WI: Magnus Hirschfeld's research was not destroyed by the Nazis?

cpip

Gone Fishin'
The recent discussion over on the HOI led to @Ashtagon linking this article concerning Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld's research in sexual reassignment surgery in the 1920s.

From the Article:
Sex reassignment surgery had an earlier life, in an unexpected time and place: 1920s Germany. Several doctors there performed such surgeries using analog technology and organic hormones. They worked under a new paradigm: What if they could make someone’s body fit their mind instead of forcing their mind to fit their body?
...
By the early 1930s, people came from around the world to undergo reassignment surgery in Berlin. Then Adolf Hitler was appointed Chancellor of Germany in January 1931. Two years later, his brownshirts broke into Hirschfeld’s institute and burned his journals and research. When Hirschfeld was out of Germany on tour, the Nazi student group marched on the Institute. Over 20,000 books were set aflame, as well as medical diagrams and photographs crucial to understanding sex reassignment surgery.

So, there's at least two scenarios to explore.

In one, the Nazis simply don't rise, and whatever does come to power, while it may be authoritarian, doesn't end up ransacking his lab and burning it, allowing him to continue his work.

In the other, Hirschfeld somehow gets advance notice of the march on his Institute. Perhaps it happens while he's still in Germany. For whatever reason, he manages to get some significant portion of his Institute's documentation to safekeeping, be it in hiding in Germany that can be found after the war, or perhaps he takes it with him to France when he flees there, and it manages to go undestroyed by the Nazis during the invasion.

What might this mean to the LGBT community in the 20th century?
 
Hmm, thanks for that. More useful background for my EDC.

As for the effect on LGBT rights in society it could work either way, enhancing the "they're people who deserve rights" or medicalising the "problem" of abnormal sexuality and reinforcing the (perceived) link with mental illness.
 

Deleted member 1487

Until and unless it changes the culture things aren't really going to change. Berlin was the epicenter of German and Central European gay culture in the 1920s (some would even argue European), which of course changed when the Nazis got into power. Then things shifted back post-war. Having lived in Berlin, it is very much a pro-gay culture city and reverted to that norm by the 1960s even despite the splitting of the city and not-friendly attitude the Communists had toward homosexuality. Hirschfeld's research wouldn't really matter TBH. Trans-people had other centers of toleration and acceptance like Sweden and Denmark:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Danish_Girl_(film)
Ironically the Nazis were the abberation and once they left power their legacy helped actually liberalize German culture IOTL, as the 1960s generation reacted strongly to the social conservatism of their parents' generation. So I don't see a role for Hirschfeld's research to matter after the Nazis beyond being a historical snapshot into what gay and trans cultures/situtions were like in 1920s Berlin/Germany. Society had moved on from that point and elaborated on what Hirschfeld was researching.
Now, what would be an interesting TL would be what impact Hirschfeld would have had in a surviving Weimar where the rise of the Nazis never shuts down his institute. THEN he could potentially have been the start of much interesting research, a European Kinsey, but even more extensive in his research, 30 years early.
Gay and trans issues might well have then been culturally integrated by the 1960s in German culture had the Nazis and war not interrupted the arc of history and society that was developing in the 1920s.
 
@wiking, it's ironic that you downplay Hirschfeld's work while at the same time play up The Danish Girl. The woman on whom that film was loosely based, Lily Elbe, had her first surgeries under the supervision of Hirschfeld. From the commentaries around the various doctors operating at the time, Hirschfeld seems to have had the best (most survivable; surgery was serious business in those days) techniques. While the German LGBT culture bounced back readily enough, losing that library of research put the state of the surgical art in that field back decades.
 

Deleted member 1487

@wiking, it's ironic that you downplay Hirschfeld's work while at the same time play up The Danish Girl. The woman on whom that film was loosely based, Lily Elbe, had her first surgeries under the supervision of Hirschfeld. From the commentaries around the various doctors operating at the time, Hirschfeld seems to have had the best (most survivable; surgery was serious business in those days) techniques. While the German LGBT culture bounced back readily enough, losing that library of research put the state of the surgical art in that field back decades.
How am I downplaying Hirschfeld's work? I'm saying in the context of OTL with the Nazis and WW2, by the time the war is over his research surviving isn't going to make that much of a difference due to the world be preoccupied by a ton of other social issues going on, including recovery from the war and the start of the Cold War. By the 1960s there would be enough elaboration on his work in other countries independent of Hirschfeld to make any surviving material redundant.
As to Lily Elbe's surgeries, Hirschfeld supervised the removal of his testicles, but the actual surgery was carried out by someone else AFAIK and all the later surgeries were conducted by a different surgeon:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lili_Elbe#Surgeries_and_dissolution_of_marriage
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kurt_Warnekros
AFAIK there is nothing particularly groundbreaking about testicle removal surgery at that time. AFAIK Hirschfeld wasn't the only or even best person doing such sugeries at the time and Lili Elbe died from a womb implant after getting ovary implants, which indicates that there were some really radical experiments going on at the time that even now aren't done (AFAIK).

As it was the surgeries were being done in Sweden:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christine_Jorgensen#Sex_reassignment

Its tough to really know what was going on at the time because the history of sexual reassignment surgeries don't seem to be particularly rigorous about the very early period. Hormone therapy was being experimented with in several European countries as was the surgery for it; it's not clear that Hirschfeld was the only or best practioner, he was one experimenter in a field in it's infancy and one with the best publicity.
 


She obtained special permission from the Danish Minister of Justice to undergo a series of operations in that country. On September 24, 1951, surgeons at Gentofte Hospital in Copenhagen performed an orchiectomy on Jorgensen.[5] In a letter to friends on October 8, 1951, she referred to how the surgery affected her:

Last time I checked, Copenhagen was in Denmark.
 

Deleted member 1487

Last time I checked, Copenhagen was in Denmark.
Funny that that was the only response you had to what I wrote. Anyway the article said the surgeries were only being done in Sweden, apparently this particular surgery was performed in Denmark.

Jorgensen intended to go to Sweden, where the only doctors in the world who then performed the surgery were located. During a stopover in Copenhagen to visit relatives, she met Dr. Christian Hamburger, a Danish endocrinologist and specialist in rehabilitative hormonal therapy. Jorgensen stayed in Denmark and underwent hormone replacement therapy under Dr. Hamburger's direction. She chose the name Christine in honor of Dr. Hamburger.
So my comment was correct, at the time that Jorgensen was going to get the surgery the only country where they were being done was Sweden, which meant that the surgery technique was evolving anyway in a European country not participating in WW2. We have no idea what if any influence the work in Germany had or would have had on their development of the surgery.
 
So, there's at least two scenarios to explore.

In one, the Nazis simply don't rise, and whatever does come to power, while it may be authoritarian, doesn't end up ransacking his lab and burning it, allowing him to continue his work.
Probably something we should explore more often. For example, I think it's an example of something borderline ASB happening in real life

that this small, dopesville nazi party found that big a power vacuum to step into.
 
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cpip

Gone Fishin'
We have no idea what if any influence the work in Germany had or would have had on their development of the surgery.

Well, isn't that sort of why we make these posts? In the hope of finding out? This all strikes me as oddly dismissive.
 

Deleted member 1487

Well, isn't that sort of why we make these posts? In the hope of finding out? This all strikes me as oddly dismissive.
There is very little info to go on as to what Magnus actually did or what methods he used that were special. We also don't know what if anything from Germany influenced the Swedish surgeons. If you have any info please share.
 

thorr97

Banned
How is the work of a gender reassingment specialist tied to or relevant to the emergence of the gay community?
 

Deleted member 1487

How is the work of a gender reassingment specialist tied to or relevant to the emergence of the gay community?
Its not. Magnus though advocated for the rights of both groups.
 
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