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Concept
The Sonntags-Club
Summary
The Sonntags Club, founded in 1987, was the first secular LGBT group in East Germany. The group originated out of the HIB (Homosexuelle Interessengemeinschaft Berlin) which was banned in the late 1970s by the socialist regime. The group became the Sonntags Club in the 1980s when it went underground and began renting a meeting space only available on Sundays, hence the name. The Club was located in East Berlin, and though never officially recognized in the German Democratic Republic, its members continued to advocate for LGBT rights and freedoms in the years to follow.
After the reunification of Germany, the Sonntags Club was able to petition successfully for official status in 1990 and continues operation into the present day.
Since the partition of Germany at the end of World War II, the German Democratic Republic (GDR) restricted public debate on the topic of homosexuality, stalling advocacy on the topic. Stemming from previously held notions, homosexuality was considered a pathological condition and was criminalized. The lack of discourse around the topic in East Germany soon led to the first known private gay and lesbian groups of the 1970’s. Considered the precursor to the Sonntags-Club, the HIB was one such group.
HIB, the group from which the Sonntags-Club emerged, was founded in the 1970s after the premiere of an underground LGBT film titled “Nicht der Homosexuelle ist pervers, sondern die Situation, in der er lebt” (It is not the Homosexual who is perverse, but the society in which he lives). It was the first group of its kind in the Eastern Bloc countries. The HIB had ties to multiple smaller LGBT groups across the Bloc, tying together queer individuals in the region. However, because of the GDR’s refusal to grant official status to the organization, it was very difficult to find meeting space in an already difficult renting market (often space was only rented to official organizations). Consequently, most meetings were held in member’s apartments or homes.
Official source
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