The year is 1980: Helmut Schmidt is Chancellor, and the German public is slowly recovering from the “RAF terror”; the German Autumn of 1977 is over. The RAF’s actions have brought the issue of public safety to the forefront; the police have become increasingly militarized over the course of the 1970s, now appearing at demonstrations—for example, against nuclear power—in riot gear and with batons, and deploying tear gas . The “Free Wendland Republic” is cleared by the police in June 1980. To prosecute criminal offenses, the “Rasterfahndung” —the Word of the Year at the time—is developed. Surveillance and control experience a new heyday, driven by the increasing spread of electronic data processing (EDP), a development that is also increasingly subject to critical discussion within the middle class.
With the decriminalization of §175 of the German Criminal Code in 1969, publicly visible gay culture becomes possible for the first time: gay magazines (“Du&Ich;” available for general sale), openly gay bars like the Spundloch, and shops like the Revolt Shop are founded. At the same time, student-led gay groups of what would later be called the “Second German Gay Movement” could look back on a decade-long history. With the 1971 film “It Is Not the Homosexual Who Is Perverse, But the Situation in Which He Lives” by Rosa von Praunheim, action groups were founded nationwide, primarily in student circles. These groups were outward-facing through public actions and protests, while also working inwardly within the scene through self-awareness programs. They viewed the term “gay” not as a description of sexuality, but as a political identity. In Hamburg, the first groups emerged in this context, such as the theater group “Brühwarm,” which combined art and activism. For despite legal relaxations, there was still no broad societal acceptance of homosexuality in the 1970s, as gay people had to fear losing their jobs if they came out, for example. Even though Section 175 of the German Criminal Code (StGB) was further relaxed in 1973, making homosexual acts punishable only if the age of consent (18 years) was disregarded or if a relationship of dependency was exploited, homosexuality continued to be subject to the criminal “presumption of guilt.” The 1970s were marked by tensions between narrow-minded conservatism and liberation movements.
Even the knowledge now widely accepted regarding the targeted persecution of gay men, lesbian women, and trans people under National Socialism only became widespread in the 1970s. “Brühwarm” addressed this topic (among several others) in their first play in 1978; one of the first monographs on this subject was published in 1981 by Hans-Georg Stümke and Rudi Finkler, under the title “Rosa Winkel, Rosa Listen. Homosexuelle und »Gesundes Volksempfinden« von Auschwitz bis heute.” It was only then that the homosexual community was recognized as a victim group of National Socialism, and thus public commemoration of them was officially established in the late 1970s and early 1980s.