Scientific-Humanitarian Committee
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The Scientific-Humanitarian Committee (
History
The WhK was founded in
The committee was based in the
The WhK took a great deal of scientific theories on
In campaigning against Paragraph 175, the committee argued that homosexuality was not a disease or moral failing, and said they reached this conclusion from scientific evidence. The group made other arguments against this law, saying for example that its repeal would reduce blackmailing behavior among
The committee created sex-education pamphlets on the topic of homosexuality and distributed them to the public.[4] It had begun distributing this type of material to university students and factory laborers as early as 1903.[12] They also assisted defendants in criminal trials, and gathered more than 6,000 signatures on a petition for the repeal of Paragraph 175.[16][17] The committee's opposition was not indiscriminate, as its petition did support preservation of criminal status for some homosexual acts, including cases between an adult and a minor under age 16.[15][18] At the time of the original proposal, the age of consent was in fact two years lower than that for heterosexual people, at age 14; effectively they called for the age of consent to be raised as part of their campaign.[18]
Work on promoting their petition began in 1897, and the committee particularly wanted signatures from those with prominent status in such fields as politics, medicine, art, and science. They sent thousands of letters to key figures such as Catholic priests, judges, lawmakers, journalists, and mayors. August Bebel signed the petition and took copies to the Reichstag to urge colleagues to add their names. Other signatories included Albert Einstein, Hermann Hesse, Thomas Mann, Rainer Maria Rilke, and Leo Tolstoy.[3]
During
Officially, the committee was
The biological deterministic tendency that Hirschfeld gave to the committee met with opposition within the WhK from the start. But it was not until November 24, 1929 that his internal competitors, above all the Communist Party (KPD) functionary Richard Linsert, succeeded in forcing Hirschfeld to resign. He was succeeded by the Medical Councilor Otto Juliusburger, Kurt Hiller was elected Deputy Chairman and the writer Bruno Vogel became the third member of the new board. Juliusburger led the committee in the short time that elapsed until the committee was dissolved after the Nazi Party came to power in 1933.[21] The committee's final meeting took place in Peter Limann's apartment on June 8, 1933, with the singular purpose of dissolving the organization.[22] A reorientation of the WhK that freed it from its scientific isolation was the focus placed on psychological and sociological research instead of biological research.
The committee was based in Berlin and had branches in about 25 German, Austrian and Dutch cities. It had roughly 700 members at its peak and is considered an important milestone in the homosexual emancipation movement.[23] It existed for thirty-six years.[15]
Publications
The WhK produced the
Another of the WhK's widespread publications was a brochure entitled Was soll das Volk vom dritten Geschlecht wissen? (What Must Our Nation Know about the Third Sex?) that was produced alongside the committee's sexual education lectures. It offered information on homosexuality, pulling largely from the studies of the Institute for Sexual Sciences. The brochure offered a rare case of nonjudgmental insight into the existence of homosexuality and, as such, was frequently distributed by homosexuals to family members or to total strangers on public transport.[23]
Reformation attempts
In October 1949, Hans Giese joined with Hermann Weber (1882–1955), head of the Frankfurt local group from 1921 to 1933, to re-establish the group in
In 1962 in Hamburg, Kurt Hiller, who had survived
New WhK
In 1998, a new group was formed with the same name.
See also
References
- S2CID 249301944.
- ^ .
- ^ a b c Peters, Steve (February 18, 2019). "LGBT History Month 2019 Faces – Magnus Hirschfeld and the first LGBT+ film". Canterbury Christ Church University. Retrieved May 14, 2021.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-58367-438-3.
- ^ Djajic-Horváth, Aleksandra (10 May 2022). "Magnus Hirschfeld". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 10 June 2022.
In 1897 Hirschfeld established the Scientific-Humanitarian Committee with Max Spohr, Franz Josef von Bülow, and Eduard Oberg; it was the world's first gay rights organization.
- ^ "Magnus Hirschfeld and HKW". Haus der Kulturen der Welt. 21 June 2019.
In 1897, together with Max Spohr, Eduard Oberg and Franz Joseph von Bülow, he founded the Scientific-Humanitarian Committee in Berlin Charlottenburg.
- ISBN 978-0-307-47313-4.
- ^ "Dinge, die wir suchen". magnus-hirschfeld.de. Retrieved 2016-08-07.
- Project MUSE.
Other corporate members were the Scientific Humanitarian Committee...
- ^ ISBN 978-1-317-36815-1. Archivedfrom the original on 11 June 2022.
- ISBN 978-1-4725-0695-5.
- ^ OCLC 872608428.
- S2CID 19788523.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-87586-357-3.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-317-36812-0.
- S2CID 22292105.
- The Washington Blade. October 3, 2013. Retrieved May 13, 2021.
...Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld founded the gay organization Wissenschaftlich-humanitäres Komitee (Scientific-Humanitarian Committee). Its first action was to draft a petition against Paragraph 175 with 6,000 signatures of prominent people in the arts, politics and the medical profession; it failed to have any effect.
- ^ S2CID 148966028.
- S2CID 145307131.
- PMID 8666756.
- ISBN 9783110548426.
- ISBN 978-1-56024-724-1.
- ^ )
- GLBTQ Encyclopedia Project. Archived from the originalon 29 November 2014. Retrieved 16 November 2014.
- ISBN 0-87810-041-5.
- ISBN 3-928983-65-2. Entries for Hans Giese p. 278, and Kurt Hiller p. 357: Citation.
- ^ Jürgen Müller, Review of: Andreas Pretzel (Ed.): NS-Opfer unter Vorbehalt. - Homosexuelle Männer in Berlin nach 1945, LIT-Verlag, Münster 2002
- ^ Online exhibition of the Magnus Hirschfeld Society: Kurt Hiller
- GLBTQ Encyclopedia Project. Retrieved 10 June 2022.
- ^ whk - wissenschaftlich-humanitäres komitee
- ^ The history of the new WHK (german)
Further reading
External links
Media related to Scientific-Humanitarian Committee at Wikimedia Commons