Jan–André Jodjohn:
Die Gemeinschaft der Eigenen, die Männer– und die Frauenemanzipation
Jan–André Jodjohn:
The Community of the Special (Gemeinschaft der Eigenen), male and female emancipation
On ideas and motives in the collaboration of men's league (Männerbünde) and women's movement
English abstract
Jan-André Jodjohn‘s essay analyses the relationship of the German Community of the Special (Gemeinschaft der Eigenen, G.D.E.) – one of the first organisations in the world campaigning for the rights of homo- and bisexual men – and the women's movement. The essay looks at this history from the German Empire until the early years of the Third Reich. The author evaluates the G.D.E. as a community of homo- and bisexual men, whose leading figures conceptualised bisexuality as the natural condition of both sexes. The members of the G.D.E. advocated not only the rights of men who differed from the hegemonic masculinity (Connell) of their time and society but also promoted the rights of women, children, teenagers and proletarians because they saw the emancipation of the individual as their primary goal. By assessing nearly all available sources Jodjohn concludes that albeit only four per cent of the (cultural-)political texts of the G.D.E. deal with issues relevant to the women's movement, these four per cent are to be seen as constitutive of the self-concept of this men's league.