Life Through a Queer Lens

EP73: The Pink Triangle's Legacy

Jenene & Kit Season 2 Episode 73

The pink triangle, a symbol of Nazi persecution of homosexuals, has been reclaimed and transformed into powerful monuments worldwide, from Amsterdam to San Francisco to Paris.

• Amsterdam's Homomonument (1987) was the world's first and largest LGBTQ+ memorial, with a triangular design pointing to significant locations including Anne Frank's house
• Berlin's Holocaust Memorial at Nolendorfplatz station (1989) features an upside-down pink triangle plaque commemorating homosexual victims of National Socialism
• San Francisco's annual giant pink triangle on Twin Peaks began in 1995 as a nighttime activist project and has evolved into an official Pride weekend tradition
• The Pink Triangle Memorial Park in San Francisco features 15 granite pylons representing 15,000 men killed in concentration camps
• Sydney's monument (2001) incorporates both pink and black triangles forming a fractured Star of David, with elements that glow at night symbolizing hope
• Paris unveiled a new memorial in May 2023 featuring a wand with a star that has both black (representing grief) and mirrored sides (reflecting changing public opinions)
• Most memorials serve multiple purposes: honoring victims, educating the public, and transforming symbols of hate into emblems of pride and remembrance


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Speaker 1:

We here at Life, through a Queer Lens, just wanted to extend our deepest condolences to jonathan joss and to the family of jonathan joss and his husband. For those of you who are unaware, on the first day of pride, indigenous and proud queer actor jonathan joss, who is best known for his roles in King of the Hill and on Parks and Recreation, returned to his home with his husband and their home had been burned to the ground. Their dog had been killed and they found the dog's skull in their front yard along with the dog's harness. Both of these attacks the house being burned down and the dog being killed are two of many attacks against the couple that are homophobically charged. They were hate crimes. They were hate crimes. His death was a hate crime and everything leading up to his death was also a hate crime. But, as the police tend to do, they ignored all of the warning signs leading up to his tragic murder and now are refusing to label it a hate crime and instead are saying it was just a dispute between neighbors. So if you hear about this story on major news publications, you will most likely hear about it as a dispute between neighbors. This man was gunned down for being gay the shooter was aiming for his husband, who was a trans man was aiming for his husband, and Jonathan pushed his husband out of the way and took a bullet and died While this man was firing. He was calling them slurs. Man was firing, he was calling them slurs. They killed their dogs, burned down their house. Like this is. This is as clear cut a hate crime as you could get, and police are refusing to label this a hate crime. So don't shut up about this. Tell everyone you know about this. This is an absolute, abhorrent miscarriage of justice and it's something that we will continue to see under this administration. We will continue to see people be murdered because of their identities Specifically.

Speaker 1:

This is a cut and dry hate crime and it will not be labeled a hate crime. I'm just warning y'all now, like this is not the first, most likely, and this most likely will not be the last. This is just a very high profile one because he was an actor in his life. So, yeah, like that is something that is important to keep in mind. Just like, brace yourselves and also keep an eye out.

Speaker 1:

When you hear a story hit the news like this, look into it a little deeper and, you know, draw your own logical conclusions. This was very clearly a hate crime and yet it is not being labeled as such and that matters. So scream this from the fucking rooftops truly Like, do not shut up about this. Do not shut up about this. This was a hate crime. Call it what it was. Call it what it is. On the first day of Pride, a prominent queer and indigenous actor was killed for and because of his identity. He was hate crime. Call it what it is, not to get somber on the first note, but that matters and I know, like in my spheres on the internet, I've personally been hearing a good amount about this and have been being delivered the information as, like, this was a hate crime. However, I also know that not everyone is on my sphere of the internet and who knows who listens to this podcast, so I don't really have access to those analytics. That's my co-host. My co-host, janine, is the one who has access to a lot of those analytics. The numbers overwhelm me. So, in case you are unaware and you're hearing about this from just like, major news publications and not much else the reason they are not calling this a hate crime is because the cops aren't calling it a hate crime and the reason the cops aren't calling it a hate crime is because cops are homophobic and they feel emboldened by this new administration to not do anything to protect the queer community. So yeah, that's kind of just the major, unfortunately, the major news around pride that I feel not enough people are aware of, or, if they are aware of it, they are learning about it in a very improper way.

Speaker 1:

Hello everyone, welcome back to another episode of life through a queer lens. This is going to be another solo cast with moi kit. I hope you all are doing well today. I hope you guys are having a great pride month. I think this is our third episode of pride month. Our first episode was about francis bacon. Our second episode is about the history of the pink triangle, and then this is our third episode, which is about monuments and memorials that utilize the pink triangle within their designs and within their messaging and meaning. And we're also going to go into the messaging and meaning behind these monuments, some of the history behind their construction and stuff like that. So it's going to be a fun one, going to be a relatively chill one.

Speaker 1:

I did my best to organize this by the year in which the statue or monument was created and opened basically to the public. So we started it with the first ones that were opened and we end it with the most recent ones. You know what I mean. That's how, in general, this list will be organized. So we are going to start in Amsterdam with the Hommel Monument, also known as the Gay Monument. It was first designed in 1979 and officially unveiled in 1987. This monument was the first of its kind globally. The monument is a set of stairs leading down to a lake where a large stone pink triangle stands as a platform over the water. The artist was Karin Dan K-A-R-I-N. I don't know if that would be pronounced Karen or Karin, but that is the artist. It's a really cool monument. I hope one day to be able to go visit it, because Amsterdam is one of those like bucket list places that I would love to be able to go see. This is a direct quote from I Am Amsterdam's website about the monument Quote.

Speaker 1:

This world-renowned icon takes the shape of a triangle on the bank of the canal. Its three points are symbolic One corner points toward the National War Memorial on Dam Square, another points across the canal to the site of the Anne Frank House, while a third corner points toward the COC Amsterdam. It remains the largest monument in the world dedicated to homosexuality and remembrance. So that's pretty cool and just a little pre-middle of the episode. Interesting, interesting fact Anne Frank was most likely, judging by her diary bisexual. She frequently wrote about love and attraction for and toward femininity as well as masculinity.

Speaker 1:

Access information about LGBTQIA, plus history and events from the region. So that's pretty cool, like it's. It's. It's a monument. However, right by that is a little thing called Pink Point, which is information. It's. It's about the monument, it's about LGBTQIA, plus history and queer events in the area. And that's really cool. Like it is an all-encompassing experience to go to see this memorial. It is informational, it is memorializing, it is the joy that is queer experience. You know what I mean. There are events also that you can find through going there, Because all of these things I don't know, at least in my experience of queerness go hand in hand.

Speaker 1:

I think it was Ezra Fuhrman at one of her concerts she had said that to her. The trans experience is walking a tightrope between euphoria and despair. It's like that whole idea of these two opposite feelings existing, completely intertwined, and I very much identify with that personally. Again, that is not going to be every queer person. Obviously this is an all-encompassing spectrum of feeling and experience about being queer, but for me personally, I very much identified with that when she said that. Oh guys, this is in German so please forgive me.

Speaker 1:

However, at the Nolendorfplatz station in Berlin, erected in 1989, is the Holocaust Memorial for LGBTQIA plus victims. See, this was erected two years after the one in Amsterdam, fixed to the outside wall of the train station in the center of a historically gay neighborhood in Berlin. The plaque is shaped like an upside down pink triangle. The artist is unknown, slash to be determined. It's just one of those things where the exact person who designed and put up this plaque is lost to history. Unfortunately, the plaque reads in German Slaughtered Silence to the Homosexual Victims of National Socialism, quoted from the Center for Jewish Art. Quote the plaque at Nullendorfplatz was the first to prominently commemorate the homosexual victims of national socialism in a public space and to acknowledge their history of persecution. Activist groups had demanded the commemorative plaque for more than 10 years. In 1989, after initial resistance from the Berlin Transportation Authority, the BVG, the plaque was mounted on the outer wall of the Nullendorfplatz subway station. An additional plaque was installed in 1933. And I think when they mean like the first one to commemorate, I think they mean in Germany specifically, but I could be mistaken about that. However, I do know that the one in Amsterdam was the first one globally to be opened and is still the biggest, like I saw pictures of it. I recommend looking it up. It's huge. You can fit like an entire group of people standing on this platform, which is really cool to see.

Speaker 1:

Next up, we have something that doesn't exactly stay up year round but is considered a very important part of Pride Month, and I had to talk about it here. We have the Friends of the Pink Triangle Organizations Pink Triangle of San Francisco of the Pink Triangle Organizations Pink Triangle of San Francisco, california. This started all the way back in 1995, the year before I was born. Every year in June, the organization Friends of the Pink Triangle gathers hundreds of volunteers to place a massive pink triangle on Twin Peaks Mountain in San Francisco for the Pride Parade weekend. So it's not something that's up for all of Pride, it's something that goes up right before the Pride Parade weekend and then comes down at the end of the weekend. It's huge, it's massive.

Speaker 1:

I don't know if you guys have ever seen pictures of this thing or videos of this thing, but it is massive. It's really cool to see, especially considering it's something that was started again not that long ago. That was only the year before I was born. That's not ancient history y'all, but it's still something that was started during a period of time when public feelings around homosexuality were kind of, you know, comparable to how they are now. You know, comparable to how they are now.

Speaker 1:

When it first started, it was a protest project put together by activists and assembled on the mountain at night to stay safe from police. Now the event has gotten to the point where local politicians show up to commemorate the massive triangle. The mayor of San Francisco, willie L Brown, commemorated the monument three times with bottles of pink champagne, and I think that's cool. I don't know even like. The way it started is like this clandestine middle-of-the-night activist-run operation and was able to gain legitimacy from there. Not that it didn't start out as its own form of legitimate, but it started out as illegal and it was able to gain legal legitimacy, if you will, which is pretty cool. Yeah.

Speaker 1:

And then next up and I do believe this memorial is connected to the Friends of the Pink Triangle organization. I think that they work together sometimes, or like they start I'm not 100% sure. I found one through the other, like one's website was on the others and vice versa. So it seems like in some way they are connected, but in the like official who designed this, who started this, who there was no direct mention of the other. But it seems like they're in some way connected and I felt that important to mention. So this one started in 1995 and then the next one we have chronological order is the gay and lesbian holocaust memorial in sydney, australia. This was erected in 2001 close to the jewish holocaust memorial museum. It's located on a triangular platform within an area known as Stonewall Gardens. The artist was Russell Rodrigo.

Speaker 1:

The memorial makes use of both pink and black triangles, as we spoke about in the previous episode, used to identify homosexual men and lesbian women, slash other LGBTQIA plus identities respectively during Nazi persecution. Excuse me, respectively, not respectfully, because it's not at all respectful, I just mean respectively. As in, the pink triangle was used for gay men and the black triangle was used for lesbians. Slash other LGBTQIA plus identities. That makes sense. I hope that makes sense. Holy shit, I talk very quickly. That makes sense. I hope that makes sense. Holy shit, I talk very quickly.

Speaker 1:

This is a direct quote from the Sydney of Australia's website about the monument. Quote the artwork consists of a pink triangular prism made of enameled steel and a grid of black steel columns in the form of a triangle. Together, the two elements form a fractured star of David. The prism is etched with images of people who suffered persecution and of Sachsenhausen concentration camp in Germany. During the day, the glass surface reflects the surroundings and at night it glows with a soft light, symbolizing hope and life. End quote.

Speaker 1:

And I think that's kind of nice. That's pretty beautiful. That well, very well done, very well done, sydney. Okay, this is the memorial that I believe is in some way connected to the friends of the pink triangle organization that sets up the pink triangle of twin peaks in san francisco. Oh, my goodness, I'm knocking everything over. It's fine, um, but, and then again, the only reason I think these two might be connected is because they're mentioned on each other's websites. So it seems like there's some type of like. They work together in some way.

Speaker 1:

But this is the pink triangle memorial in san francisco, located within a mini park known as pink triangle. The memorial is the first in the US to commemorate LGBTQA plus victims of Nazi Germany, officially dedicated on December 10, 2001, on the 53rd anniversary of the UN Declaration of Human Rights. The artists were Howard Grant and Gilbert Blake, who designed the first pride flag, with co-artists Robert Bruce and Suzanne Martin, with the Eureka Foundation, a non-profit organization sponsoring the memorial and being responsible for its upkeep. A lot of moving cogs involved in this one, but it's a very cool little part. I saw some pictures of it online Again, another one of those like bucket list items that I would love to be able to see someday.

Speaker 1:

Quoted directly from the pink triangle memorials website, quote 15 pink and gray granite triangular pylons were erected, each one representing 1 000 men killed in concentration camps. Together, the pylons form a triangle facing the castro's monumental rainbow flags. In addition to this, a large pink triangle made of rose quartz stones sits among the pink rose bushes as a symbol of love, healing and pride. Visitors are invited to take a single stone as a remembrance to those lost and also to spread a message of hope and peace throughout the world. This memorial is regularly taking donations, especially to help refill the pink triangle of rose quartz stones with more rose quartz for people to take. So if you're looking for one to donate to that is US-based, whatever, that's one that says right on their website like, hey, if you want to donate, we could use that. And it seems like they work with the friends of the pink triangle, which again erects that every year and needs supplies because that takes a lot. It's a big triangle, y'all. It's a very big triangle, okay.

Speaker 1:

Next up we have the buchenwald Memorial, the commemorative stones, former Block 45. When victims of Nazi persecution were first brought to Buchenwald after the disinfection and intake process, many were first housed in Block 45, the so-called transit block. Since the year 2000, it's possible for communities who were victims of Nazi persecution to lay commemorative stones the artists. This was made and placed by members of the queer community. In 2006, the commemorative stone for homosexual men was placed, stating in both German and the English language in memory of the homosexual men that suffered here. There were 650 Rosa Winkle prisoners in the Buchenwald concentration camp between 1937 and 1945. Many of them lost their lives. Rosa Winkle is just another term for pink triangle.

Speaker 1:

The pink triangle monument within Sitges, spain, a small coastal town southwest of Barcelona, erected in 2006 with the phrase Sitges Against Homophobia, never Again, the artist is unknown, but it was placed by the local city government slash politicians. The town was long considered a gayborhood within Spain. However, in 1996, heavy policing of beaches at night, specifically targeting gay men, sparked public outrage and backlash in the form of protests and riots. So because of that, within by 2006, so like 10 years later, they erected a memorial in memory of all victims of homophobia and persecution for being LGBTQIA, but made use of the pink triangle for obvious reasons. Our interesting fact for today is, on May 17th 2025, so this just happened Paris, france, unveiled a new memorial to LGBTQIA plus victims of Nazi persecution.

Speaker 1:

The monument, created by artist Jean-Luc Verna, is shaped like a massive wand with a five-point star at the top. Quoted from the artist, the memorial is quote a big thing so that it's finally seen. He goes on to say quote the black side of the star is the bodies that were burned. It's grief. It's also a shadow that tells us that these things can happen again. The other side, the mirror, is the present, with colors from the weather and the sky of Paris that changes as fast as public opinion can turn backwards. I think that's beautiful. If you guys haven't seen pictures of this monument, I really recommend looking it up. I saw some pictures from the opening ceremony of it and there was a bunch of drag queens standing around this big fucking wand and I don't know man, I'm going to cry just thinking about it. It was so beautiful. Happy Pride y'all you.