Sexology and transidentities, a forgotten history. Part 2 : Rosa Winkel (1933-1945)

Researcher Joni Alizah Cohen said "the earliest entanglement of Nazi anti-semitism and transmisogyny occurred in response to the emerging gay and trans liberation movement in Weimar Germany". Historian Florence Tamagne explains that under Weimar Republic, attacks "show that reactionary forces are already active".

Hirschfeld was exposed to Nazi party's hate. since years. Jew, homo, left-wing activist and important figure of trans healthcare, he is the man "who tried to effeminate Germany" for Nazis. Sexual and gender revolution was over. Then, it was a time of repression. The most famous symbol was the Pink Triangle (Rosa Winkel in German), wore by prisoners send to concentration camp under the Paragaph 175. Homos, bi and trans women could be forced to wear it. 

Some ignorant left-wing parties and prepared far-right

On the left, we can find parties using Ernst Röhm's homosexuality for a smear campaign to undermine his credibility. Röhm was homo but homophobic, but also SA (Storm Division) chief and friend of Hitler. Tamagne says that later there was "a kind of confusion because this left parties, that stood up for decriminalization of homosexuality, will, from 1934, define homosexuality as fascist perversion". A part of the left abandon Hirschfeld, who was a left-wing activist hated by Röhm. 

The 6th of May 1933, few weeks after Hitler came to power, Nazi students and SA members ransacked a part of the Institute. Dora Richter (1892-1966), the 1st trans women successfully operated was living there. We know now she didn't die this day but she was persecuted after that. 

According to a French journalist who interviewed Hirschfeld few weeks after the ransack, 14,000 books are stolen. Part of this books are burned the 6th of May, another part the 10th the Opera's place (not all of them). The second time was the most important book burning. 20 other student cities were targeted this night. The campaign against "Un-German spirit" organized by Joseph Goebbels, was ransacks, books stolen an book burnings against "subversive" documents : from Jews, communists, socialists, anarchists, liberals, pacifists, sexologists. Because of his identities, Hirschfeld was very "subversive" for Nazis. Not all of historians who work on this topic agree with the term, but some are talking about "memoricide". 

Even if some LGBT+ maybe believed before 1933-1935 that nazism will not persecute them, the firsts homo, lesbian and trans movement were over. And the worst persecution period for the Community came. This is LGBTphobic, mysoginistic and antisemitic, as Alizah, Cohen demonstrates. Some members of the Institue were Jews. This fact was used to "prove" the conspiracy theory telling that Jews created "transvetitism" for example to destroy "Aryan race" and German civilization. 

Every known LGBT socialization places were closed, including the most famous Eldorado Night Club. Lesbian, trans and homo Speech for example were censored and activists claims were coming back to the closet. In 1935, the Paragraph 175 was aggravated. The Reich Central Office for the Combating of Homosexuality and Abortion was created in 1936. Trans people could be categorized as "asocial", "homosexuals" or "transvestites". Some of them wore the pink triangle, used to categorize as a "homosexual man". Members of the Community were among victims of nazi fascist ideology. Nazism won in Germany. Democracy lost. The Eldorado was over. And the pink triangle appeared. That was not the only one. 

Triangles 

Lesbian cis women were relatively less targeted : "feminine homosexuality" was not viewed in tve same way. But they were persecuted too if they were found with another lesbian for example.
It is very difficult to find how many trans people were targeted under the Regime. Many antisemitic and transphobic conspiracy theories appeared at this time. We can find the idea that Jews "controled' this movement or that trans people was a "danger to youth" for example. 

We know than most of the "transvestites" passports from the IfS were removed. Trans (and probably drags) were arrested for "indecency" or "unnatural fornication", as homo and bi people. Toni Simon, a German trans woman was arrested and jailed. In its report, the Gestapo officer wrote she was a "danger to youth". He wanted to send her to a camp. Sanctions could be : forced detransitions, conversion therapies, prison and concentration camps. Trans men could wore the black triangle associated to "socially unadapted people". 

They were humiliated, even assassinated. Historian Laurie Marhiefer says that worst violences were made against trans women. The transmisoginy was important. Historian Waitman W. Beorn demonstrates that they were Holocaust victims. Some scientists talk about "genocide" but this is not recognized by the law today. 

Obscurantism won against science 

At this time the transphobic obscurantist schema appeared. Scientific researchs were stolen, some of them destroyed by Nazis. Many doctors collaborated to the regime. For example, the surgeon Erwin Gohrbandt. Even if he was among the first doctors to make trans healthcare operations during Weimar Republic, he became research assistant for surgical questions in the Social Office of the Reich Youth Leader. And then became a War Criminal.

With their obscurantism, Nazis destroyed LGBT+ fundamental sources, including trans ones. But also the destruction of Community's hope for years. This European catastrophe hit the Community. They wanted to destroy the "Intellectual waste from the past" as the journalist Pauline Petit says.

Joni Alizah Cohen demonstrates : « the Institute was seen by the Nazis as a hub for Jewish Marxist intellectuals and their nefarious plans to undermine the purity of Aryan racial biology and culture. ». Pour aller plus loin dans la description de l’idélologie nazie, elle dit : "Nazism also understands the fundamental terrain of this war to be on the level of biology. There is a deep anxiety expressed in Nazi and far-right thinking which is constantly concerned about the biological undermining of the white race yes, but also the white male, and his hormone balance, his testosterone level. Nazi political ontology understands the biological as one of, if not the most important terrains of political dispute". 

As a 2023 documentary demonstrates : Hirschfeld theories were "all the Nazis hate". In July 1933, a few weeks after the ransack of the Institute, Hirschfeld was in France. Interviewed by the magazine "Voilà" (published by Gallimard with at its best was sold at 350,000 units), he described his vision of sociology, biologt and sexology : "Humanity did not discover a unique solution about the sexual problem that can satisfy both biology and sociology yet. Only an objective science can do it... . The sexual question makes part of the sovial question but the social question makes part of the sexual question too...".

This was a kind of war against science lead by Nazis, for "aryan race purity". Using false biology (biologism) to justify their crimes. 

Thousands of books from the Institute disappeared. Then, anti-scientific experiments were realized on people wearing pink triangle. Organized by Henrich Himmler, this experiences included using artificial hormones into the body of prisoners. The goal was to "cure" the homosexuality. 

To conclude.
In 1945-1946, the LGBT+ Community was not recognized as nazi domination's victims. LGBT+ people was not totally liberated and European conservative movements continued persecutions in their own ways.
The depenalization of "homosexuality" in 1980s for example was not linked everytime with depenalization of transness. But many trans people was persecuted in similar ways. 

The Nazi pink triangle is a symbol of persecution for homos, bis and trans women. And it became a symbol of fight against silence and death for all Communities.
The "Gay Nazis" myth is similar to the conspiracy theory are trying to use an anti-scientific ideology in an authoritarian way. In reality, Nazis and then conservative governments used pseudosciences to perscute the Communities. 

A pseudo-biologic vision still be used to ban trans healthcare, not only by neo-nazis activists. 

Vocabulary (other definitions in Part 1) 

Pink Triangle : Nazi symbol used to categorize "homosexuals". In fact, it was wore by other persons from the Community. It is a symbole of fight today. 

References 

"Why We Need the Pink Triangle in the Era of “Don’t Say Gay”', Jake D. Newsome. Nursing Clio. August 22, 2022. 
"Trans+ History Week: The persecution of trans people by the Nazis still echoes down the ages". Pink News. Maggie Baska. May 5, 2025.
"The Eradication of “Talmudic Abstractions”: Anti-Semitism, Transmisogyny and the National Socialist Project". Joni Alizah Cohen Blog Verso Edirions for Historical Materialism Symposium. December 2018.
"Historians are learning more about how the Nazis targeted trans people", Laurie Marhoefer. Conversation. June 6, 2023.
"Eldorado: Everything the Nazis hate", documentary by Benjamin Cantu. Film Base Berlin (2023) 
"LGBTQIA+ L'histoire de l'Institut de sexologie détruit par les nazis". Radio France. Pauline Petit (June 12, 2023).
« Transgender People, the Nazi State, and the Holocaust » (Personnes transgenres, l’État nazi et l’Holocauste), entretien vidéo avec Laurie Marhoefer, Musée de l’Héritage Juif de New-York (5 juin 2023).
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=T97cE5u5CmQ&pp=ygURbWFnbnVzIGhpcnNjaGZlbGQ%3D