When I left my last post, I was talking about the ancient History of trans gender people and I left off with
Troy-Anthony also told The Hook Up that Aboriginal people suppressed or hid their sexuality as a survival mechanism after Christianisation and colonisation.
I did that on purpose, hehe … I did it, because today what this LONG post is going to be about, is the more modern History to trans gender History. I left it off with that quote, because like a LOT of other groups of people. Christianity and colonisation did a lot of bad things to good people. But included in that, are also the Nazi’s…
The Nazi’s…Are you shocked and surprised?
Before I do that though, I want to apoligise for using the term trans gender people in my previous. Trans gender is actually a modern term. The reason I’m apoligising though, is because a lot of transphobes will that trans gender people weren’t called trans gender as some sort of “proof” that trans people just didn’t exist.
Back to the Nazi’s
Institut für Sexualwissenschaft
On May 6, 1933, Nazi demonstrators raided the libraries of the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft, a German name that roughly translates to the Institute of Sexology. The Institute was a privately operated research space for studies of human sexuality. More than 20,000 books were taken from shelves and burned days later in the streets by Nazi youth groups.
It was a devastating blow to the life’s work of Magnus Hirschfeld, the institute’s founder. Hirschfeld, who was Jewish and gay, was a pioneer for rights and liberation in Berlin’s thriving LGBTQ community.
LGBTQ Institute in Germany Was Burned Down by Nazis
BY LUCY DIAVOLO SEPTEMBER 20, 2017
In 1973, a new Institut für Sexualwissenschaft was opened at the University of Frankfurt am Main (director: Volkmar Sigusch), and 1996 at the Humboldt University of Berlin.
The West German courts found that the foundation’s dissolution and the seizure of property by the Nazis in 1934 was legal. The West German legislature also retained the Nazi amendments to Paragraph 175, making it impossible for surviving gay men to claim restitution for the destroyed cultural center.
But you know being trans, being gay is a “fad”.
In 1885 the Criminal Law Act was passed in the UK, which made all homosexual ‘behaviour’ illegal. One of the first public trials for transvestite behaviour was that of Ernest (Stella) Boulton, and Fred (Fanny) Park, arrested in 1870 for indecent behaviour. The authorities based the prosecution on their transvestism and their soliciting of men as women, rather than the act of sodomy. No conviction could be obtained on these grounds and were acquitted of the charge of conspiracy to commit a felony by cross-dressing. One of the largest organisations for transvestite men in the US today is the Boulton and Park Society.
Throughout the 1920s and 30s medical provision was rare, but transsexual people managed to find doctors who would help them. At Hirschfield’s infamous clinic, the first sex change operations were performed by Dr Felix Abraham: a mastectomy on a trans man in 1926, a penectomy on his domestic servant Dora in 1930, and a vaginoplasty on Lili Elbe, a Danish painter, in 1931. Lily died less than two years later from complications.
In the UK, Michael (formerly Laura) Dillon managed to obtain gender reassignment treatment during the war. In the late 1940s he even had a penis constructed by the plastic surgeon Sir Harold Gilles, who later became famous for his work with burns victims. Michael Dillon trained and worked as a ship’s doctor until he was outed by the Sunday Express in 1958. He withdrew to India where he became a Buddhist monk and writer until his death.
April Ashley – April Ashley: Model, actress and trans trailblazer dies aged 86
Ashley became only the second Briton to undergo male-to-female gender reassignment surgery, in 1960. She had the operation in Casablanca, Morocco, and later said becoming a woman made her the happiest she had ever been. Once back in England, she obtained a passport and driving licence which identified her as female.
She was later photographed for British Vogue and appeared opposite Joan Collins in the film Road to Hong Kong.
Ashley was made an MBE in 2012 for her campaigning work for the transgender community.
Again, April Ashley was not well known to be transgender, and in 1961 her career was cut short, when she was outed. However, she carried on. So NO, you can’t “always” tell.
There is only one day left to make your voice heard and ban conversion therapy in the UK. To find out why this consultation is so important, head over to the Mermaids website where you’ll find information, survivor stories and more.
I hope, one can see over the two posts that being trans is not new, nor is it a modern fad. Most of what transphobic people say, is as we say “recycled” homophobia. Meaning, that what’s happening now to trans people, is what has also happened to the gay community. Especially times from the 80’s and 90s. Some of the people right now who talk about
“Its a fad. They’ll grow out of it”.
“How can you have children”
“Trans people are mainly predators”.
I wish that I could find it, but someone posted two news article from the same newspaper, a couple of decades apart. Apart from the word homosexual and trans, it was all pretty similar, derogatory wise.
Lolsys Library 