight back against the capitalist society by becoming visible. The movie enforced a dichotomy between emancipated homosexuals and pathological homosexuals, which had already existed in the scientific discourse.111 105 Moeller, ‘Private Acts, Public Anxieties, and the Fight to Decriminalize Male Homosexuality in West Germany’ 542-545 – Whisnant, Male Homosexuality in West Germany.

106 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 52.

107 Griffiths, ‘Sex, Shame and West German Gay Liberation’ 447-451.

108 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 43.

109 Moeller, ‘Public Anxieties, and the Fight to Decriminalize Male Homosexuality in West Germany’ 547 – Ibidem, “The Homosexual Man Is a ‘Man,’ the Homosexual Woman Is a ‘Woman’” 546-547 – McLellan, Love in the time of Communism 109-110.

110 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 42-49.

111 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 58-65 – Griffiths, ‘Sex, Shame and West German Gay Liberation’ 564.

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Many within the gay scene were afraid that this negative image would only reinforce negative stereotypes and lead to more homophobia in society, and indeed, there were many complaints about the movie. Nevertheless, there were positive responses too, and the movie led to more public discussion of homosexuality. Documentaries and other movies on the topic followed, and the magazine Der Spiegel published several stories on homosexuality throughout the 1970s. Screenings and film discussions led to the formation of gay-student Aktionsgruppen (activist groups). The movie was especially influential for gay men who were already involved in political activism through the student movement. Many were Marxist-Leninist anti-capitalists who wanted to participate in the class struggle, but to be able to live freely while doing so.

The Communist party and student groups had not wanted to create gay subgroups, wanting to focus only on the class struggle. Some student activists thought that fascism was partially the result of latent homosexuality.112 The Aktionsgruppen had difficulty in formulating their goals, manifestos, and a positive gay image. Much of the focus was negatively and exclusionary, aimed at neurotic personalities within the subculture, which was underscored by gay magazines. These identity struggles led to clashes within the movement, which were fought out in the Tuntenstreit (Fairy Debate) in June 1973. The HAW had organized a three-day national demonstration, with the motto ‘The oppression of homosexuality is only a particular example of the general oppression of sexuality!’ When French and Italian activists showed up in drag, a debate ensued. An orthodox Marxist wing argued that homosexual emancipation would only come out of a unified revolution against capitalism and drag queens undermined their relationship with the Left. A feminist wing wanted to combat patriarchy by demonstrating in drag, and wanted to work together with the women’s movement instead of the largely homophobic working class.113 Nevertheless, the Tuntenstreit did not lead to dramatic ruptures in the movement; the group continued with a mixture of Marxist and feminist perspectives.114 Moreover, the Tuntenstreit had two positive outcomes; firstly, the pink triangle was reclaimed as a symbol; a common way to come out for feminists and orthodox Marxists which emphasized its connection to persecution under Nazism.115 Secondly, the gay subculture grew more accepting 112 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 49-59.

113 Ibidem,71-82.

114 115 Moeller, ‘Private Acts, Public Anxieties, and the Fight to Decriminalize Male Homosexuality in West Germany’ 548.

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of effeminate gays and drag queens, who now had revolutionary potential.

Despite the fact that both Marxist and feminist ideologies were adopted, working together with the organized Left or women’s movement mostly did not work out.116

New activism and controversies during the 1980s In 1977 a series of violent actions of the Rote Armee Fraktion against the state led to authoritarian measures by the BRD government, such as the Berufsverbot and the Radikalenerlass, through which anyone that was thought to have been involved in anti-government or unconstitutional activities could be denied employment in civil service.117 At the same time, a disorganized Sponti scene was emerging; a group of left wing (often student) activists who wanted a revolution that would occur spontaneously from a bottom up movement, and rejected both centralized political organizations and working within the existing parliamentary system.118 This frustrated other young leftists, who wanted to respond to state oppression.

To voice this dissent, they organized a counter-cultural festival, the Tunix conference of 1978. This was the beginning of a transnational anti-authoritarian ‘alternative culture’. They viewed the Left as having become stagnant and conformist whilst the state had become more repressive and were skeptical of class-based revolutionary theories. They did not abandon the anti-capitalist struggle, but wanted to change the system from within.119 Gay and lesbian activists were inspired by this organization. They thought they were especially vulnerable for the Berufsverbot, and wanted to respond to blacklisting and police harassment. In 1977, the Russell Tribunal met in Frankfurt. The Russell Tribunal was a private body established in 1966 by Bertrand Russell and Jean-Paul Satre, and initially sought to assess ongoing US military actions. Afterwards, further tribunals were set up to investigate human rights violations, amongst which the one in Frankfurt.120 Gay activists gathered evidence of discrimination against homosexuals for the Tribunal, but the committee did not consider it human right violations.

116 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 78-89.

117 Fulbrook, A concise history of Germany 221.

118 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 90.

119 Fulbrook, A concise history of Germany 221 – Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 128-137.

120 Z. Manfredi, ‘Pluralizing the History of International Criminal Law: Reconsidering the Russell Tribunal as an Alternative form of Left Legalism’, The Rituals of Human Rights’ Workshop Centre For International Governance and Justice (Canberra 2014) <http://regnet.anu.edu.au/sites/default/files/publications/attachments/2015-08/10%20 Manfredi%2C%20Pluarlizing%20the%20history%20of%20International%20Criminal%20Law.pdf>, last accessed 8 June 2017.

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In order to still draw public attention to the oppression of homosexuals, the activists hosted their own mass festival, Homolulu, in Frankfurt. This movement wanted to bring cohesion to a variety of gay organizations, at a moment where some Aktionsgruppen folded or became part of larger organizations. Their agenda was dominated by reform-oriented strategies, and the movement overall was more integrationist. They distanced themselves from the male-focused gay movements in the past and attempted to be inclusive for lesbians, but lesbians had formed their own separate movement in the 1970s, and had limited interaction with male activists.121 In the 1980s, lesbians had two tactics. Firstly, by organizing women-only projects, they withdrew their creative, political, and social potential and competence from male-dominated public space and created a women-only public space in which women could relate to each other. These groups were financed through city council and state subsidies.

Because the public funds that would otherwise have gone to male-dominated institutions was now redirected to women-dominated ones, financial loss became an immediate consequence of excluding women’s issues.

Secondly, they organized women-only groups for a limited period to formulate needs and goals, after which lesbians went back into mixed spaces to change the discourse in male-dominated organizations.122 The 1980s held two other controversies for the gay and lesbian movement. The first was around the topic of pedophilia. Since the early 1970s, part of the New Left and gay movement viewed the denial of children’s sexuality as part of the larger political and sexual repression by the bourgeois society. They thought that pedophiles were persecuted minorities, and argued that consensual pedophilia should be legal. Additionally, the efforts to reform the age of consent in Paragraph 175 brought homosexuals in alliance with pedophile groups. More importantly, the New Left felt as though they had to show solidarity to any other oppressed group. These issues were included in a meeting between gay activists and politicians on July 12, 1980 in Bonn. The meeting had seen a rare measure of cooperation between gays and lesbians, but the presence of pedophiles made audience members disruptive and the meeting had to be brought to an end.

121 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 77, 137-144 – A.S. Münst, ‘Lesbian’s Contribution to the Autonomous Women’s Movement in (West-) Germany, Exemplified by a State Capital City’, Women’s Studies International Forum 23-5 (2000) 601-607.

122 Münst, ‘Lesbian’s Contribution to the Autonomous Women’s Movement in (West-) Germany, Exemplified by a State Capital City’ 601-607.

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The cooperation ended over the question if the anti-discrimination bill needed to repeal only Paragraph 175 or the entire sexual criminal code.123 The Greens, a fairly nuanced anti-capitalist party that wanted to transform the system from within, was supportive of gays and lesbians, and reform of sexual legislation was a prominent issue in its platform. Because of this, the Greens also dealt with the controversies of the gay movement.

A working group for gays and pedophiles within the party wanted to have legislation against pedophilia removed, causing major controversy within the party and shocking the public. An early attempt at removing the Paragraph failed, and some blamed the inclusion of pedophilia for it.124 Support of pedophilia ended when there came a growing emphasis on rights, including the rights of children. Gay men sought to refute the prejudice that homosexuals preyed on boys. Eventually, this led to an abandonment of support for the repeal of age of consent laws, and a total exclusion of pedophiles from the international gay movement in the 1990s.125 The second controversy was around the AIDS-crisis. The BRD official approach was relatively humane; it demonstrated concern for victims and focused on education and prevention policies, and there was generous funding for the eighty local non-profit groups in the German AIDS support network. Some sectors of the government did panic and called for quarantining those with HIV, mandatory testing, and contact tracing. Bavarian courts enacted local legislation that led to more coercive policies. Media reports were incredibly sensationalist and spread a sense of panic through the BRD, with the underlying message that AIDS was the product of too much sexual liberation and the dangerous lifestyles of homosexuals.126 Some gay activists, including Dannecker, were afraid that an AIDS prevention strategy was a way to enforce bourgeois values and that the safe-sex approach might lead to the increased regulation of homosexuality, undermining the achieved emancipation. Other activists, headed by Von Praunheim, were angry that liberation was seen as more important than the threat of AIDS. Eventually, a more selective safe-sex strategy was adopted in the BRD, which specified the need to wear protection only during anal intercourse.127

123 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 157-162 – Griffiths, ‘Sex, Shame and West German Gay Liberation’ 456-457.

124 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 158-165.

125 Griffiths, ‘Sex, Shame and West German Gay Liberation’ 456-466 – Moeller, ‘Private Acts, Public Anxieties, and the Fight to Decriminalize Male Homosexuality in West Germany’ 548.

126 Griffiths, ‘Sex, Shame and West German Gay Liberation’ 445.

127 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 169-177 – Griffiths, ‘Sex, Shame and West German Gay Liberation’ 465.

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By the late 1980s, the autonomous left-wing gay movement came to an end. In its place came a large collection of community centers, self-help groups, and cultural organizations, which emphasized identity politics, not in favor of a larger collective revolution, but as a strategy to gain rights within the existing system.128

128 Cleef, A Tale of Two Movements? 157.

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CHAPTER 3

Transsexual experiences in a divided Germany ‘Ist das nicht ehrlos, daβ du um deine Freiheit, deine Würde feilschen muβt, wie ein Pferdehändler?’129

Before delving into the history of transsexual people in the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany, it is important to consider the theoretical framework around transsexual narratives. Sandy Stone’s study shows that often, autobiographical and biographical transsexual narratives used a binary oppositional mode of gender identification, wherein the subject changed gender at one very specific moment; the gender reconstruction surgery. This surgery functioned as a clear barrier between the former and the new self. Transsexual narratives often seem as though they adhere to conservative traditional gender-norms that underwrite a gender-binary, rather than a more ambiguous gender-spectrum. Stone explains that these narratives are actually constructed by the medical establishment.130 When, in the 1960s, the first academic gender dysphoria clinics were established, doctors desired diagnostic, repeatable, objective, and clinically appropriate criteria to decide whether a person was eligible for genital reconstruction surgery. Constructing these criteria proved impossible, so 129 ‘Is it not dishonorable that one needs to bargain for one’s freedom, one’s dignity, like a horse dealer?’ (Ulrich, ‘Am liebsten würden sie uns vergasen’ 80).

130 S. Stone, ‘The ‘Empire’ Strikes Back: Posttranssexual Manifesto’ 1-8.

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final decisions of eligibility were made on the basis of an individual sense of whether or not candidates performed the gender of choice convincingly, according to traditional gender-roles. This was known and passed along within the transsexual community, so candidates made sure they fit the description.131 If they did not, their honesty was punished by a denial of treatment. Thus, candidates omitted information which would disrupt normative gender-roles, such as homosexuality or the enjoyment of sex in their unaltered body.132 Many transsexuals adopted the medical narrative of ‘being in the wrong body’. As such, the medical establishment created norm-abiding gendered subjects, screening out those that did not fit into a dichotomized traditional gender-binary. The process of obtaining permission required transsexuals to repeat their approved narrative in many subsequent meetings with medical professionals, counselors, and psychiatrists.133 Another requirement was a successful daily performance of normative gender-roles in the new gender category. This was considered successful when cisgender people recognized their ‘new’ gender.

Transsexuals copied these normative standards to obtain surgery in a self-conscious strategy, but that does not mean they always identified with them. Since transsexuals were required, by society’s judgment, to continue proving their gender-identity was legitimate, many autobiographical narratives still adhered to these norms.134 Transsexuals felt as though they needed to erase the past of their assigned gender in order to ‘pass’ as the gender they identified with, subsequently erasing the complexities and ambiguities of their experiences. This has made it difficult to create an effective counter-discourse to the medical narrative.135 It is interesting to analyze to what extent the case-studies below follow the medical narrative, and/or create a counter-discourse.

131 Ibidem, 1-10.

132 D. Spade, ‘Mutilating Gender’.

133 Stone, ‘The ‘Empire’ Strikes Back: Posttranssexual Manifesto’ 10-15.

134 Spade, ‘Mutilating Gender’.

135 Stone, ‘The ‘Empire’ Strikes Back: Posttranssexual Manifesto’ 13-14.

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3.1 TRANSSEXUAL EXPERIENCES IN THE GERMAN DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC ‘Wir wollen leben, weiβt Du. Nicht mehr und nicht weniger.’136

The GDR Ministry of Health allowed genital reconstruction surgery since 1976. The amount and success of the operations performed is unclear. The state was willing to treat transsexuality because it was seen as a medical condition that was diagnosable, quantifiable, and, most importantly, could be healed by professional intervention.137 The internal decree for the treatment of transsexual people contained hormone treatment, psychological care, genital reconstruction surgery and a possibility to change one’s name.138 The age minimum was eighteen and the procedure was entirely free.139 In this chapter we will analyze the stories of two FTM-transsexuals (Sidney M., born in Neuenhagen in 1959; and Andreas Krieger, born in Berlin in 1966), and three MTF-transsexuals (Nadja Sch., born in Berlin in 1969; Lilith E., born in Erfurt in 1951; and Amanda Z., born in Wernigerrode in 1964).

Oppressive enforced gender roles in public and at home There are several recurring themes in these stories. For one, society’s strict adherence to gender-roles, enforced through excessive social control, led to a feeling of isolation for transsexuals in their youth and adolescence.

Sidney describes living in the municipality Neuenhagen, where inhabitants were distrusting towards anything abnormal or from beyond the Wall. A girl wearing pants was a provocation, especially the forbidden ‘jeans’ from the class enemy. Teachers encouraged other students to start fights with Sidney, just to rip up his clothes. They refused to give Sidney high grades, arguing that they had assumed Sidney had cheated. The social control of the village also made it too dangerous to pursue his love for a girl.140 Nadja’s isolation was of a different nature; at the age of six she was diagnosed with a behavioral disorder and locked in a mental hospital for three months.

She attempted suicide and was subsequently locked in an isolated room.141 136 ‘We want to live, you know? Nothing more and nothing less.’ (Ulrich, ‘Und die Eisbären glotzen neidisch’, in: Ibidem, Messer im Traum, 68).

137 McLellan, Love in the time of communism, 130.

138 Nadja Sch. actually says that this decree had been in force since 1974. (Ulrich, ‘Und die Eisbären glotzen neidisch’ 63).

139 Ulrich, ‘Und die Eisbären glotzen neidisch’ 63.

140 Ibidem, ‘Ich träume mein Leben voraus’ in: Ibidem, Messer im Traum, 45-47.

141 Ibidem, ‘Und die Eisbären glotzen neidisch’ 55-57.

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Lilith describes desperately trying to fit in with boys at school when she was fourteen, by participating in a game of sexually harassing a girl. Afterwards, she was so ashamed of her actions that she isolated herself completely.142 Andreas, as well, describes feeling like an outsider at school and in girls’ groups. He found his place when he was fourteen, in the Sports School for Children and Youth in Berlin, which was affiliated with the Stasi-sponsored sports club Dynamo. There, he felt accepted and appreciated.143 Only Amanda does not describe such difficulties, despite her love for the not quite traditionally masculine interests of ballet and theatre.144 The case-studies often mention abusive parents. Sidney145 and Nadja were punished for deviating from gender-norms, in Nadja’s case for wearing women’s clothing. Her father forced her to take off the clothing piece by piece in front of her siblings eyes, after which she was continuously mocked by her siblings and beaten by her parents. At the age of eleven, Nadja attempted to commit suicide, but fainted before she could do it. Eventually, she decided to tell her parents about her loneliness and suicidal thoughts, but was met with accusations of being ungrateful.146 Lilith was abused not because of her gender performance, but because of the mental disorders of her parents. Her mother constantly accused Lilith of not loving her enough, and when Lilith was ten, her mother threatened to commit suicide, telling Lilith she was to blame. Lilith’s father did not intervene, being mentally ill as well. He took his own life when Lilith was eighteen.147 For all but Amanda, family relationships were compromised when one’s true gender-identity was pursued.148 Nadja’s parents had eventually accepted her transsexuality and even tried to help her obtain surgery, but ended their support when Nadja fell in love with a woman seventeen years older than herself.149 ‘Dysphoria’, the feelings of distress resulting from uncomfortableness with one’s current body, led to mental health problems. Andreas’ situation was exceptional, since he was given the steroid ‘Oral-Turinabol’ as part of a state-sanctioned doping system, without his knowledge. Andreas expresses that in his youth his gender had not been fixed yet, and the hormones 142 Ibidem, ‘Alles began bevor ich starb’ in: Ibidem, Messer im Traum, 96.

143 J. Longman, DRUG TESTING; East German Steroids’ Toll: ‘They Killed Heidi’ – Andreas Krieger: Heidi’s Farthest Throw [Video file].

144 Ulrich, ‘In der Hölle war ich schon’ in: Ibidem, Messer im Traum, 147-148.

145 Ibidem, ‘Ich träume mein Leben voraus’ 47.

146 Ibidem, ‘Und die Eisbären glotzen neidisch’ 55-68.

147 Ibidem, ‘Alles began bevor ich starb’ 95-97.

148 Ibidem, ‘In der Hölle war ich schon’ 155-156.

149 Ibidem, ‘Und die Eisbären glotzen neidisch’ 65.

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switched his balance to the masculine side. At the age of eighteen, he had gained a lot of weight in muscle-mass, had a deep voice, and increased body and facial hair. On the streets of Berlin he was called homosexual or drag queen, after which he stopped wearing skirts. The pills led to mood swings, depression, and aggression. He felt out of place in his own body, in the sports school, and in girls’ groups.150 In regards to Sidney, dysphoria made him ill for long periods of time, which worsened when his menstruation started; the pain made him unable to move and to perform at school. He dropped out, and moved to Berlin in hopes for improvement.151

Berlin, a safe haven?

Berlin did offer more anonymity, and more importantly, a gay and lesbian scene or the alternative Prenzlauer Berg scene. It was not always a way out, though. Sidney found a boyfriend at Prenzlauer Berg, but after Sidney told him about identifying as male, his boyfriend attempted to ‘cure’ him by quarantining Sidney in their rooms and raping him. Consequently, Sidney grew ill and apathetic, and his boyfriend sought out a pastor to help.

Against Sidney’s expectations, the pastor advised Sidney to leave his boyfriend and to seek out the gay and lesbian community. There, for the first time, Sidney found understanding and emotional connection.152 Sidney was the only one who reached this community through religion. His initial skepticism about the ability of the church to help might also have existed for the others, keeping them from seeking solace in the church. Berlin presented an escape for Nadja as well. She had gotten a girl pregnant and married her, but her wife had grown resentful towards Nadja’s habit to dress as a woman. Nadja left for Berlin, finding freedom to have numerous casual sexual encounters and colleagues who accepted her feminine clothing. She came across Reiner Werner’s book153 on homosexuality, the first time she found information on the subject, and realized she was transsexual.154 Amanda moved to Berlin to escape the control of her mother. Amanda had been raped by three men in a pub toilet at the age of fourteen. She had actually enjoyed it and afterwards kept visiting the pub for sexual contact

150 Longman, DRUG TESTING; East German Steroids’ Toll: ‘They Killed Heidi’ – Andreas Krieger: Heidi’s Farthest Throw [Video file] – Lost World of Communism: East Germany [Video file].

151 Ulrich, ‘Ich träume mein Leben voraus’ 46-47.

152 Ulrich, ‘Ich träume mein Leben voraus’ 47-48.

153 R. Werner, Homosexualität – Herausforderung an Wissen und Toleranz (Berlin 1988).

154 Ulrich, ‘Und die Eisbären glotzen neidisch’ 61-62.

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with men, until her mother had found out and started monitoring her every move. Amanda ran away to live with an estranged aunt in Berlin, where she became a regular at one of the gay meeting points. There she got a forty year old boyfriend, with whom she moved in. At an underground party in Prenzlauer Berg, he got her drunk and let a stranger have sex with her in exchange of money. Upon confrontation, he argued that she could either make a lot of money working there or go to the police. The latter was not really an option, since the police was not a safe place for gay men.

Amanda took up a five year contract as Animierboy in the secret brothel, earning about three-hundred marks per night. She was certain that the establishment was led and controlled by the state to satisfy western visitors. After discovering the girls in the brothel were actually boys in drag, Amanda also dressed as a woman. She moved in with a transsexual colleague, Melanie. At home, both wore women’s clothes, which was accepted by their neighbors as long as they did their duties in the house.155 Lilith moved to Berlin under different circumstances; through her activism. She had started doubting the system after being harassed by the police and Stasi when she had greeted BRD-chancellor Willy Brandt too enthusiastically during his visit. Since then, she rejected forced conformism and uniformity. She broke off her education and went to Berlin, where she followed a diaconal education at the church hospital. Through the church she came into contact with Heike, who printed anti-state pamphlets and smuggled them over the border. Lilith spread them throughout East Germany, until they were caught in 1976 and condemned to four years in prison.156

The problems with getting surgery At the age of twenty-four, Sidney was allowed to go to West-Berlin, where he found a self-help group for transsexual people and a doctor who was familiar with transsexuality.157 Andreas heard about transsexuality at twenty-three, by meeting another transsexual person, which helped him start the transition that saved his life.158 Finding surgery after having discovered one’s gender identity was not always as easy. After Nadja found out, she had a mental breakdown, feeling as though even if she did have surgery she would 155 Ibidem, ‘In der Hölle war ich schon’ 147-155.

156 Ulrich, ‘Alles began bevor ich starb’ 96-101.

157 Ibidem, ‘Ich träume mein Leben voraus’ 48.

158 Longman, DRUG TESTING; East German Steroids’ Toll: ‘They Killed Heidi’ – Andreas Krieger: Heidi’s Farthest Throw [Video file].

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still never truly fit in. Although her boss had tolerated her gender-ambiguity, her long absence from work due to her breakdown was the final straw, and Nadja describes becoming one of the first unemployed people in the GDR. She decided that she had to choose either death or genital reconstruction surgery. Her parents helped her seek the consultation of many doctors and psychologists, none of whom were able to help. In February 1990 they finally found a doctor, but the GDR did not exist long enough for Nadja to use its provisions. Nadja decided not to have surgery for the time being, regarding her penis as a large clitoris. Her ID still showed her birthname and assigned gender, making it difficult to cross the border or to get a new job.159 For Lilith too, the bureaucracy and the high costs were a big hindrance in obtaining surgery in West Germany, though she did acquire hormone treatment.160 Amanda had cancelled her own operation after her friend Melanie’s had gone terribly wrong, leading to Melanie’s suicide. Only much later in her life did Amanda seek treatment, but after being diagnosed with HIV, nobody in Germany wanted to operate on her, and she lacked the money for treatment in England.161 Sidney had a hormone treatment and had his uterus removed to combat the dysphoria coming with menstruation and his fear of pregnancy. It took a long time to obtain permission for a breast amputation. Sidney expresses that eventually, when surgery had come far enough, he would like to have a penis built.

Most important was that his manly side had enough room to develop.162 Sidney describes how failed operations often led to suicide. With suicidal tendencies Sidney was already familiar, he expresses.163 So were the others.

After winning the European championship in 1986, Andreas’ muscle weight and heavy work-outs started to overwhelm his joints and skeletal system, ending his career in 1991. That year, a book appeared about East German doping164, which detailed Andreas’ steroid dosage. Still, Andreas was in denial.

After the reunification there was no longer a social safety net, and Andreas was unemployed. He prepared to commit suicide, but was snapped out of it when his dog pressed his cold nose against Andreas’ arm, signaling it was time for a walk.165 159 Ulrich, ‘Und die Eisbären glotzen neidisch’ 62-63.

160 Ibidem, ‘Alles began bevor ich starb’ 105.

161 Ulrich , ‘In der Hölle war ich schon’ 155-159.

162 Ibidem, ‘Ich träume mein Leben voraus’ 48-52.

163 Ibidem, ‘Ich träume mein Leben voraus’ 48.

164 B. Berendonk, Doping documents - From Research to commit fraud (Berlin 1991).

165 Longman, DRUG TESTING; East German Steroids’ Toll: ‘They Killed Heidi’.

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Relationships and self-acceptance Romantic and sexual relationships often did not come easy. Sidney settled down with a boyfriend who at first protested against his breast amputation, but Sidney refused to let himself continue to be controlled.166 Lilith was often unfaithful in her relationships. After completing a year of her prison sentence, she was bought out and released into the BRD, where she campaigned to have Heike freed, which succeeded half a year later. They married and Lilith ended all her other relationships, but this time Heike cheated and left Lilith. Later, when Lilith had stopped with the anarcho-scene and political activism and had begun occasionally dressing as a woman, she fell in love with an old lover from East Germany, Renate. After marrying Lilith, Renate was allowed to live in West Germany. Renate accepted her transsexuality, and Lilith lived with her and their child as well as with another girlfriend, which was fine with all parties involved.167 Amanda had moved back to her birth city and taken up her male role again after Melanie died. While there, she got a woman named Silvia pregnant. Amanda was honest about her past, and Silvia told her she did not mind whether Amanda was male or female, gay or transsexual, or even if she slept with men. They married and Silvia gave birth to two girls. Silvia worked whilst Amanda took care of the children. In 1985, Amanda lost this family in a car crash. Amanda became depressed and addicted to alcohol and drugs, and had to give her one remaining daughter up to her mother.168 Andreas’ story was happier; when confronting the officials behind the doping in court in 2000, he met Ute Krause, a former East German swimmer. They fell in love and married in 2002. Andreas had broken contact with his three brothers and mother, but Ute’s family and friends accepted him as their family.169 Nadja seems to be the only one to express a sort of Ostalgie. She fought for the acceptance of marginalized groups in society, both with her art and theatre and as a leader of the Sonntags-Club. Additionally, she established an LGBT information center. She wanted to create solidarity, reason and understanding in society, but expressed that it would be hard in the reunited Germany, where new freedoms led to more violence from neo-Nazi’s.170 Sidney

166 Ulrich, ‘Ich träume mein Leben voraus’ 52.

167 Ibidem, ‘Alles began bevor ich starb’ 101-105.

168 Ulrich , ‘In der Hölle war ich schon’ 156-158.

169 Longman, DRUG TESTING; East German Steroids’ Toll: ‘They Killed Heidi’ – Andreas Krieger: Heidi’s Farthest Throw [Video file].

170 Ulrich, ‘Und die Eisbären glotzen neidisch’ 63-68.

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had dealt with multiple skinhead attacks in West-Germany as well, because of which he and his boyfriend planned to move to New-Zealand. However, gay bashing happened in his own village in East-Germany as well.171 Amanda too, had been terrorized by Skinheads in East-Germany. The police always came too late, and Amanda distrusted them.172 Nadja’s skepticism towards the reunited Germany also came out of the fact that it had become harder to obtain treatment and an ID change.173 Though Andreas did believe in the state’s ideology, he became cynical after acknowledging its systematic doping.174 Everyone had considerable trouble obtaining the two expert approvals required to change their ID’s. ‘As if anyone who doesn’t live in my skin could know whether I sweat or freeze,’ Sidney said, regarding the expert opinions. With unaltered IDs, their integration in society was restricted.175 Striking is how these case-studies do not fit the traditional gender-normative narrative described by Stone and Spade. They describe feeling different than their peers, but do not use the narrative of wanting to do traditionally feminine or masculine things, except wishing to dress in the clothes of the different gender. Moreover, Andreas, Sidney, and Lilith clearly state they do not want to completely disconnect with their past, describing that it will always be a part of them. Andreas states; ‘I have to accept that Heidi is part of my history. The more open I am, the less problems I have. Less than if I try to deny her.’176 Nor is their gender-identity compromised by their inability to transition completely. Often, they employ a practical pragmatic vision towards their bodies, and transition as far as they can or are comfortable with. They do not adhere to stereotypical gender-roles in the performance of their ‘new’ gender, nor change their sexual identity to fit a heteronormative gender performance.

171 172 173 174

Ibidem, ‘Ich träume mein Leben voraus’ 51-52.

Ibidem, ‘In der Hölle war ich schon’ 158-159.

Ibidem, ‘Und die Eisbären glotzen neidisch’ 63-68.

Longman, DRUG TESTING; East German Steroids’ Toll: ‘They Killed Heidi’ – Andreas Krieger: Heidi’s Farthest Throw [Video file] – Lost World of Communism: East Germany [Video file].

175 Ulrich, ‘Und die Eisbären glotzen neidisch’ 51.

176 Longman, DRUG TESTING; East German Steroids’ Toll: ‘They Killed Heidi’.

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3.2 TRANSSEXUAL EXPERIENCES IN THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY ‘Adieu, mach’s gut, wir sehen uns nicht wieder! Nicht wieder!’177

Before 1978, almost all BRD court rulings denied a change of sex-status on the birth registry. Political efforts to come to a solution had proved difficult, because for a long time the parliament did not want to consider the transsexual problem. They were worried that homosexual men would be able to marry by having themselves recognized as a member of the female sex through falsified certifications provided by doctors. The Federal Ministry of Justice stated that since transsexuality was an abnormal development, transsexuals were not protected by the Grundgesetz: denying them a legal change of name and gender was constitutional. On October 11, 1978, the Federal Constitutional Court disagreed. Since the Grundgesetz promised human dignity and the free development of one’s personality, the sex registered in the birth registry must be corrected ‘in the event of an irreversible case of transsexualism, and after sex reassignment surgery had been performed’.178 Another precondition was the permanent inability to reproduce.179 Transsexuals could then attain the ‘larger solution’, legal recognition of their new gender, and the ‘smaller solution’, a change of first name. The Transsexuellengesetz came into force on January 1, 1981.180 Still, the law was extremely restrictive. Firstly, it set an age minimum of twenty-five for both solutions. However, in 1982 the Federal Constitutional Court decided that this was unconstitutional for the larger solution. Because lawmakers had not determined a minimum age for genital reconstruction surgery, they could not determine a minimum age for legal recognition of the new gender. In 1993 the same was decided for the smaller solution.

Secondly, the Transsexuellengesetz determined that the change of first name became invalid when a transsexual person entered into a marriage, wherein they would have to use their old first name. MTF-transsexuals could not enter into a legally protected partnership with women and keep their chosen name, nor could FTM-transsexuals marry men.181 Thirdly, the law 177 ‘Goodbye, be well, we won’t see each other again! Never again!’ (Anders, Grenzübertritt 145).

178 Augstein, Vom Verbot zur Gleichberechtigung 113.

179 This was declared unconstitutional by the Federal Constitutional Court in 2011.

180 Augstein, Vom Verbot zur Gleichberechtigung 113-114 – Evangelische Akademie Tutzing, Auf der Suche nach meiner Identität: Transsexuelle in der Gesellschaft 10 – Schwenk, ‘Junge in Frauenkleidern: Keine Aufregung- ganz normal!’

– Rauner, Transsexualität, Informationen, Erfahrungen, Kontakte.

181 This was declared unconstitutional by the Federal Constitutional Court in 2005.

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required married transsexuals to divorce before their new gender could be legally recognized.182 Moreover, the provisions of the Transsexuellengesetz were only available for Germans, because lawmakers wanted to prevent transsexual tourism.183 Additionally, transsexuals needed to go through degrading procedures and required two expert opinions to get genital reconstruction surgery and both solutions. The costs were very high.184 In the 1980s, under social pressure, the statutory health insurance funds had to pay the genital reconstruction surgery and follow-up operations, as long as a person had acquired the expert permissions. Only with special documents that showed that one had access to funding, would hospitals operate without prepayment. Psychotherapy after the operation was only reimbursed after it was confirmed as a medical necessity. A hormone treatment was easier to obtain. For many transsexuals post-operative psychotherapy was necessary, since they often lost their jobs and families. The Federal Institute of Transsexuals helped transsexuals obtain new occupations.185 The incomprehension and scorn of society and the hardship of not being understood by professionals produced a psychological burden for transsexuals, often ending in suicide. Because of this, in 1988 an advisory bureau that offered advice and practical help for transsexuals –the first of its kind in Europe– was established in Cologne. It assisted transsexuals with psychological care, financial help and a place to live.186 The case-studies below show the common occurrence of suicidal tendencies, and show that state provisions were not as accessible as it seems, and that sometimes the restrictive measures could be circumvented.

During the 1980s, the understanding of transsexuality grew in the legal and medical establishments, but a report and conference in 1988 by the Evangelische Akademie Tutzing showed that misunderstandings and misconceptions still proliferated.187 This research was based on working groups, wherein a number of transsexual people answered questions on a range of topics, such as their situation before and after surgery, working circumstances and unemployment.188 They had a hundred transsexual participants, more people than the Academy initially thought were struggling with gender dysphoria.189 182 This was declared unconstitutional by the Federal Constitutional Court in 2008.

183 This was declared unconstitutional by the Federal Constitutional Court in 2006.

184 Augstein, Vom Verbot zur Gleichberechtigung 113-119 – Evangelische Akademie Tutzing, Auf der Suche nach meiner Identität: Transsexuelle in der Gesellschaft 10.

185 Schwenk, ‘Junge in Frauenkleidern: Keine Aufregung- ganz normal!’

186 Mittler, “Leben zwischen Spott und seelischer Not: Eine Beratungsstelle in Köln bietet Transsexuellen Rat und praktische Hilfen”.

187 Schwenk, ‘Junge in Frauenkleidern: Keine Aufregung- ganz normal!’

188 Evangelische Akademie Tutzing, Auf der Suche nach meiner Identität: Transsexuelle in der Gesellschaft.

189 Zimmermann, ‘Wann ist ein Mensch eine Frau’.

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The Arbeitsgruppen stated that there were three groups of transsexuals; the intelligent, who consciously sought the path to the different gender; the realists, who calculated each step they took; and the self-destructive, who harmed themselves and subsequently no longer had a chance at surgery.190 The research did not just focus on social issues, but gave a scientific overview of the ‘causes’ of transsexuality, with a strong psycho-analytic approach. It showed that a combination of biological and psychological causes was further triggered by a disrupted relationship between child and parents, such as a strong mother-son relationship or the desire of the father to have a strong son. The Academy stated that transsexuals first needed to stabilize themselves psychologically and socially by living for a year or longer in a complete performance of their identified gender, undergoing hormone treatment and psychotherapy before they could be granted surgery. Still, in the report it is expressed that the search for personal identity of transsexuals should be respected.191 This chapter will closely analyze how life in the BRD was experienced by seven MTF-transsexuals (Renate Anders, born in Berlin in 1941; Bonny-Anita G., born in Berlin Schmargendorf in 1954; Susan W., born in 1962; Michelle Z., born in Oberfranken in 1970; Jacqueline-Josephine, born in Berlin in 1955; Tamara W. born in Saarbrücken in 1965; and Jennifer P., born in a southern state in the United States in 1964) and three FTM-transsexuals (Fritz Z., born in 1950; Maxi D., born in 1930; and David. E., born in 1954).

A troubled youth Every case-study mentioned a feeling of isolation and loneliness in their youth. They were often bullied. Only David does not mention feeling isolated or bullied. He had a good relationship with his siblings and mother, but a bad relationship with his father stemming from his resistance to traditionally feminine things.192 Another recurring theme is troubled family relationships, often caused by the transgression of traditional gender-roles. Renate had a bad relationship with her parents because as a weak child with a crooked head and a deformed sternum, she did not fit her father’s Nazistic ideals.

More importantly, Renate did not meet expectations of masculinity, having a

190 Schwenk, ‘Junge in Frauenkleidern: Keine Aufregung- ganz normal!’

191 Schwenk, ‘Junge in Frauenkleidern: Keine Aufregung- ganz normal!’ – Evangelische Akademie Tutzing, Auf der Suche nach meiner Identität: Transsexuelle in der Gesellschaft 2-5, 11.

192 Ulrich, ‘Ich bin ein ganz normaler Typ’ 162-164.

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preference for traditionally feminine toys.193 Michelle had a good relationship with her grandmother, who allowed her to play with dolls and dress up as a princess, which stood in stark contrast to her abusive mother and stepfather.

After Michelle was caught dressing up in women’s clothes, her stepfather started visiting her room at night to rape her. Her mother subsequently attacked Michelle with a knife for accusing her husband of this. Michelle’s grandmother saved her from her parents, taking her in.194 Tamara likewise had a father who attempted to beat the femininity out of her, but later in her life her parents accepted her attraction towards men and then her transsexuality.195 Maxi, as well, was mentally and physically abused by his parents in his youth.196 Spade argues that the perception of the transsexual as a medical anomaly requiring treatment functioned to control gender performance, since it gave parents regulatory measures and an opportunity for increased surveillance to make sure children developed as norm-abiding gendered subjects.197 The aforementioned abuse can be seen as a result of this.

Mentions of sexual violence are shockingly reoccurring, as seen in Michelle’s case. Likewise, Bonny-Anita was raped by a friend of the family when she was twelve.198 At the day of his Confirmation, Fritz had yelled out that he would rather be like the boys because he had been forced to wear a dress. Afterwards, the priest abused and raped him. He was caught, but nobody spoke of it.199 Tamara was sexually violated twice in her life, describing that the second time the perpetrator could do it knowing he could get away with it, since it was hard for a boy in women’s clothing to go to the police. At home, Tamara took an overdose of pills, but called the emergency doctor before falling unconscious. After this, she was ill for two months, and subsequently fired from her job.200 Maxi was raped and nearly killed when he was sixteen. The next day, his parents went to the police, who at first did not take it serious until they found his undergarments on the scene.201 Dysphoria was a daily hindrance. Bonny-Anita describes how her dysphoria made her ill202, and for Jacqueline it obstructed her education. The

193 Anders, Grenzübertritt 11-52.

194 Ulrich, ‘Ich hab geheult vor Glück’ 36-40.

195 Ibidem, ‘Jetzt bin ich nur noch ein Wrack’ 108-110, 118.

196 Ibidem, ‘Ich muβ ein biβchen auf die Beine kommen’ 124-125.

197 Spade, ‘Mutilating Gender’.

198 Ulrich, ‘Meine eine einzige groβe Liebe’ 15.

199 Ibidem, ‘I wollt im Stehe piesle könne’ 86-87.

200 Ibidem, ‘Jetzt bin ich nur noch ein Wrack’ 109, 114-115.

201 Ibidem, ‘Ich muβ ein biβchen auf die Beine kommen’ 128-129.

202 Ibidem, ‘Meine eine einzige groβe Liebe’ 12-14.

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school psychiatric diagnosed her as an introverted outsider with stupidity of character, and she was expelled from school because of a ‘refusal of performance.’203 Fritz’ menstruation started at the age of eighteen, but it quickly stopped due to his severe resistance. After a few months his mother noticed and took him to the doctor, who prescribed him hormones to revive the menstruation. Trying to convince the doctor against it, he told the doctor he was actually a man. The doctor only laughed and told him he should first try out being a woman. In an attempt to do so, Fritz slept with a boy and got pregnant. He became ill from hatred towards his own pregnant body and did not want to raise his son, so his sister adopted the child.204 All case-studies expressed a desire to dress up as the different gender. To fight this desire Renate created a masquerade of masculinity and applied for the army. A mother of a friend told her that she would either lose her identity or die when joining the army, which ironically was exactly Renate’s goal. She wanted to become masculine or die an honorable death. In the army, she had held a gun against her head at multiple instances, ready to commit suicide, but did not want her relatives to have to identify her body like that.205 Susan, as well, joined the army to feel masculine in uniform.206 For both, this masculine façade did not terminate their desire to dress up as a woman. Renate found out the army was less honorable than expected; soldiers were a perverse company that objectified women. Despite this, she was able to pose convincingly as male and was promoted to ‘officer’, even though she was diagnosed by the army psychologist with a ‘weakness of will.’207 Susan was quickly stigmatized as homosexual within the army, but she was not the only one and found her place with other gay men in the army. She was promoted and felt equal to those around her.208 Romantic relationships could be liberating or restrictive. Bonny-Anita found support in her relationship, and when she made the request to have her name changed, she did not request a change of civil status to maintain her marriage.209 Susan’s relationship was restrictive, since her girlfriend wanted her to remain a man.210 Renate’s girlfriend, Beate, demanded the same at first. Beate did allow Renate a second house at the other side of the 203 Ibidem, ‘Am liebsten würden sie uns vergassen’ 73.

204 Ibidem, ‘I wollt im Stehe piesle könne’ 87.

205 Anders, Grenzübertritt 52-72.

206 Ulrich, ‘Zuviel Nähe ertrag ich nicht mehr’ 26.

207 Anders, Grenzübertritt 72-74.

208 Ulrich, ‘Zuviel Nähe ertrag ich nicht mehr’ 26.

209 Ibidem, ‘Meine eine einzige groβe Liebe’ 16-17.

210 Ibidem, ‘Zuviel Nähe ertrag ich nicht mehr’ 27-28.

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city, where Renate could live as a woman, but she also resisted vehemently against Renate’s transition, afraid of public scorn and loss of status. Eventually, these fall-outs stopped and they were happy together once more.

Their three children fully accepted Renate.211 Tamara and Maxi got trapped in abusive relationships, which in Tamara’s case led to a suicide attempt.212

Support groups and the search for surgery Not everyone was affiliated with the gay or transsexual subculture. Renate lived a secret double-life in the underground LGBT scene from the age of twenty-nine to thirty-three. She had close transsexual friends, but expressed a strong dislike of transvestites. Renate and her friends gathered at home, as they did with their ‘normal’ friends, avoiding clubs.213 The gay subculture and trans groups helped end Susan’s isolation.214 Anita became a prominent member of the Berliner Gruppe der Transsexuellen, organizing their meetings, giving advice, and arranging contact with the authorities, doctors and experts who needed to give permission for surgery.215 Jacqueline too became active in transsexual activism. She filed lawsuits against institutions, surgeons, and psychologists, whose disinterest and incompetence took many’s last hope to live.216 Fritz found support elsewhere, namely, in the Lutheran church. After being locked in a psychiatric clinic for years and fighting an alcohol and drugs addiction, the Brothers and Sisters at a bible school in Heidelberg noticed he urgently needed help. They helped him through his addiction and then through his process of trying to obtain treatment.217 Getting surgery was not a straightforward procedure. Renate had to deal with many uncomprehending doctors, one of whom said that her cross-dressing was a form of masturbation, narcissism, self-complacency, and moreover a luxury-illness, coming out of too much money and spare time. Renate had read a lot of scientific works on transsexuality and knew what to do to qualify for treatment, but decided to stick to the truth. As a result, the doctor said she first needed to divorce from her family and live in women’s clothing for at least a year before she could be treated. Both Beate and Renate would not accept this. In the next four years, she had countless meetings of this 211 Anders, Grenzübertritt 83-185.

212 Ulrich, ‘Ich muβ ein biβchen auf die Beine kommen’ 129-130 – Ibidem, ‘Jetzt bin ich nur noch ein Wrack’ 110-112.

213 Anders, Grenzübertritt 103-106.

214 Ulrich, ‘Zuviel Nähe ertrag ich nicht mehr’ 26.

215 Ibidem, ‘Meine eine einzige groβe Liebe’ 11-12.

216 Ulrich , ‘Am liebsten würden sie uns vergassen’ 82.

217 Ibidem,, ‘I wollt im Stehe piesle könne’ 91-93.

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nature. Eventually, she was allowed hormone treatment. Officials would only grant her a name change if the name was gender-neutral, and the insurance company refused to pay the costs of the treatment, calling it a ‘mutilation’. Renate had to sell her belongings to pay the 50,000 marks for the operation. At the age of thirty-seven, a surgeon accepted her for surgery.

Renate describes being indifferent towards the success of the operation; she did not have expectations for the functionality of her genitals, regarding them as decoration and a key to change social roles. She did not tell the surgeon this, afraid to make her change her mind. Before the operation, she greeted herself for the last time in the mirror, a transsexual tradition, ‘Adieu, mach’s gut, wir sehen uns nicht wieder! Nicht wieder!’218 Afterwards, Renate’s change of name and status were accepted by her surroundings, and Renate felt as though the surgery gave her a stronger position and self-assurance to assert her gender identity. She did not feel the need to change her deep voice, with which she had always been able to identify. Besides, she argued, somewhere there needed to be an end; no amount of surgeries would make her the ideal woman.219 After many psychiatric, neurological, and psychological examinations, Anita underwent her operation on in 1990. Beforehand, she had told the surgeons; ‘Whether I die or stay alive, cut off that thing down there in any case’. The operation lasted six hours and thirty minutes, and succeeded. Finally, she could urinate like a lady.220

Jacqueline had a harder time procuring treatment. The incomprehension of the professionals she met with made her desperate enough to attempt suicide. Later, when she filed for a change of first name, one psychological expert told her that he would not give permission to anyone with a shoe size of 42. In front of his eyes, she took an overdose of pills. The second expert did give permission, and she started looking for a trustworthy surgeon, warned by the experiences of other trans women to be careful. In Jacqueline’s search, she came across a lot of incompetent doctors. For instance, in Frankfurt there was a doctor whom she had to pay a hundred marks beforehand and then heard that the doctor principally did not do MTF-operations, ‘since they all killed themselves after anyways.’ Jacqueline noted: ‘Perhaps it’s the surgeons.’ In Krefeld she finally found a competent doctor, Professor Westenfelder. She agreed with him that her vagina would be functional and 218 Anders, Grenzübertritt 145.

219 Ibidem, 99-158.

220 Ulrich, ‘Meine eine einzige groβe Liebe’ 18.

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capable of orgasms, which the doctor could guarantee with great probability.

They did not talk about the aesthetics of the new organ, and he was clear that there could be complications but they would not bring additional financial burdens. The operation succeeded, and afterwards Jacqueline did not want to be called transsexual anymore, since she had now become a woman.221 For Maxi, it was hard to obtain expert permission for treatment, since he was completely cross-paralyzed, due to a ski-accident.222 Susan had wanted to be operated in London, but due to financial problems could not access surgery for another ten years.223 Jennifer, who was born in America, could have her surgery done in Germany, but a name change was only possible in America.224 David, who worked in a hospital, had his operation at his own department. He had his breasts, uterus and ovaries removed, but decided not to have a penis built yet. There were too many complications with the surgery and his gender identity was not dependent on a penis.225 For Fritz, this was different. He was diagnosed as transsexual in 1974 and the most important surgery for him was a ‘phalloplasty’, the construction of a penis. In Germany, he was one of the first transsexuals to have this operation. At first, Fritz’ constructed penis was thirty-two centimeters, which gave circulation disorders and led to necrotic tissue. The artificially lengthened urethra calcified and perforated. Many corrective operations to shorten the penis were needed. All this led to desperation for Fritz; he was not a woman and he could not become a man, so he attempted suicide. Afterwards, he had to spend three years in a mental hospital. He describes having attempted suicide fifteen times in his life. The year he was interviewed he just completed his seventieth corrective operation. Afterwards he felt good; his penis was finally suitable for both intercourse and urinating whilst standing.226 Ian Morland theorizes about the surgical task of making intersex227 genitals non-intersexed. Surgeons did not reconstruct genitalia using an image of existing genitalia as reference, but instead relied solely on certain fantasies of the ideal genitalia; ‘the fantasy of the endlessly mammoth penis, of the immeasurably spacious vagina, of the infinitely delicate clitoris. Such body 221 Ulrich, ‘Am liebsten würden sie uns vergassen’ 71, 76-81.

222 Ibidem, ‘Ich muβ ein biβchen auf die Beine kommen’ 131-132.

223 Ibidem, ‘Zuviel Nähe ertrag ich nicht mehr’ 28-29.

224 Ibidem, ‘Jennifer soll leben’ 135, 145.

225 Ibidem, ‘Ich bin ein ganz normaler Typ’ 161-162, 167-168.

226 Ibidem, ‘I wollt im Stehe piesle könne’ 85, 91-93.

227 ‘Intersex’ is a term used for a variety of conditions in which a person’s reproductive or sexual anatomy does not fit the typical definitions of female or male.

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parts do not exist; they are fantasies about how genitals ought to be.’228 It seems as though Fritz’ penis of thirty-two centimeter was constructed after such a fantasy. Tamara’s operation also went completely wrong. She had originally wanted to be operated in Krefeld, but her health insurance had insisted she was operated in Berlin, which led to a mutilation. She wanted to have the mistakes corrected in Krefeld, but the health insurance resisted for half a year. After such a long time, there was not much to be saved. She sued the doctor who mutilated her, but had not had any success. The failed operation left her feeling suicidal.229

A hostile society and sensationalist reporting Another recurring theme is prostitution. With an unchanged name and/or legal status, it was incredibly difficult for transsexuals to find work. Because of this, they were pushed into social marginality and forced to work in prostitution under bad circumstances, which made people regard transsexual problems as petty bourgeois decadence.230 Susan’s hormone treatment increased her libido, which, in addition to her financial troubles, made her decide to sell her ‘extraordinary’ body in prostitution, because of financial troubles and because her hormone treatment had increased her sexual urges. The streets were controlled by panderers, so she had to join a ‘Club’. After that, she worked in a ‘sex cinema’, where her transsexuality sold as something erotic. Out of fear of AIDS, Susan was careful to only have protected intercourse.231 Michelle also worked as Animiermädchen in a nightclub, which she saw as a test of her femininity.232 Tamara similarly sold her transsexuality as something erotic to save up for surgery, which she initially wanted to have done in London.233 Society’s response differed. Michelle experienced winning the Miss Bayreuth beauty competition in 1990 as an extraordinary moment of acceptance. For her, she said, this acceptance was more important than expert opinions and official certificates.234 Below, we will see that this acceptance should not be exaggerated. David made sure to be completely open about transitioning, which prevented gossip and he was accepted by almost all his 228 I. Morland, ‘The Glans Opens Like a Book: Reading and Writing the Intersexed Body,’ Continuum: Journal of Media & Cultural Studies 19-3 (2005) 338-339.

229 Ulrich, ‘Jetzt bin ich nur noch ein Wrack’ 107-108.

230 Dröge, „Männer’, ‘Frauen’ und andere Menschen’ 37.

231 Ulrich, ‘Zuviel Nähe ertrag ich nicht mehr’ 29.

232 Ibidem, ‘Ich hab geheult vor Glück’ 42.

233 Ibidem, ‘Jetzt bin ich nur noch ein Wrack’ 118-120.

234 Ibidem, ‘Ich hab geheult vor Glück’ 33-34.

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colleagues.235 Jacqueline had to actively fight for her rights in society. When looking for jobs she was initially rejected for the discrepancy between her gender performance and her ID, but at her next job as a truck driver her boss did not mind. For her job she traveled often across the border to the GDR. She said there had been no officials in the ‘enlightened West’ who had treated her as politely and respectfully as the people in the GDR. In 1979, Jacqueline became a bus driver, wearing men’s clothing out of necessity. From that moment onwards, she lived a kind of double life that many transsexuals did; male at work and woman at home. She became active in the trade union class struggle, but for Jacqueline there were really only two opposing camps; ‘normal’ people and the discriminated marginalities. Her activities in the union made her aware of employment laws and jurisdiction, useful for her larger activism for human rights. When her hormone treatment began, she resumed wearing women’s clothing. Her employers rejected her request to wear a female service uniform, arguing that customers would not accept it. Jacqueline took it to court and won.236 Jacqueline spoke about the incomprehension and scorn of society, which the others faced as well. Jennifer had moved to Berlin thinking it would be a paradise for people like her, but was quickly disillusioned when she got there.

With no housing nor occupation, she was focused solely on surviving. She passed as woman, but did not get any satisfaction out of the objectification that came with it.237 Renate describes how her gender-neutral clothes both before and after her transition led to confusion and aggression by her surroundings.

Once, she was physically attacked by a stranger. She could not visit public toilets anymore, not fitting in either one. After transition, her colleagues at the school she worked at accepted her, but it was harder to be accepted by her students. After Renate had her surgery, another patient in the hospital leaked her story to a magazine. The magazine visited the school Renate was employed at and if published, the magazine would have outed her without her consent. After legal intervention, the magazine decided not to publish.238 Sensationalistic reporting on transsexuality was not an unusual phenomenon. During the 1980s, there was an increase in articles reporting on transsexuality. Some gave scientific explanations, whilst others detailed a specific story with a focus on the high financial costs of surgery and the 235 Ulrich,, ‘Ich bin ein ganz normaler Typ’ 167-168.

236 Ibidem,, ‘Am liebsten würden sie uns vergassen’ 74-80.

237 Ibidem, ‘Jennifer soll leben’ 138.

238 Anders, Grenzübertritt 106-159.

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effects of it on the family. These articles were voyeuristic, often showing transsexuality as a spectacle. Many of these articles contained nude pictures.239 An example is the article that appeared on Michelle’s victory as Miss Bayreuth, titled ‘Friseur seifte ganze Stadt ein: Miβ Bayreuth mit dem kleinen Unterschied…’ (Barber soaped entire city: Miss Bayreuth with a small difference…) The author started with pointing out the differences between Michelle and other hairdressers, and wondered what genitals Michelle had.

The article called Michelle’s story a ‘tragicomedy’ and reported on the scandal in the city when people found out that ‘the miss is a mister!’240 Another article was simply titled ‘Die schönste Frau von Bayreuth ist ein MANN!’ (The most beautiful woman in Bayreuth is a MAN!). This article, as well, focused on how Michelle’s body was physically different from cisgender women’s bodies.

The article ends with the comment: ‘One thing is of course clear; Michelle won’t be miss Germany.’241 In contrast, Michelle expresses in her interview her ambition to defend her title of Miss Bayreuth and then try to become Miss Bavaria and perhaps even Miss Germany, ending with the comment ‘everything is possible.’242 In 1993, a more respectful article reported on her marriage, using proper pronouns.243

Narratives of West-German transsexuals The West-German case-studies complicate the traditional gender-norm adhering narrative. Most did know they were ‘different’ from an early age onwards and expressed this in wanting to dress as the different gender, which does correspond with the traditional narrative. However, instead of describing that they wanted to do the things traditionally associated with the different gender, they mostly describe not wanting to do the things traditionally associated with their assigned gender. Tamara did use the narrative of wanting to play with dolls and other traditionally feminine toys in her 239 Many of these articles are gathered at the Schwules Museum Archive in Berlin. This collection has been given to the Schwules Museum archive on the 21st of July in 2008. The donor wanted to stay anonymous and gave themselves the pseudonym ‘Rebro’. This donation was the first part of the collection, and in the autumn of 2013 ‘Rebro’ donated the remaining parts of the collection. The donation contained mostly of magazine and newspaper excerpts. ‘Rebro’ died in march 2015, and left six crates of books and another binder with newspaper and magazine excerpts to the museum. (Schwules Museum, Berlin, ‘Sammlung Trans*’ (Sammlung ‘Rebro’)).

240 M. Wedel, ‘Friseur seifte ganze Stadt ein: Miβ Bayreuth mit dem kleinen Unterschied…’ Quick (13 June 1991) Schwules Museum, Berlin, SL Trans*.

241 P. Römer, ‘Überraschung nach der Miβ-Wahl: Die schönste Frau von Bayreuth ist ein MANN!’ Neue Revue (14 June 1991) Schwules Museum, Berlin, ‘Sammlung Trans*’ (Sammlung ‘Rebro’).

242 Ulrich, ‘Ich hab geheult vor Glück’ 43.

243 C. Koch, ‘Geschlechtsumwandlung mit glücklichem Ausgang: Michael wurde Michelle. Mit 14 ein frecher Konfirmand.

Mit 21 ‘Miβ Bayreuth’. Mit 22 eine glückliche Braut’ Freizeit Revue (5 August 1993) Schwules Museum, Berlin, ‘Sammlung Trans*’ (Sammlung ‘Rebro’).

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youth.244 Renate did as well, but later in her life she struggled with the normative gender-roles around her. She did not want to adhere to traditional gender-roles, and showed a strong distaste for men and patriarchy.

Her rhetoric fits within a transnational lesbian ‘nur-frauen’ scene, wherein contact with men is taken to an absolute minimum.245 Renate showed disregard and pity towards women who adhered to traditional gender-norms, calling them victims of the patriarchal system. Furthermore, Renate expresses that not much has changed after her surgery in the way she lived, other than that she did not live behind a façade anymore. Her gender identity came primarily out of role identification and attribution, and had little to do with her physical body, which she describes as initially neutral.246 What does correspond with the traditional gender-norm adhering narrative is that many sought the recognition of cisgender people in their surroundings to feel as though they performed their gender successfully. Also fitting is that the surgery does get considerable weight and is seen as a definite changing point, and identity and body are sometimes closely interconnected.

It could be argued that the descriptions of bad relationships with their parents do in a way follow the medical narrative, since the medical psychoanalytic narrative described disrupted relationships between the child and their parents. However, not adhering to traditional gender-roles from youth onwards was often the cause of this troubled relationship, so this may very well be disconnected from the medical narrative. Medical narratives made an effort to distinguish between transsexuality and transvestitism.247 The case-studies correspondingly make this distinction, because doctors wanted to make sure they were not dealing with transvestites before giving permission for surgery and name changes. The Tutzing-report concluded that transsexuals who had undergone surgery were better integrated into society than transsexuals who had not. They were free of addictive behavior, and able to work, live off their own income, and have a social network. Suicide attempts were rare after transition, and most transsexuals were content with their new gender-role.248 The case-studies examined here do seem to reflect this.

244 Ulrich, ‘Jetzt bin ich nur noch ein Wrack’ 108-109.

245 C. Chase, ‘Hermaphrodites with Attitude: Mapping the Emergence of Intersex Political Activism,’ GLQ 4-2 (1998) 194.

246 Anders, Grenzübertritt 106, 154-174.

247 Evangelische Akademie Tutzing, Auf der Suche nach meiner Identität: Transsexuelle in der Gesellschaft 6-7 – Schwenk, ‘Junge in Frauenkleidern: Keine Aufregung- ganz normal!’ – Schibber, ‘Transsexualität’.

248 Evangelische Akademie Tutzing, Auf der Suche nach meiner Identität: Transsexuelle in der Gesellschaft 10.

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Conclusion The German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany both inherited a past of homosexual prosecution, relative social liberation during the Weimar Republic, and heavily increased persecution during Nazism.

After the Second World War, both republics fought to reconstruct their devastated countries, relying heavily on conservative family roles and traditional morality to do so. A perceived threat to this was homosexuality. The great emphasis on protecting the youth led to higher age of consent for homosexual men in both countries, even after the decriminalization of homosexuality. In the GDR, this included lesbianism. Despite the fact that the GDRâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s legal situation seemingly enabled a more progressive legal situation sooner than the BRD, it cannot be argued that the GDR was more progressive than the BRD. In both countries, the sexual revolution of the 1960s was a heterosexual revolution, since social attitudes remained homophobic and discrimination persisted.

Nevertheless, the decriminalization of homosexuality in both countries made gay and lesbian activism possible. Striking is that in both countries the movie Nicht der Homosexuelle had a big impact on the organization of this activism, though the message was interpreted differently. In the Federal Republic of Germany the movie installed controversies within the LGBT-movement that kept resurfacing until the 1980s. The BRDâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s movement was fragmented over ideological disputes due to the size of the movement, and its close affiliation with the New Left and student associations. In contrast, the German Democratic Republicâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s movement was smaller and had a working class background. Nevertheless, both the BRD and GDR had an

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assimilationist wing that wanted to integrate into society, and an anti-state activist wing. This made for the paradoxical situation that the GDR integrationists and the BRD anti-state movement were more alike in their goals of building a space for homosexuality under socialism and within the class struggle, while the GDR’s anti-state movement fit better with the BRD integrationists. Still, the differences between integrationists and activists should not be exaggerated; in both countries membership overlapped and collaboration occurred.

There were also differences between the LGBT-movements in the Democratic and the Federal Republic. In the GDR there was relatively more collaboration between gays and lesbians, while in the BRD lesbians began their own movement. The BRD queer subculture could organize and grow, whereas within the GDR the state imposed restrictions upon the movements to keep them marginalized and invisible. The Stasi infiltration and surveillance led to a self-censorship of too radical ideas in the GDR, while the BRD’s movements could develop relatively freely. Additionally, in the 1980s the Greens actively fought for LGBT+ rights, whilst the GDR’s movement did not have such political representation. The growth of the BRD’s movement meant that it was more fragmented and had more controversies than the GDR’s movements, such as those on pedophilia and AIDS. The GDR did pick up on some of the BRD’s panic around the AIDS-crisis, but the crisis was not as pressing within the communist republic. Nonetheless, the one case of HIV in the transsexual case-studies does come out of the GDR. The case-studies from either country do not reflect a large hysteria around the AIDS-crisis, only Susan mentions taking precautions.

The Iron Curtain was not impenetrable, at least for people with non-normative sexualities or gender identities. In the Federal Republic of Germany, LGBT-activism was largely influenced by LGBT-activism in the United States and Europe, but state decisions were also influenced by the preceding liberalizing decisions of the German Democratic Republic. The GDR LGBT-activism was influenced by its contacts with West Germany, but had its distinct own nature as well. Sillge argues that the position of LGBT-activism within the Protestant Church was a peculiarity for the GDR, stressing that this did not occur elsewhere.249 While in the BRD there was indeed no such large scale LGBT-activism within the Lutheran Church, the Protestant Church had

249 Sillge, ‘Lesben, Schwule, Bisexuelle, Transgender in der DDR,’ 5-6.

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supported decriminalization of homosexuality since the 1960s. The case-studies show that besides Sidney finding support within the church in the GDR, so did Fritz in the BRD. Furthermore, the research of the Evangelische Akademie Tutzing was relatively supportive of transsexual people. Thus, Protestant support was not limited to the GDR. Many trans people became involved within transsexual activism, but often only later in life. In the Federal Republic of Germany, many lesbian and gay activists had gotten involved through their student activism, but this cannot be said for the case-studies presented, since many were not students. Renate, as a student, did have an interest in feminism, and picked up radical anti-patriarchal sentiments. Renate’s contempt for transvestites fits with the BRD’s activist groups that rejected drag queens. The ‘secret double-life’ that the movie Nicht der Homosexuelle –a movie that is never mentioned in the case-studies– criticizes, was a life led by many transsexuals as well, since they were often forced to perform as their assigned gender at work. Renate lived such a double-life, but disapproved of the gay clubbing scene. Moreover, Jacqueline used anti-capitalist rhetoric but personally focused on the marginalized groups in society; a point of view fitting with the Frankfurt school. In the 1980s, the Left LGBT-movement was replaced with community centers and self-help groups. The transsexual activism presented in the case-studies, however, had always taken that shape, consisting of communities of trans people helping each other obtain treatment and sharing experiences. They do not seem concerned with ideological discourses, since they were mostly concerned with surviving and finding or creating their place in society. Still, trans people were not completely separated and often active in lesbian and gay scenes.

Whilst the German Democratic Republic’s case-studies show skepticism towards the state, they were not involved in an activist movement, except for Lilith’s anti-state activism. Transsexuals did get involved with the lesbian and gay scene and the alternative scene, but often out of individual motivation to find like-minded people. Whether or not transsexuals in the Democratic and the Federal Republic were involved in activism, their relationship with the state was never very favorable, and neither was their relationship with the medical establishment.

In both countries, the LGBT-movements existed despite society’s homophobia, rather than because of society’s acceptance. Violence towards queer people was a problem, as exemplified by the case-studies, who describe being

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abused and harassed for their gender-nonconformity. Notable are the frequent mentions of sexual violation, more so in the Federal Republic. In both countries, transsexuals show a reluctance to go to the police, whom were seen as dangerous to approach when one was visibly queer. For a long time the state was non-supportive of gay and lesbian rights; decriminalization was granted with other motives. In the BRD, it was done to uphold the Grundgesetz, and in the German Democratic Republic to avoid radicalization of the LGBT-movement. This fear of radicalization, in addition to a lack of pedophilia controversy over the age of consent, led to its equalization sooner than in the BRD. The republics held on to exclusionary policies because they feared LGBT+ people would join and undermine public institutions or the army. The cases of Renate and Susan bring to light that not only was there already a homosexual subculture present in the army in the BRD, it was also possible to be promoted in the army for homosexuals. In both countries, the LGBT-movements fought to be recognized as victims of fascism, though in the GDR this had a larger priority. Anxieties that memories of political victimhood would be spoiled led to an incredibly late acceptance of homosexuality within the anti-fascist rhetoric.

In the German Democratic Republic, the tight-knit communities that offered a support system for heterosexual people often isolated lesbians and gays, and the case-studies clearly demonstrate that the same can be said for transsexual people. Striking is that even though these communities are peculiar for the GDR, trans people in the Federal Republic of Germany were similarly strictly controlled by their surroundings to be gender-conforming. In the GDR, transsexual people often fled to Berlin to escape this surveillance in favor of anonymity and a gay scene. In both republics, isolation was often combined with experiences of abusive parents and harassment by peers in their youth and adolescence due to their gender-nonconformity and the prevalent fear of homosexuality. This, plus experiences of dysphoria, cultivated a situation where suicidal tendencies proliferated.

Lack of information on transsexuality and the incomprehension of doctors and society led to frustration and desperation. Only around their twenties or even later did the case-studies find out about transsexuality, through involvement with the LGBT-scene, meeting transsexual people, or by finding literature on the subject.

Both in the Democratic and in the Federal Republic, it was hard for transsexuals to find a job when their appearance and name or legal status did not

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correspond. In the BRD, this often led to the prostitution of transsexual bodies as something erotic. Amanda worked in the GDR as a male prostitute in drag in a state-sanctioned brothel, together with others like her. In the other cases, it led to occupations in sub-stratums of society or unemployment.

The life-course of marrying and having children early, described as a ‘typical German Democratic Republic life-course’, led to uneasy situations for transsexuals in both countries. Often, they were married and sometimes had children before coming out or figuring out they were transsexual. The pressure to be good husbands and fathers in the Federal Republic was a hindrance for MTF-transsexuals. In the 1980s, acceptance of and knowledge on transsexuality slowly started growing in the BRD, leading to transsexual advisory bureaus and scientific publications supportive of transsexuality.

Even so, there were still persistent misconceptions in scientific circles, and when not scientific, the publications on transsexuality were voyeuristic and sensationalist. In the GDR, it seems invisibility of transsexuality proliferated up until the re-unification.

The Democratic and Federal Republics had different provisions for transsexuals. The BRD’s provisions were decidedly more restrictive, more expensive, and harder to obtain. Although the GDR’s provisions were more social, they were part of an internal decree that apparently not all doctors were aware of, and so it was hard for transsexual people to find out about. In both cases, hormone treatment was acquired relatively easily, with a more difficult process of obtaining surgery or legal changes. In the BRD, there were more doctors aware of transsexuality, but it took a long time to find a competent doctor. The difficulties in obtaining surgery and surgeries gone wrong were often a cause for desperation and suicide attempts. When transition succeeded, it did lead to a better integration within society. Despite the restrictive laws, loopholes could be found to preserve one’s marriage or to have one’s name changed before surgery by taking a gender-neutral name.

As for the traditional gender-normative narrative, no clear distinction can be made between the Democratic and Federal Republic case-studies.

There are some differences, such as that the GDR case-studies put less emphasis on the surgery than those in the BRD, where a fixation on the surgery can be noted. This was because none of the GDR case-studies were able to completely transition, and therefore approached surgical intervention with a pragmatic vision. Most narratives describe being different and

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gender-nonconforming early in their youth, frequently expressed through their desire to wear the clothes of the gender they identified with. The BRD case-studies more frequently show a tendency to seek the approval of cisgender people regarding their gender. Both the Democratic and Federal Republicâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s cases explicate disrupted relationships with their parents, as do the medical sources. Renateâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s case-study is most critical of traditional gender-norms, which may have to do with that she had more room to decide her own narrative, writing her own autobiography. The other cases have been guided by the questions asked in the interview, and therefore concentrate completely on how their transsexuality shaped their lives. All case-studies are critical of the gender-roles expected of them in their youth. The fact that the transsexuals in the case-studies acknowledge their past and embolden their transsexual status already creates a counter-discourse, but adherence to traditional gender-norms can be found as well.

Further research on the German medical narrative on transsexuality would be useful, to find whether these narratives fit within the broader transgender theory. Furthermore, additional research on the outside gaze on transsexuality in German society, using the sensationalistic articles of the 1980s, would tell a lot about the way society envisioned and portrayed transsexual people. The findings in this study are only based on the case-studies presented, and further research on additional transsexual narratives is needed to broaden the knowledge on transsexual experiences within the divided Germany even more. This thesis has been a start in that direction.

Thus far, it seems that whilst between the gay and lesbian movements and experiences in the German Democratic Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany there are considerable differences, these are way less pronounced in transsexual experiences. There are important distinctions, such as the possibilities of acquiring treatment or a state-sanctioned doping system, but the case-studies presented show a lot of similarities as well, such as the restrictive gender-conforming upbringings and the limited opportunities to find a place within a society that strictly adhered to an unambiguous heterosexual gender-binary. This thesis has shown that a binary division, wherein the Federal Republic of Germany is progressive and modern, and the German Democratic Republic is traditional and controlling, is indeed a fiction. For transsexual people, both societies imposed conservative gender-norms and supplied carefully restrictive provisions. Of the aspects that determine and shape a personâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s everyday life, such as their personality,

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surroundings, or the society within they live, in this case the political conditions of an authoritarian state or a democracy did not have a definite dividing impact on the lives of transsexuals. The findings of this thesis, then, raise the broader question of whether the bipolar logic of analysis which characterized the research of Cold War Europe is also â&#x20AC;&#x201C;at least to a certain extentâ&#x20AC;&#x201C; fiction.

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