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Kurt Hiller (17 August 1885,
Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
– 1 October 1972,
Hamburg Hamburg (, ; ), officially the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg,. is the List of cities in Germany by population, second-largest city in Germany after Berlin and List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, 7th-lar ...
) was a German essayist, lawyer, and
expressionist Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it rad ...
poet. He was also a political (namely
pacifist Pacifism is the opposition to war or violence. The word ''pacifism'' was coined by the French peace campaigner Émile Arnaud and adopted by other peace activists at the tenth Universal Peace Congress in Glasgow in 1901. A related term is ''a ...
) journalist.


Biography

Hiller came from a middle-class
Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...
background. A communist, he was deeply influenced by
Immanuel Kant Immanuel Kant (born Emanuel Kant; 22 April 1724 – 12 February 1804) was a German Philosophy, philosopher and one of the central Age of Enlightenment, Enlightenment thinkers. Born in Königsberg, Kant's comprehensive and systematic works ...
and
Arthur Schopenhauer Arthur Schopenhauer ( ; ; 22 February 1788 – 21 September 1860) was a German philosopher. He is known for his 1818 work ''The World as Will and Representation'' (expanded in 1844), which characterizes the Phenomenon, phenomenal world as ...
, despising the philosophy of
G. W. F. Hegel Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (27 August 1770 – 14 November 1831) was a 19th-century German idealism, German idealist. His influence extends across a wide range of topics from metaphysical issues in epistemology and ontology, to political phi ...
, which made him quite unpopular with Marxists. Hiller was educated at the University of Berlin around 1900 where he met other left-wing and homosexual activists, like sexologist
Magnus Hirschfeld Magnus Hirschfeld (14 May 1868 – 14 May 1935) was a German physician, Sexology, sexologist and LGBTQ advocate, whose German citizenship was later revoked by the Nazi government.David A. Gerstner, ''Routledge International Encyclopedia of Queer ...
, left-wing activist
Georg Simmel Georg Simmel (; ; 1 March 1858 – 26 September 1918) was a German sociologist, philosopher, and critic. Simmel was influential in the field of sociology. Simmel was one of the first generation of German sociologists: his neo-Kantian approach ...
(who was his doctoral advisor), and his life-long friend, gay author Hugo Marcus. At the start of the 20th century, Berlin had a prominent homosexual scene, home to many gay bars and clubs, and was generally less sexually conservative than other places. Because of this, gay rights activists, including Hiller came to Berlin to practice their activism and form groups like Hirschfeld's
Scientific-Humanitarian Committee The Scientific-Humanitarian Committee (, WhK) was founded by Magnus Hirschfeld in Berlin in May 1897, to campaign for social recognition of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, and against their legal persecution. It was the first L ...
, of which Hiller was a member. Despite being more safe than elsewhere, homosexual activists in Berlin usually did not out themselves as homosexual and fronted their championing of gay rights as a general humanitarian effort rather than a personal one. At the start of his career as an activist, however, Hiller described himself as "gay" and In a 1905 Scientific-Humanitarian Committee meeting, he proposed a mass self-outing of a thousand homosexuals, as he thought it would help their cause. The proposal was denied. Hiller became an influential writer in the early German
gay rights Rights affecting lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) people vary greatly by country or jurisdiction—encompassing everything from the legal recognition of same-sex marriage to the death penalty for homosexuality. Not ...
movement in the first two decades of the 20th century. Hiller was elected as vice-chairman of the
Scientific Humanitarian Committee The Scientific-Humanitarian Committee (, WhK) was founded by Magnus Hirschfeld in Berlin in May 1897, to campaign for social recognition of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people, and against their legal Violence against LGBT people, pers ...
in 1929. In 1929 he took over as chairman from fellow gay activist Magnus Hirschfeld. Like Hirschfeld, he had affairs with men but did not publicly identify himself as homosexual. He is remembered, too, for his book ''§175: Schmach des Jahrhunderts'' (Paragraph 175: Outrage of the Century) published in 1922. Hiller maintained that if homosexuals wanted change, they would have to effect it themselves. Hiller was arrested by the
Gestapo The (, ), Syllabic abbreviation, abbreviated Gestapo (), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of F ...
in March 1933 following the Nazi seizure of power and was severely beaten before his release in August 1933. He spent nine months in prisons and in the earliest
concentration camps A concentration camp is a prison or other facility used for the internment of political prisoners or politically targeted demographics, such as members of national or ethnic minority groups, on the grounds of national security, or for exploit ...
, being transferred to
Columbia-Haus Columbia concentration camp (also known as Columbia-Haus) was a Nazi concentration camp situated in the Tempelhof area of Berlin. It was one of the first such institutions established by the regime. Development Originally called ''Strafgefängni ...
,
Brandenburg Brandenburg, officially the State of Brandenburg, is a States of Germany, state in northeastern Germany. Brandenburg borders Poland and the states of Berlin, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Saxony. It is the List of Ger ...
and
Oranienburg concentration camp Oranienburg was an early Nazi concentration camp, one of the first concentration camp, detention facilities established by the Nazis in the Free State of Prussia, state of Prussia when they Hitler's rise to power#Seizure of control .281931 - 1933 ...
. He was released in April 1934. He fled to
Prague Prague ( ; ) is the capital and List of cities and towns in the Czech Republic, largest city of the Czech Republic and the historical capital of Bohemia. Prague, located on the Vltava River, has a population of about 1.4 million, while its P ...
immediately after his release, and met his partner (a member of the
Social Democratic Party of Germany The Social Democratic Party of Germany ( , SPD ) is a social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany. Saskia Esken has been the party's leader since the 2019 leadership election together w ...
) there while in exile. He later left Prague for
London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
in 1938. In 1955, he returned to
West Germany West Germany was the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) from its formation on 23 May 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with East Germany on 3 October 1990. It is sometimes known as the Bonn Republi ...
, shortly after which he tried and failed to reestablish the Scientific Humanitarian Committee. In the 1960s, he began formulating another attempt to petition against
Paragraph 175 Paragraph 175, known formally a§175 StGBand also referred to as Section 175 in English language, English, was a provision of the Strafgesetzbuch, German Criminal Code from 15 May 1871 to 10 March 1994. It Criminalization of homosexuality, mad ...
, but did not complete it. He lived and wrote in Hamburg until his death in 1972. As a renowned and prominent gay activist from the beginning of the century to his death he was connected with many other activists of the
first homosexual movement The first homosexual movement thrived in Germany from the late nineteenth century until 1933. The movement began in Germany because of a confluence of factors, including the criminalization of sex between men (Paragraph 175) and the country's ...
such as
Magnus Hirschfeld Magnus Hirschfeld (14 May 1868 – 14 May 1935) was a German physician, Sexology, sexologist and LGBTQ advocate, whose German citizenship was later revoked by the Nazi government.David A. Gerstner, ''Routledge International Encyclopedia of Queer ...
,
Eva Siewert Eva Siewert (11 February 1907 – 3 December 1994) was a German journalist, writer, radio announcer and opera singer, who lived and worked mainly in Berlin. Childhood Eva Siewert was born in Breslau (today Wrocław, Poland), the daughter of tw ...
and many more.


References


Further reading

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External links


BiographyKurt Hiller: A 1928 Gay Rights Speech
1885 births 1972 deaths German gay writers German political writers German male non-fiction writers German Peace Society members LGBT survivors of Nazi concentration camps Jewish emigrants from Nazi Germany to the United Kingdom Jewish pacifists Jewish socialists Gay Jews German LGBTQ journalists German LGBTQ rights activists 20th-century German LGBTQ people German male journalists People convicted under Germany's Paragraph 175 Writers from Berlin 20th-century German journalists First homosexual movement LGBTQ socialism {{Germany-activist-stub