Karl Heinrich Ulrichs was a German lawyer, jurist, journalist, and writer who is regarded today as a pioneer of sexology and the modern gay rights movement. Ulrichs has been described as the "first gay man in world history."
Sabine Hark is a German feminist and sociologist, and sits on the editorial board of the journal Feministische Studien .
Holger Bernhard Bruno Mischwitzky, known professionally as Rosa von Praunheim, is a German film director, author, painter and one of the most famous gay rights activists in the German-speaking world. In over 50 years, von Praunheim has made more than 150 films. His works influenced the development of LGBTQ+ rights movements worldwide.
Felix Rexhausen was a German journalist, editor and author. As a journalist, he wrote for Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger, Westdeutscher Rundfunk, and the magazines Die Zeit and Der Spiegel.
Volkmar Sigusch is a German sexologist, physician and sociologist. From 1973 to 2006, he was the director of the Institut für Sexualwissenschaft at the clinic of Goethe University in Frankfurt.
Gunter Schmidt is a German sexologist, psychotherapist and social psychologist. He was born in Berlin.
Reimut Reiche is a German sociologist, sexologist, author and psychoanalyst.
Michael Bochow is a German sociologist who has authored a number of empirical studies of German gay men with a particular focus on the impact of HIV/AIDS.
Elmar Kraushaar is a German journalist and author who lives in Berlin.
Gisela Bleibtreu-Ehrenberg is a German sociologist, ethnologist, sexologist, and writer further specializing into the fields of psychology, Indo-European studies, religious studies, and philosophy, since 1980 also increasingly anthropology. As Bleibtreu-Ehrenberg uses these approaches in research particularly in the fields of sexology, homophobia, and prejudice studies, the US Society of Lesbian and Gay Anthropologists of the American Anthropological Association ranked Bleibtreu-Ehrenberg's works on homophobia as internationally outstanding.
Centrum Schwule Geschichte e. V., abbreviated CSG, is a German "LGBT" organization based in Cologne (Köln).
The memorial to gay and lesbian victims of National Socialism is a monument in Cologne, Germany, dedicated to the gay and lesbian victims of the Nazis.
Karin Flaake is a German sociologist and professor (retired) at the Carl von Ossietzky University Oldenburg. Her publications on the adolescence of young women and men are part of the literature of socio-psychologically oriented gender research. Another focus of her work is on the chances of changing gender relations in families.
Ortwin Passon is a German gay, HIV/AIDS and human rights activist.
The Akademie Waldschlösschen is an education and conference center near Reinhausen in Lower Saxony, between Göttingen and Heiligenstadt.
Klaus Sator is a German grammar school teacher, political scientist, historian, author and Information manager.
The German Democratic Republic, a state in Central Europe that existed from 1949 to 1989 and was merged with the Federal Republic of Germany, was dominated by heterosexual norms. However, homosexual East Germans experienced decriminalisation during the 1960s, followed by increasing social acceptance and visibility.
There is a widespread and long-lasting myth alleging that homosexuals were numerous and prominent as a group in the Nazi Party or the identification of Nazism with homosexuality more generally. It has been promoted by various individuals and groups both before and after World War II, especially by left-wing Germans during the Nazi era and the Christian right in the United States more recently. Although some gay men joined the Nazi Party, there is no evidence that they were overrepresented. The Nazis harshly criticized homosexuality and severely persecuted gay men, even going as far as murdering them en masse. Therefore, historians regard the myth as having no merit.
The Eldorado was the name of multiple nightclubs and performance venues in Berlin before the Nazi Era and World War II. The name of the cabaret Eldorado has become an integral part of the popular iconography of what has come to be seen as the culture of the period in German history often referred to as the "Weimar Republic". Two of the five locations the club occupied in its history are known to have catered to a gay crowd, though the phrase gay bar, which could conjure up images of the type of bar that became common after World War II catering first and foremost to gay and lesbian clientele, does not accurately describe what an establishment like Eldorado to a certain extent was, and what similar venues still are to this day. Perhaps because in the present day it is no longer legally problematic in many places to be "suspected" of being gay, and likely due to the impact of internet on the entertainment industry in general, the popularity of establishments offering drag shows, etc. for the entertainment of a largely presumed to be heterosexual audience has somewhat waned. Nevertheless locales that offer ostensibly queer entertainment of some kind for the pleasure of heterosexuals, are very much still existent in the present. Eldorado was a gay cabaret in that along with gay, lesbian, bisexual, trans* patrons, a heterosexual-identifying audience would have been present as well. "Cross-dressing" was tolerated on the premises, though for the most part legally prohibited and/or sharply regulated in public at the time. This exception to everyday life attracted not only male patrons who wished to dress in the "clothing of the opposite sex", and their admirers, but also to no small extent women who wished to do the same, and their admirers. Wealthy lookers-on were encouraged to come and drink and watch as so-called "Zechenmacher". The practice was particularly common in so-called "Lesbian bars" or at so-called "Lesbian balls" in the neighborhood at the time and up the 1960s in places like the Nationalhof at nearby Bülowstraße 37. As women's incomes were on average much lower than men's then as now, male spectators with money to spend were explicitly welcome, and it was not uncommon that there were sex-workers present to offer their services. Eldorado also included what have come to be called drag shows as a regular part of the cabaret performances. There were numerous somewhat similar establishments to Eldorado during its day. The club has been described by writers, and artist and has been immortalized in paintings and photographs. However the eradication during the Nazi Period of any and all references to queer life in Germany was so thorough, that very little explicit public, or even archival reference to the clubs queer history remained by 1945. Criminalization made researching, speaking, or writing about queer realities a legal risk during the first decades following WWII, not only in Germany. That the cabaret Eldorado is remembered at all, is due in no small part to its central role in inspiring the novels of the Anglo-American author Christopher Isherwood and to the Broadway musical and moreover to the 1972 film Cabaret inspired by Isherwood's novels. At the same time historians, and activist of the Gay liberation movement, and of the ensuing LGBT rights movement began piecing back together was is now called queer history. Eldorado thereby became a prominent part of the telling of LGBTIQ+ histories.
Franz Vollrath Carl Wilhelm Joseph von Bülow was a German author, soldier and homosexual activist.
