"Nazi homophobia" was actually just Weimar homophobia in jackboots. Hitler had no problem with Röhm's homosexuality until Röhm became a problem. Homosexuals were one class of criminal convict when the Nazis first started sending "undesirables" to Dachau. This is not to minimize the acute suffering of homosexuals in the camp system, of co…
"Nazi homophobia" was actually just Weimar homophobia in jackboots. Hitler had no problem with Röhm's homosexuality until Röhm became a problem. Homosexuals were one class of criminal convict when the Nazis first started sending "undesirables" to Dachau. This is not to minimize the acute suffering of homosexuals in the camp system, of course. One problem in historiography is that we don't have many primary sources to read. Unfortunately, the governments of Europe went right back to criminalizing homosexuality right after the war, which meant that a depressing number of them were released from camps only to be arrested and imprisoned again. History is always worse than we think.
"Nazi homophobia" was actually just Weimar homophobia in jackboots. Hitler had no problem with Röhm's homosexuality until Röhm became a problem. Homosexuals were one class of criminal convict when the Nazis first started sending "undesirables" to Dachau. This is not to minimize the acute suffering of homosexuals in the camp system, of course. One problem in historiography is that we don't have many primary sources to read. Unfortunately, the governments of Europe went right back to criminalizing homosexuality right after the war, which meant that a depressing number of them were released from camps only to be arrested and imprisoned again. History is always worse than we think.