While we may believe that this homophobia was a natural outgrowth of 1930s society, the opposite was the case. Redlich was from the Czechoslovakian town of Olomouc. Similarly to Weimar Germany, Czechoslovakia had a vocal movement calling for the decriminalization of homosexuality, there was a gay subculture, with bars, journals, novels, and activists.
Scholars like Insa Eschebach have pointed out that homophobia among those who were themselves victims of the Holocaust was a specific product of the concentration camp society. Reading survivors’ testimonies, the historian comes across often hair-curlingly vicious statements about prisoners who engaged in same sex conduct.
This homophobia was not a byproduct of the Nazis’ prejudice; the prisoners viewed same sex desire as a personification of all that was wrong in the violent world of the camps. [...]
The Holocaust produced a prisoner society that was deeply gendered, homophobic, hierarchical, and violent. We need to recognize that even a collective of those who themselves had been excluded and victimized still excluded those they defined as "other."
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