Lesbian visibility in the GDR
Regardless of their gender or identity, people from the LGBTQI+ community (e.g. lesbian, gay, bi, trans, queer, inter, and more) still face discrimination and social pressure today. Those who deviate from heteronormative ideas often have to justify themselves. And this is not a purely East German issue.
Anyone who studies queer history will quickly realise: Lesbian women are much less visible in public perception and in the media than gay men. This also applies to the GDR. Although queer people there fought for more rights and visibility, the movement was strongly characterised by male voices. Contemporary witness Rainer Herrn told MDR, for example, that the gay movement in the GDR and the concerns of lesbian women often developed into two separate spaces despite having common goals. Many women simply did not feel included or heard within the community.
Women in the GDR as socialist superheroes?
In the GDR, great importance was officially attached to equality – following the example of Marxism-Leninism. Women were supposed to participate in working life in the same way as men, and many were, in fact, employed. However, equal pay for equal work existed mainly on paper. In reality, women often earned less.
Compared to the old FRG, however, the GDR was even a step ahead in terms of women's rights. Women's employment was not only tolerated, but explicitly encouraged, even in male-dominated professions. Sounds pretty progressive at first. However, there was a catch, because the expectations of women were huge. In addition to having a full-time job, they were also expected to be perfect mothers and housewives. In short: socialist superheroines.
The SED advertised equal rights and created structures that made it easier for women to enter the labour market. But the motivation behind this was less feminist than economic. The state simply needed all the labour it could get. The traditional division of roles in the family and everyday life often remained untouched – except that now everything had to be done at once. The GDR primarily protected marriage between a man and a woman as the smallest cell of socialist society. It was noted in the GDR constitution as an institution particularly worthy of protection, as stated in Article 38.
Queer life in the GDR
Even though homosexuality was officially decriminalised in the GDR as early as 1968, the reality for queer people was anything but open or tolerant. The basic social attitude was not queer-friendly, and lesbian women in particular felt the effects of this. There was a lot of pressure to either conform or hide their identity. And this was not just a question of personal well-being. Those who were openly lesbian often had worse job opportunities.
Especially in small towns and villages, it was difficult to separate private and professional life. In the anonymity of the big city, it was somewhat easier to create space for yourself, but life was not safe there either. Some opposition groups, such as peace and environmental activists, sought refuge in church premises. The Protestant church was also a central place of refuge for the homosexual movement, as many parishes also made their rooms available to them for meetings. It was often up to individual pastors to decide whether they welcomed this openness or not, and this decision was often controversial internally. The Gethsemane Church in Prenzlauer Berg was one of the first major East German congregations to make its premises available to the »Lesbians in the Church« working group, among others. As a non-church alternative, the »Sunday Club« opened in the mid-1980s and still exists today. It was founded by the women's rights activist Ursula Sillge and served as a meeting place for gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and trans people. The Stasi always had the place and its people in its sights, but the organisers were not deterred - the Sunday Club became a space for counselling, networking, and cultural events. Nevertheless, you never knew whether, and if so, who within a group was possibly an unofficial collaborator (IM) and was passing on information to the state security.
The SED regime viewed any form of independent organisation with suspicion – especially if it took place outside of state-controlled structures. Anyone involved in queer networks or groups therefore ran the risk of being targeted by the Stasi. The secret police often worked with subtle means, for example by deliberately spreading rumours to isolate people at work or among friends. Queer people suffered particularly badly from these methods.
And yet, lesbian-feminist groups managed to organise themselves - often through personal networks, friendships, romantic relationships, or at events such as church congresses and peace workshops. In some cities, real meeting places for young women, mostly between 20 and 30, were created where they could discuss their lives, politics, and identity. Books, films, and magazines on the subject of homosexuality were also collected there.
One very special project was the magazine »frau anders« – the first and only lesbian magazine in the GDR. It was published in Jena from January 1989, was distributed secretly, and had a mini-circulation of just 100 copies. Some of the texts came from the editorial team, the rest were submissions from readers. The fact that such a project was possible at all shows how strong and creative this community was despite all the restrictions.
Homosexuality as a deviation from the »socialist norm«
Homosexuality was not regarded as a »sin« in the SED state, but as a deviation from the »socialist norm«. Historian Rainer Marbach describes this in his book on homosexuality in the GDR: Homosexuals were considered a »deviation from the healthy normality of the socialist person«. Openness and tolerance were therefore not necessarily the order of the day – even if there were individual voices in favour of this.
One example of this is the psychologist Reiner Werner, who conducted research at Humboldt University and dealt with the topic in his book »Homosexuality - A Challenge to Knowledge and Tolerance«. At first glance, this sounds promising; after all, he was in favour of more humanity and social integration. But at the same time, he treated homosexuality like a mental disorder, used terms such as »affected person« and placed queer life in the same category as »adolescent misbehaviour« and »behavioural disorders«. Critical voices were not long in coming: activist and author Ursula Sillge, for example, criticised the fact that Werner's 179-page book only wrote four and a half pages about lesbian women, despite promising tolerance and knowledge in the title.
Ursula Sillge and the East German lesbian movement
Ursula Sillge was one of the most important voices of the lesbian movement in the GDR. As early as the 1970s, she began to publicly campaign for the rights and visibility of lesbian women – despite the repression she faced as a result. In 1978, together with a friend, she organised the first lesbian meeting with participants from all over the GDR. Around 100 women took part, but the People's Police and State Security were also present. From this moment on, surveillance was significantly increased.
The founding of the Sunday Club, which she started in 1985/86, also brought her into the focus of the State Security. When she later inspected the files, she discovered reports from more than a dozen unofficial collaborators (IM) who had been spying on her for years.
In her book »Invisible women. Lesbians and their emancipation in the GDR«, Sillge describes what makes queer life worth living: protected living space, public visibility, places to meet, social participation, and, above all, rights – both social and political. She also made it clear that the invisibility of lesbian women was no coincidence. To quote her: »The low visibility of lesbians is the potentiation of the low visibility of women.«.
This sums up what we mean by intersectionality today. Discrimination often takes place on several levels at the same time. Lesbian women were not only disadvantaged because of their sexuality, but also because they were women. And anyone who was also black or a person of colour had an even harder time. This multiple discrimination characterised many realities of life. It is about patriarchal structures in our society, in which men occupy the upper echelons of the hierarchy. These conditions also exist in the queer community, both back then in the GDR and today.
To find out more about individual life stories of queer women in the GDR, we recommend the documentary film »Uferfrauen - Lesbian life in the GDR« by Barbara Wallbraun from 2019.
Wanted: Memorabilia and documents of the time
The fact that (female) homosexuality was taboo in the GDR is also reflected in our limited collection in this area. The DDR Museum would be delighted to receive donations of objects from queer (former) GDR citizens and (not only, but) encourage women in particular to share their stories. This could take the form of pictures, diary entries, letters, or other artefacts. Through contemporary witnesses and personal accounts of their experiences, history can also be preserved for future generations.
