Цитаты из книги Branded by the Pink Triangle

The gay community was not even allowed to participate in the memorial services held at concentration camps or at war memorials. In 1970 gay activists in Amsterdam arrived at the National War Memorial in Dam Square with a lavender wreath to honor the gay men who had perished. The activists were arrested, and the wreath was removed and denounced as a disgrace.

Even with the murder of Ernst Röhm and the execution of other Nazi homosexuals, at the end of the war there was still the lingering belief that the SS was rife with homosexuals. There was little proof of this accusation, but it was another way of showing disgust for the Nazi Party. Unfortunately, these rumors of homosexuality in the Nazi Party revealed the continuing disdain for homosexuality in general.

Many in the years after the war didn’t even consider homosexual prisoners as victims – they viewed the survivors as men with a criminal past. Nor did young gay men growing up after the war look to the gay victims of the Holocaust as role models.

Allied forces had limited sympathy for homosexual prisoners. They came from countries such as Canada, England, the United States, and Russia where homosexuality was still illegal. So if the men had served out the term of their original sentence, they were most likely freed, but if there was time left on their prison term, then they were kept incarcerated to serve out the balance of their sentences.

Finally, in 2001, the German government recognized gays as victims of the Nazi regime. Homosexual survivors were encouraged to come forward and claim compensation for their treatment. By then, most of the men were either very elderly or dead.

In many camps homosexuals were housed apart because the Nazis believed that homosexuality was a disease that could spread to the other prisoners.

There was a hierarchy from the strongest to the weakest. There was no doubt that the weakest in the camps were the homosexuals. All the way to the bottom.

The Nazis were able to build on the prejudices of previous generations to gain support for their hatred of homosexuals. Everyone was encouraged to help rid the population of the filthy queers in much the same way as people were encouraged to help identify and persecute the Jews.

A ghost has no fantasies, no sexuality.