title: Civilization (video game)

text: "Civilization" was released with only single-player support, with the player working against multiple computer opponents. In 1991, Internet or online gaming was still in its infancy, so this option was not considered in "Civilization" release. Over the next few years, as home Internet accessibility took off, MicroProse looked to develop an online version of "Civilization". This led to the 1995 release of "Sid Meier's CivNet". "CivNet" allowed for up to seven players to play the game, with computer opponents available to obtain up to six active civilizations. Games could be played either on a turn-based mode, or in a simultaneous mode where each player took their turn at the same time and only progressing to the next turn once all players have confirmed being finished that turn. The game, in addition to better support for Windows 3.1 and Windows 95, supported connectivity through LAN, primitive Internet play, modem, and direct serial link, and included a local hotseat mode. "CivNet" also included a map editor and a "king builder" to allow a player to customize the names and looks of their civilization as seen by other players.


title: Civilization (video game)

text: According to Brian Reynolds, who led the development of "Civilization II", MicroProse "sincerely believed that "CivNet" was going to be a much more important product" than the next single-player "Civilization" game that he and Jeff Briggs had started working on. Reynolds said that because their project was seen as a side effort with little risk, they were able to innovate new ideas into "Civilization II". As a net result, "CivNet" was generally overshadowed by "Civilization II" which was released in the following year.


title: Civilization (video game)

text: "Civilization" critical success created a "golden period of MicroProse" where there was more potential for similar strategy games to succeed, according to Meier. This put stress on the company's direction and culture. Stealey wanted to continue to pursue the military-themed titles, while Meier wanted to continue his success with simulation games. Shelley left MicroProse in 1992 and joined Ensemble Studios, where he used his experience with "Civilization" to design the "Age of Empires" games. Stealey had pushed MicroProse to develop console and arcade-based versions of their games, but this put the company into debt, and Stealey eventually sold the company to Spectrum HoloByte in 1993; Spectrum HoloByte kept MicroProse as a separate company on acquisition.


title: Civilization (video game)

text: Meier would continue and develop "Civilization II" along with Brian Reynolds, who served in a similar role to Shelley as design assistant, as well as help from Jeff Briggs and Douglas Kaufman. This game was released in early 1996, and is considered the first sequel of any Sid Meier game. Stealey eventually sold his shares in MicroProse and left the company, and Spectrum HoloByte opted to consolidate the two companies under the name MicroProse in 1996, eliminating numerous positions at MicroProse in the process. As a result, Meier, Briggs, and Reynolds all opted to leave the company and founded Firaxis, which by 2005 became a subsidiary of Take-Two. After a number of acquisitions and legal actions, the "Civilization" brand (both as a board game and video game) is now owned by Take-Two, and Firaxis, under Meier's oversight, continues to develop games in the "Civilization" series.


title: Civilization (video game)

text: "Civilization" has been called one of the most important strategy games of all time, and has a loyal following of fans. This high level of interest has led to the creation of a number of free and open source versions and inspired similar games by other commercial developers.


title: Civilization (video game)

text: "Computer Gaming World" stated that "a new Olympian in the genre of god games has truly emerged", comparing "Civilization" importance to computer games to that of the wheel. The game was reviewed in 1992 in "Dragon" #183 by Hartley, Patricia, and Kirk Lesser in "The Role of Computers" column. The reviewers gave the game 5 out of 5 stars. They commented: ""Civilization" is one of the highest dollar-to-play-ratio entertainments we've enjoyed. The scope is enormous, the strategies border on being limitless, the excitement is genuinely high, and the experience is worth every dime of the game's purchase price."


title: Civilization (video game)

text: Jeff Koke reviewed "Civilization" in "Pyramid" #2 (July/Aug., 1993), and stated that "Ultimately, there are games that are a lot flashier than "Civilization", with cool graphics and animation, but there aren't many - or any - in my book that have the ability to absorb the player so totally and to provide an interesting, unique outcome each and every time it's played."


title: Civilization (video game)

text: "Civilization" won the Origins Award in the category Best Military or Strategy Computer Game of 1991. A 1992 "Computer Gaming World" survey of wargames with modern settings gave the game five stars out of five, describing it as "more addictive than crack ... so rich and textured that the documentation is incomplete". In 1992 the magazine named it the Overall Game of the Year, in 1993 added the game to its Hall of Fame, and in 1996 chose "Civilization" as the best game of all time:


title: Civilization (video game)

text: A critic for "Next Generation" judged the Super NES version to be a disappointing port, with a cumbersome menu system (particularly that the "City" and "Production" windows are on separate screens), an unintuitive button configuration, and ugly scaled down graphics. However, he gave it a positive recommendation due to the strong gameplay and strategy of the original game: "if you've never taken a crack at this game before, be prepared to lose hours, even days, trying to conquer those pesky Babylonians." Sir Garnabus of "GamePro", in contrast, was pleased with the Super NES version's interface, and said the graphics and audio are above that of a typical strategy game. He also said the game stood out among the Super NES's generally action-oriented library.


title: Civilization (video game)

text: In 2000, GameSpot rated "Civilization" as the tenth most influential video game of all time. It was also ranked at fourth place on "IGN" 2000 list of the top PC games of all time. In 2004, readers of "Retro Gamer" voted it as the 29th top retro game. In 2007, it was named one of the 16 most influential games in history at a German technology and games trade show Telespiele. In Poland, it was included in the retrospective lists of the best Amiga games by Wirtualna Polska (ranked ninth) and "CHIP" (ranked fifth). In 2012, "Time" named it one of the 100 greatest video games of all time. In 1994, "PC Gamer US" named "Civilization" the second best computer game ever. The editors wrote, "The depth of strategies possible is impressive, and the look and feel of the game will keep you playing and exploring for months. Truly a remarkable title." That same year, "PC Gamer UK" named its Windows release the sixth best computer game of all time, calling it Sid Meier's "crowning glory".


title: Civilization (video game)

text: On March 12, 2007, "The New York Times" reported on a list of the ten most important video games of all time, the so-called game canon, including "Civilization".


title: Civilization (video game)

text: By the release of "Civilization II" in 1996, "Civilization" had sold over 850,000 copies. By 2001, sales had reached 1 million copies. Shelley stated in a 2016 interview that "Civilization" had sold 1.5 million copies.


title: Civilization (video game)

text: In 2022, The Strong National Museum of Play inducted "Sid Meier’s Civilization" to its World Video Game Hall of Fame.


title: Civilization (video game)

text: There have been several sequels to "Civilization", including "Civilization II" (1996), "Civilization III" (2001), "Civilization IV" (2005), "Civilization Revolution" (2008), "Civilization V" (2010), and "Civilization VI" in 2016. In 1994, Meier produced a similar game titled "Colonization".


title: Civilization (video game)

text: "Civilization" is generally considered the first major game in the genre of "4X", with the four "X"s equating to "explore, expand, exploit, and exterminate", a term developed by Alan Emrich in promoting 1993's "Master of Orion". While other video games with the principles of 4X had been released prior to "Civilization", future 4X games would attribute some of their basic design principles to "Civilization".


title: Civilization (video game)

text: An Easter egg named "Nuclear Gandhi" in most of the games in the series references a supposed integer overflow bug in "Civilization" that causes a computer-controlled Gandhi, normally a highly peaceful leader, to become a nuclear warmonger. The game is said to start Gandhi's "aggression value" at 1 out of a maximum 255 possible for an 8-bit unsigned integer, making a computer-controlled Gandhi tend to avoid armed conflict. However, once a civilization achieves democracy as its form of government, its leader's aggression value falls by 2. Under normal arithmetic principles, Gandhi's "1" would be reduced to "-1", but because the value is an 8-bit unsigned integer, it wraps around to "255", causing Gandhi to suddenly become the most aggressive opponent in the game. Interviewed in 2019, developer Brian Reynolds said with "99.99% certainty" that this story was apocryphal, recalling Gandhi's coded aggression level as being no lower than other peaceful leaders in the game, and doubting that a wraparound would have had the effect described. He noted that all leaders in the game become "pretty ornery" after their acquisition of nuclear weapons, and suggested that this behaviour simply seemed more surprising and memorable when it happened to Gandhi. Meier, in his autobiography, stated "That kind of bug comes from something called unsigned characters, which are not the default in the C programming language, and not something I used for the leader traits. Brian Reynolds wrote Civ II in C++, and he didn't use them, either. We received no complaints about a Gandhi bug when either game came out, nor did we send out any revisions for one. Gandhi's military aggressiveness score remained at 1 throughout the game." He then explains the overflow error story was made up in 2012. It spread from there to a Wikia entry, then eventually to Reddit, and was picked up by news sites like Kotaku and Geek.com.


title: Civilization (video game)

text: Another relic of "Civilization" was the nature of combat where a military unit from earlier civilization periods could remain in play through modern times, gaining combat bonuses due to veteran proficiency, leading to these primitive units easily beating out modern technology against all common sense, with the common example of a veteran phalanx unit able to fend off a battleship. Meier noted that this resulted from not anticipating how players would use units, expecting them to have used their forces more like a war-based board game to protect borders and maintain zones of control rather than creating "stacks of doom". Future civilization games have had many changes in combat systems to prevent such oddities, though these games do allow for such random victories.


title: Civilization (video game)

text: The 1999 game "Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri" was also created by Meier and is in the same genre, but with a futuristic/space theme; many of the interface and gameplay innovations in this game eventually made their way into "Civilization III" and "IV". "Alpha Centauri" is not actually a sequel to "Civilization", despite beginning with the same event that ends "Civilization" and "Civilization II": a crewed spacecraft from Earth arrives in the Alpha Centauri star system. Firaxis' 2014 game "", although bearing the name of the main series, is a reimagining of "Alpha Centauri" running on the engine of "Civilization V".


title: Civilization (video game)

text: A 1994 "Computer Gaming World" survey of space war games stated that "the lesson of this incredibly popular wargame has not been lost on the software community, and technological research popped up all over the place in 1993", citing "Spaceward Ho!" and "Master of Orion" as examples. That year MicroProse published "Master of Magic", a similar game but embedded in a medieval-fantasy setting where instead of technologies the player (a powerful wizard) develops spells, among other things. In 1999, Activision released "", a sequel of sorts to "Civilization II" but created by a completely different design team. "Call to Power" spawned a sequel in 2000, but by then Activision had lost the rights to the "Civilization" name and could only call it "Call to Power II".


title: Civilization (video game)

text: An open source clone of "Civilization" has been developed under the name of "Freeciv", with the slogan "'Cause civilization should be free." This game can be configured to match the rules of either "Civilization" or "Civilization II". Another game that partially clones "Civilization" is a public domain game called "C-evo".


title: Meconium

text: Meconium is the earliest stool of a mammalian infant resulting from defecation. Unlike later feces, meconium is composed of materials ingested during the time the infant spends in the uterus: intestinal epithelial cells, lanugo, mucus, amniotic fluid, bile, and water. Meconium, unlike later feces, is viscous and sticky like tar – its color usually being a very dark olive green and it is almost odorless. When diluted in amniotic fluid, it may appear in various shades of green, brown, or yellow. It should be completely passed by the end of the first few days after birth, with the stools progressing toward yellow (digested milk).


title: Meconium

text: Meconium is normally retained in the infant's bowel until after birth, but sometimes it is expelled into the amniotic fluid (also called "amniotic liquor") prior to birth or during labor and delivery. The stained amniotic fluid (called "meconium liquor" or "meconium-stained liquor") is recognized by medical staff as a possible sign of fetal distress. Some post-dates pregnancies (when they are more than 40 weeks pregnant) may also have meconium-stained liquor without fetal distress. Medical staff may aspirate the meconium from the nose and mouth of a newborn immediately after delivery in the event the baby shows signs of respiratory distress to decrease the risk of meconium aspiration syndrome, which can occur in meconium-stained amniotic fluid.


title: Meconium

text: Most of the time that the amniotic fluid is stained with meconium, it will be homogeneously distributed throughout the fluid, making it brown. This indicates that the fetus passed the meconium some time ago such that sufficient mixing occurred as to establish the homogeneous mixture. Terminal meconium occurs when the fetus passes the meconium a short enough time before birth/cesarean section that the amniotic fluid remains clear, but individual clumps of meconium are in the fluid.


title: Meconium

text: The failure to pass meconium is a symptom of several diseases including Hirschsprung's disease and cystic fibrosis.


title: Meconium

text: The meconium sometimes becomes thickened and congested in the intestines, a condition known as meconium ileus. Meconium ileus is often the first sign of cystic fibrosis. In cystic fibrosis, the meconium can form a bituminous black-green mechanical obstruction in a segment of the ileum. Beyond this, there may be a few separate grey-white globular pellets. Below this level, the bowel is a narrow and empty micro-colon. Above the level of the obstruction, there are several loops of hypertrophied bowel distended with fluid. No meconium is passed, and abdominal distension and vomiting appear soon after birth. About 20% of cases of cystic fibrosis present with meconium ileus, while approximately 20% of one series of cases of meconium ileus did not have cystic fibrosis. The presence of meconium ileus is not related to the severity of the cystic fibrosis. The obstruction can be relieved in a number of different ways.


title: Meconium

text: Meconium ileus should be distinguished from meconium plug syndrome, in which a tenacious mass of mucus prevents the meconium from passing and there is no risk of intestinal perforation. Meconium ileus has a significant risk of intestinal perforation. In a barium enema, meconium plug syndrome shows a normal or dilated colon as compared to micro-colon in meconium ileus.


title: Meconium

text: Meconium can be tested for various drugs, to check for "in utero" exposure. Using meconium, a Canadian research group showed that by measuring a by-product of alcohol, fatty acid ethyl esters (FAEE) they could objectively detect excessive maternal drinking of alcohol during pregnancy. In the US, the results of meconium testing may be used by child protective services and other law enforcement agencies to determine the eligibility of the parents to keep the newborn. Meconium can also be analyzed to detect the tobacco use of mothers during their pregnancy, which is commonly under-reported.


title: Meconium

text: The issue of whether meconium is sterile remains debated and is an area of ongoing research. Although some researchers have reported evidence of bacteria in meconium, this has not been consistently confirmed. Other researchers have raised questions about whether these findings may be due to contamination after sample collection and that meconium is, in fact, sterile until after birth. Further researchers have hypothesized that there may be bacteria in the womb, but these are a normal part of pregnancy and could have an important role in shaping the developing immune system and are not harmful to the baby.


title: Meconium

text: The Latin term "meconium" derives from the Greek , "mēkōnion", a diminutive of , "mēkōn", i.e. poppy, in reference either to its tar-like appearance that may resemble some raw opium preparations or to Aristotle's belief that it induces sleep in the fetus.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: The 2022 season is the Las Vegas Raiders' 53rd season in the National Football League, their 63rd overall, their third in Las Vegas and their first under the head coach/general manager tandem of Josh McDaniels and Dave Ziegler. The Raiders look to return to the playoffs in back-to-back seasons for the first time since 2001 and 2002 when the franchise was based in Oakland. However, the Raiders suffered their worst start since 2018, with a 2–6 record to start the season, due in large part by giving up leads by at least 17 points in three games. The Raiders failed to improve on their 10–7 record from the previous season after a Week 14 loss to the Los Angeles Rams. The team lost despite leading the Rams 16–3 midway through the fourth quarter, marking their fourth loss after leading by at least 10 points.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: On January 17, the team announced that general manager Mike Mayock had been fired after three years with the team. On January 30, the Raiders named longtime New England Patriots' executive Dave Ziegler as their new general manager. On May 6, Raiders' owner Mark Davis announced that team president Dan Ventrelle was no longer with the organization. Following this, Ventrelle alleged that Raiders' owner Mark Davis created a hostile work environment, and once the former president acknowledged this, he was fired. Around May 21, Marcel Reece, already senior advisor and then chief people officer, became team senior vice president, chief of staff. On July 7, the team announced Sandra Douglass Morgan as new president. Morgan is the first black woman in NFL history to assume this role.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: Interim coach Rich Bisaccia, who replaced Jon Gruden after his resignation after five games in the 2021 season, was not assured of returning as head coach despite the Raiders making the playoffs the previous season. Bisaccia did interview for the permanent coaching position. However, the Raiders conducted other interviews as well.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: On January 31, the team officially named New England Patriots' offensive coordinator Josh McDaniels the team's new head coach. McDaniels named Mick Lombardi offensive coordinator and Patrick Graham defensive coordinator.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: On February 28, the NFL announced that the Raiders would play the Jacksonville Jaguars in the Pro Football Hall of Fame Game on Thursday, August 4, at Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium in Canton, Ohio, at 5:00 p.m. PDT. The Raiders had two former players enter the Hall of Fame, wide receiver Cliff Branch, who died in 2019, as well as defensive tackle Richard Seymour. The two teams will meet again during the regular season in Jacksonville. On May 12, the rest of the Raiders' preseason opponents were announced. The complete preseason schedule was announced on May 18.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: The Raiders won all of their preseason games closing with a 4–0 record; it was the first time in team history the Raiders went undefeated in the preseason.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: The Raiders began the season on the road facing their division rival, the Los Angeles Chargers, at SoFi Stadium.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: The Chargers got the ball first and moved quickly into Raider territory before the Vegas defense stiffened and forced the Chargers to settle for a 43-yard field goal and an early 3–0 lead. The Raiders answered by also moving into their opponent's territory and, helped by a Davante Adams catch and run, reached the Charger four yard line. However, a loss on a Josh Jacobs run and two incomplete passes led to Daniel Carlson's 23-yard field goal to tie the game. Following punts by both teams, the game moved to the second quarter and Justin Herbert hit Zander Horvath on a one-yard touchdown pass to give LA the 10–3 lead. The Raiders were again forced to punt and the Chargers moved to the Raider 28. However, they chose to go for it on fourth down and were stuffed by the Raider defense giving Vegas the ball with 1:38 left in the half. Following a sack on the first play of the ensuing possession, Derek Carr was intercepted at midfield and the Chargers returned the ball to the Vegas 31 with 45 seconds left in the half. Two plays later, Herbert threw his second toudown pass of the game, a 25-yard score to DeAndre Carter to extend the LA lead to 17–3 with 35 seconds left in the half. The Raiders chose to kneel on the final play of the half and entered halftime trailing by two touchdowns.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: In the second half, the Raiders scored quickly as Carr his Adams for a 41-yard play that moved the ball into LA territory. Three plays later, Carr hit Brandon Bolden for an 18-yard touchdown to narrow the score to 17–10. However, the Chargers quickly responded as Herbert hit Gerald Everett for an 18-yard touchdown of his own, returning the Charger lead to 14. The Raiders moved into LA territory on the next possession, but were forced to settle for a 55-yard field goal to move within 10. Following a punt by the Chargers early in the fourth quarter, Carr hit Darren Waller for a 23-yard gain, but was intercepted for the second time a play later on a pass intended for Adams at the Charger two yard line. Following a punt by the Chargers, Carr was intercepted for the third time in the game, giving the Chargers the ball at midfield. After forcing the Chargers to attempt a 49-yard field goal that was no good, Carr moved the Raiders into LA territory. with less than five minutes remaining in the game, Carr hit Adams for a three-yard touchdown to narrow the score to 24–19. Following an LA punt, the Raiders took over with 3:30 left in the game. However, Carr was sacked by former Raider Khalil Mack and fumbled the ball giving the Chargers the ball with 1:52 left in the game. The Chargers were able to run out the clock to win the game 24–19.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: The loss moved the Raiders to 0–1 on the season. Carr threw for 295 yards in the loss, but had four turnovers (three interceptions and a fumble) in the loss. Adams had 10 receptions for 141 yards and a touchdown in his first game for Vegas.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: The Raiders, playing in their home opener at Allegiant Stadium, blew a 20–0 lead and lost, in overtime, to a struggling Cardinals team still reeling from a Week 1 home defeat. Derek Carr threw two touchdown passes, one to Davante Adams and the other to Darren Waller, while Daniel Carlson added two field goals to provide the 20-point margin. However, in the second half, Arizona began to come back. It started when Greg Dortsch caught a five-yard touchdown pass from Kyler Murray to cut the lead to 20–7. The Raiders however, responded with aCarlson field goal to give Vegas a 23–7 lead to start the fourth quarter. However, the Cardinals quickly answered on Darrel Williams one-yard touchdown run. Murray scrambled in to add the two-point conversion to narrow the lead to 23–15. Following a punt by the Raiders, he Cardinals moved downfield on an 18-play drive capped off with Murray running in for a three-yard touchdown to pull with two as the quarter ended. Murray's throw to A. J. Green on the two-point conversion tied the game at 23. In overtime, the Cardinals received the ball, but turned it over on fourth down, giving the ball back to the Raiders. However, Raiders' receiver Hunter Renfrow fumbled the ball on the ensuing Raiders drive and Cardinals' defender Byron Murphy recovered and returned the fumble 59 yards for the game-winning touchdown. The Raiders lost 29–23 and fell to 0–2 on the season.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: With an 0–2 record to the start the season, the Raiders traveled to Nashville to face the Titans. Following a Ryan Tannehill touchdown pass to give the Titans a 7–0 lead, Daniel Carlson connected on a 21-yard field goal to narrow the lead to four. Derrick Henry scored on the next Titans' possession to pus the lead to 14–3 early in the second quarter. Derek Carr answered the score, hitting Davante Adams on a 5-yard touchdown pass to pull with four. Tannehill returned the Titans' lead to 11 with a one-yard touchdown run with under five minutes left in the half. Neither team could manage much on the next few possessions before the Titans took over at midfield with 21 second left in the half. A Randy Bullock field goal as time expired gave Tennessee the 24–10 halftime lead. A Carlson field goal accounted for all the scoring in the third quarter despite a Tannehill interception. The Titans turned the ball over on downs early in the fourth quarter, but Carr was intercepted on the ensuing possession. Following a punt by the Titans, Carlson hit another field goal to narrow the lead to eight with 3:29 left in the game. The Raider defense forced a punt on the next possession and the Raiders took over with 2:57 left and down by eight. Carr hit Mack Hollis on a nine-yard touchdown pass with 1:14 left in the game. Needing a two-point conversion to tie the game, Carr's pass to Darren Waller was incomplete. The ensuing onside kick failed and the Titans ran out the clock as the Raiders lost 24–22. The loss dropped Vegas to 0–3 on the season.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: Still looking for their first win on the season, the Raiders returned home to face the Broncos. An early Daniel Carlson field goal gave the Raiders a 3–0 lead. Following punts by both teams, Russell Wilson threw a five-yard touchdown pass to give the Broncos a 7–3 lead. Josh Jacobs answered with a 10-yard touchdown run to return the Vegas lead to three early in the second quarter. After the Broncos tied it on a field goal, Amik Robertson returned a Melvin Gordon fumble 68 yards for a 16–10 lead after Carlson missed the extra point. Wilson answered with a 20-yard touchdown pass and a failed kick on the extra point left the game tied at 16. A Carlson 39-yard field goal as the half ended gave the Raiders a 19–16 lead at halftime. Carlson added two more field goals as the game moved to the fourth quarter with the Raiders ahead 25–16. Wilson scored on a three-yard run with seven minutes left in the game to narrow the lead to 25–23. Jacobs second touchdown run of the game with just over two minutes remaining sealed the win for the Raiders. The 32–23 win marked the Raiders first win of the season. Jacobs rushed for 144 yards in the win.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: The Raiders next traveled to Kansas City to face the Chiefs on Monday Night Football. The Raiders blew a 17–0 lead and lost to the Chiefs, 30–29. The Raiders took the lead early in the first quarter when Derek Carr hit Davante Adams on a 58-yard touchdown pass. Following a missed field goal by the Chiefs, Josh Jacobs scored on a one-yard run to give the Raiders a 14–0 lead early in the second quarter. A Daniel Carlson field goal pushed the lead to 17 before Patrick Mahomes led the Chiefs on a six play, 43-yard drive to narrow the lead to 17–7. Carlson's second field goal of the game with 17 seconds left in the half pushed the lead to 20–7. However, Mahomes quickly put the Chiefs in field goal position and Matthew Wright's 59-yard field goal as the half ended left the Raiders ahead 20–10 at the half. The Chiefs narrowed the lead to three as Mahomes hit Travis Kelce for his second touchdown in the game on the first drive of the second half. Following a punt, Mahomes hit Kelce again to give KC the 24–20 lead. Carlson's field goal early in the fourth quarter left the Raiders trailing by one point. Kelce's fourth touchdown catch of the game and a missed two-point conversion left Vegas trailing 30–23 with seven minutes left. Carr answered the score, hitting Adams again on a 48-yard touchdown pass to bring the Raiders within a point with 4:27 remaining. Electing to try for two to take the lead, Jacobs was stuffed as the conversion failed. Still trailing by one, the Raiders forced the Chiefs to punt with 2:29 left. Vegas was able to move to midfield, but time ran out as the Raiders lost 30–29. Jacobs ran for 154 yards in the loss.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: After a bye week, the Raiders looked to turn around their season as they faced the Texans in Las Vegas. A Daniel Carlson field goal gave the Raiders an early 3–0 lead. Following a Texans' missed field goal and a punt by the Raiders, Houston took the lead on 13-yard touchdown pass by Davis Mills. The Texans extended the lead to 10–3 with 2:31 left in the half. With 31 seconds left in the half, Derek Carr hit Mack Hollins on a 26-yard touchdown pass to give the Raiders to tie the game at the half. A Texans' field goal early in the first half pushed the lead to three, but Josh Jacobs scored on a four-yard run to give the Raiders a 17–13 lead. Another Mills' touchdown pass gave the Texans the lead again before Jacobs answered with a seven-yard run early in the fourth quarter. Following a Houston punt, Jacobs scored his third touchdown of the game to push the lead to 31–20. A Duron Harmon 73-interception return for a touchdown sealed the win for the Raiders. Jacobs rushed for 143 yards in the 38–20 win. The win moved the Raiders to 2–4 on the season.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: Traveling to face the Saints in New Orleans, the Raiders' offense struggled mightily, punting on their first three possessions. Meanwhile, the Saints, led by backup quarterback Andy Dalton, took a 7–0 lead on an Alvin Kamara three-yard touchdown run late in the first quarter. The Raiders attempted a fake punt on their first possession of the second quarter which failed and gave the Saints the ball in Raiders' territory. A 37-yard field goal by Wil Lutz made it 10–0. Following an interception of a Derek Carr pass on the ensuing possession, the Saints moved the lead to 17 on a touchdown pass from Dalton to Kamara. The Raider offense punted on its only other possession of the first half and a missed field goal by Lutz as the half ended left the Raiders behind 17–0 at halftime. The second half was no different than the first for the Raiders as they were forced to punt before Dalton again hit Kamara for a touchdown pass to extend the lead to 24. Las Vegas was forced to punt on their next two possessions and although the Saints failed to score again, the Raiders turned to backups for their final possession. They were shut out 24–0 in the game and fell to 2–5 on the season.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: The Raiders next traveled to Jacksonville to face the Jaguars. After punting on their first possession, the Raiders allowed the Jaguars to move into Raider territory, but a fumble ended the drive. Derek Carr hit Davante Adams on a 25-yard touchdown pass to give the Raiders a 7–0 lead. A Daniel Carlson field goal pushed the lead to 10 before Carr hit Adams again, this time from 38 yards, to take a 17–0 lead. The Jaguars answered with a touchdown run by Travis Etienne to narrow the lead to 10. Another Carlson field goal was answered by a Jaguars' field goal as the half ended with a 20–10 Raider lead. The Jaguars narrowed the lead to three on a Trevor Lawrence touchdown pass on the first possession of the second half. The Raider offense struggled again for the remainder of the half, allowing another Etienne touchdown run to give the Jaguars a 24–20 lead. A Jaguar field goal moved the lead to seven while the Raider offense could not muster any more points. As a result, the Raiders fell 27–20. It was Las Vegas' third blown lead of 17 points or more on the season. With the loss, Vegas fell to 2–6 on the season.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: The Raiders returned home to face the Colts and new head coach Jeff Saturday. The Raider offense continued to struggle, failing to score on its first four possessions. A Matt Ryan one-yard run gave the Colts 7–0 lead late in the first quarter. A Colts' field goal pushed the lead to 10 early in the second quarter. With less than two minutes left in the half, Derek Car hit Foster Moreau for a four-yard touchdown pass to narrow the lead to three. However, the Vegas defense allowed the Colts to push the ball to the Raider 30 with three seconds left in the half. A field goal pushed the Colts' lead to 13–7 at the half. After a missed field goal by Indianapolis to start the second half, Josh Jacobs scored on a one-yard run to give the Raiders their first lead, 14–13. However, on the first play of the ensuing possession, Jonathan Taylor scored on a 66-yard run to restore the Colts' lead. A failed two-point conversion left the score at 19–14. Carr next hit Davante Adams on 48-yard touchdown pass to take a 20–19 lead after the failed two-point conversion. Following punts by both teams, Matt Ryan hit Parris Campbell on a 35-yard touchdown pass. The two-point conversion failed again, leaving the lead 25–20. Vegas was able to move deep into Indy territory, but the drive stalled at the Colts' 16 and Derek Carr's fourth down pass fell incomplete with 47 second left as the Raiders lost again, 25–20. The loss dropped the Raiders to 2–7 on the season.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: The Raiders returned to the road to face division foe, Denver, one of only two teams the Raiders had beat on the season. The Broncos scored first on the second possession of the game on a one-yard run by former Raider Latavius Murray. Daniel Carlson missed his first field goal of the season on Vegas' next possession and a Brandon McManus field goal pushed the Denver lead to 10. The Raiders finally got on the board when Derek Carr hit Davante Adams for a 31-yard touchdown pass to bring the score to 10–7 with less than six minutes left in the half. The Broncos moved into Raider territory as the half drew to a close, but the Raiders were able to force Denver to settle for a 25-yard field goal that was blocked by Maxx Crosby. A Carlson field goal started the scoring in the second half and moved the score to 10–10. Neither offense could muster any more points in the third quarter. McManus kicked another field goal, this time from 52 yards out to move the score to 13–10. Carlson added a 57-yard field goal with 7:11 remaining in the fourth quarter to tie the game. The Broncos retook the lead four minutes later with 48-yard field goal to move the lead to 16–13. After exchanging punts, the Raiders moved to the Denver seven, but were forced to settle for a field goal with 16 seconds left to tie the game. As the game moved to overtime, the Raiders won the toss and took the ball. On the third play of overtime, Carr threw to a wide open Davante Adams for 35-yard touchdown to end the game at 22–16. The win moved the Raiders to 3–7 on the season.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: Despite squandering a 17–3 lead, the Raiders tied the game at 24 with a late touchdown pass from Derek Carr to Keelan Cole, then won due to a bizarre blunder at the end of regulation by the Patriots. As New England quarterback Mac Jones handed the ball off to running back Rhamondre Stevenson, presumably to run out the clock and force overtime, Stevenson picked up 23 yards from the New England 44-yard-line to the Las Vegas 32-yard-line as the Raiders were in prevent defense. With Raiders safety Duron Harmon closing in, Stevenson pitched the ball to Patriots receiver Jakobi Meyers, who ran back to the 40-yard-line before throwing the ball back towards Mac Jones' vicinity, unaware that Raiders defender Chandler Jones was guarding him. The latter intercepted the ball and stiff-armed the former to the ground before running the ball back to the New England endzone for the Raiders' improbable game-winning touchdown, which was later nicknamed the "Vagary in Vegas" by NFL.com.


title: 2022 Las Vegas Raiders season

text: With the win, the Raiders defeated the Patriots for the first time since 2002, when the team was based in Oakland, and improved to 6–8.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: Halloweentown is a 1998 Disney Channel Original Movie directed by Duwayne Dunham. The first installment in "Halloweentown" series starring Debbie Reynolds, Kimberly J. Brown, Joey Zimmerman, and Judith Hoag. It is the fourth Disney Channel Original Movie. It centers on Marnie, who on her 13th Halloween, learns she's a witch, discovers a secret portal, and is transported to Halloweentown—a magical place where ghosts and ghouls, witches and werewolves live apart from the human world: but she soon finds herself battling wicked warlocks, evil curses, and endless surprises.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: The film opens with Marnie Piper and her mother, Gwen, arguing over why she and her younger siblings Dylan and Sophie cannot go out for Halloween. Gwen's mother Aggie shows up for her annual Halloween visit. The children are happier to see Aggie than Gwen is, as Aggie openly encourages the children to get more involved in Halloween. Aggie and Gwen are secretly witches, but Gwen is determined to live a normal life as a mortal instead.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: Despite objections from Gwen, Aggie is intent on training Marnie as a witch. Before heading home, Aggie reads the children a bedtime story called "Halloweentown", about a mystical place where witches, vampires and monsters of all sorts live in peace away from mortals. Sophie points out a drawing of a witch in the book that resembles Marnie; Aggie does nothing to stop Marnie from imagining such a thing. After putting the children to bed, Gwen and Aggie get into an argument, with Marnie, who has sneaked downstairs, eavesdropping. Gwen is angry that her mother encourages the children to enjoy Halloween, and insists Marnie will be raised as a mortal, like her father was, and not a witch, revealing Marnie is actually a witch too. Aggie doesn't understand why Gwen wants to live without magic, and wants to train Marnie before she turns 13, as at this point without training, she would lose her powers forever. Aggie then asks Gwen for help; citizens of Halloweentown have been disappearing, and while Gwen doesn't take this seriously and says it is possible that the missing have simply moved, Aggie believes that foul play is involved.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: When Aggie leaves to return home, Marnie and Dylan covertly follow her. They see Aggie getting onto a magical bus, and sneak onto it through the back door. When they arrive in Halloweentown, Aggie does not see Marnie and Dylan getting off the bus, and the children lose sight of her. At the same time, Marnie and Dylan realize that Sophie has sneaked onto the bus with them. They begin looking for Aggie, and are approached by Kalabar, the mayor of Halloweentown. He whistles for a cab driven by Benny, a skeleton with a bad sense of humor. The children find their grandmother's mansion, and against her better judgment, Aggie decides not to take them back to their home immediately. She says she will start Marnie's witch training, but has to take care of "the bad thing" first. She shows her grandchildren what she is talking about: in her cauldron, a vision of a hooded figure appears, laughing maniacally. She says she must activate Merlin's talisman with a spell and potion to defeat the evil creature.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: After trying, and failing, to light the talisman with "instant" potion, Aggie takes the children back to town to shop for the right ingredients. The family is introduced to Luke, a goblin who was made handsome by a "shadow creature". He makes a clumsy pass at Marnie, which she turns down on the spot. Gwen, who had noticed her children were missing and immediately blamed Aggie, arrives in Halloweentown to retrieve them, much to Marnie's objections. Gwen tells the children to say goodbye to Aggie, then takes them to the bus station, but cannot find another bus back to the mortal world according to a two-headed ticket vendor, whose two heads are constantly arguing with each other, and decides to see if the mayor can do anything to help. She is shocked to see that the mayor is Kalabar, an ex-boyfriend of hers. After Kalabar briefly leaves to handle another problem, Gwen and her children see Aggie walking somewhere with Luke. Sensing Aggie might be in trouble, they follow Luke and her to an abandoned movie theater.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: Aggie meets the hooded demon in the theater, where the missing Halloweentown citizens have been frozen in time. Aggie declines to give the talisman to the demon. Gwen and the children enter the theater as Luke rushes out in fear. The demon freezes Gwen and Aggie. The children escape, and obtain the necessary ingredientsthe hair of a werewolf, the sweat of a ghost, and a vampire's fangto make the potion that will activate the talisman. They then realize they must place the talisman in the large jack-o'-lantern in the center of the town to defeat the demon.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: When they arrive to install it, the demon suddenly appears and reveals himself to be Kalabar, who is bitter that Gwen (whom he used to date when she was a teenager) chose to marry a human instead of him. He starts talking to the townspeople and tries to persuade them to join him and take over the mortal world. With the help of Luke, Marnie slips past Kalabar long enough to climb up onto the jack-o'-lantern and try to place the talisman inside. Kalabar, noticing this, casts a spell to freeze her. As she is about to pass out, Marnie drops the talisman inside the jack-o'-lantern, which causes it to illuminate. This unfreezes her and everyone trapped inside the theater, and severely weakens Kalabar. Kalabar obtains the talisman and says he will use it to become the ruler of both the mortal and magical world. Dylan is revealed to have magic powers and eventually joins Gwen, Aggie, and his sisters in confronting Kalabar and using their combined powers to defeat him. Luke is restored to his goblin appearance.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: The film ends with the family getting on the bus and blasting off to the mortal world. Gwen and Aggie decide to train Marnie as a witch and Aggie decides to stay in the mortal world to spend more time with her grandchildren.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: Steve White, in the 1970s and 1980s used to be the head of NBC's 'Movie and Mini-Series' department. In 1986 he left the company to establish his own production company, "Steve White Entertainment".


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: "The Wonderful World of Disney" which had been airing on NBC since 1988, was a sought-after property that ABC wanted to return to the network. NBC agreed to transfer the show to ABC on the condition that Walt Disney Television produce six-movies for their network in return. In 1991, Sheri Singer the "Senior Vice-President of TV Movies" for Walt Disney Television was to collaborate with Steve White on up to three movies to fulfil the contract with NBC.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: After working together, they began dating and in 1993, Steve and Sheri married. Towards the end of Sheri's time as an executive for Disney, Steve came up to her one day and said, "I don't know where to go with this but my daughter said to me, 'Dad, where do all the creatures from Halloween go the rest of the year when its not October 31?'" Dubbed "Halloweentown" the concept was pitched to NBC as part of the six-movie deal, and the network bought it. With the green-light, Singer and White approached screenwriter Paul Bernbaum to write the script. Bernbaum took inspiration from his own life, and used the names of his children, Marnie, Dylan, and Sophie as the protagonists. Since the movie was to air in the 9pm timeslot, the film was geared towards an adult demographic. As a result original script was much darker and mature. In 1994, the script was presented to NBC, and the network decided to pass on the project. Singer ended up leaving the Walt Disney Company at the end of January 1994.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: In 1997, Singer and White established, "Singer/White Entertainment", and returned to the idea of "Halloweentown." The duo pitched it to Disney Channel who initially passed on the project as well. The executives at the network changed their mind after they aired "Under Wraps", which was well received. The network returned to Singer/White Entertainment and the film was redeveloped into more of a children's film.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: In a 2018 interview with Insider, director Duwayne Dunham revealed the film was presented to him as a, "$20 million to $30 million project" — but the budget ended up only being $4 million.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: After receiving the go ahead from Disney Channel, Singer/White Entertainment began casting. The first person cast for the film was Debbie Reynolds, who at the time had just decided to venture into television work. A list of actors were purposed to Singer/White, and Sheri Singer said, "When we saw the list, we took one look at her name and said, oh my god, would she really do it? This is absolutely unbelievably blessed and terrific idea for casting... We never went to anyone else."


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: In September 2016, Kimberly J. Brown recalled her audition for the film which she had to react to the conversation where it's revealed the character Marnie is a witch. Brown read for the role twice before being cast.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: In a 2020 Galaxy Con question-and answer panel, Judith Hoag revealed she had a meeting with the head of Disney Television where she read for the part. Hoag, who had previously played April O'Neil said "I kind of knew in the room that I had gotten the job because his son was a die-hard Ninja Turtle fan."


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: According to Singer, the hardest role to cast was that of antagonist Kalabar, "...he had to be scary-but-Disney-Channel-scary." Robin Thomas, who had previously worked with White on Amityville Dollhouse was brought in to audition, and was the final choice.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: After Kimberly J. Brown was cast as Marnie, artists used a photo of her to create the "Halloweentown" book prop. The image of the witch flying across the page needed to resemble the actress.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: The initial ending of the film featured Marnie traveling deep into an enchanted forest to place the talisman. With each step the character was supposed to grow older the deeper into the forest she went, the make-up department took a life-mask of Kimberly J. Brown to make the different prosthetics to age Marnie. Before the make-up process was completed, the ending was rewritten to the character placing the talisman in the Jack-o'-lantern.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: "Halloweentown" was filmed in St. Helens, Oregon, and Scappoose, Oregon from May to June 1998, across 24-days. The 'Nob Hill Riverview' bed and breakfast in Saint Helens was used for exterior shots of Aggie Cromwell's Halloweentown home. The voice of the skeleton Benny was added in post-production, as a result the actors on set were performing opposite a voice-less animatronic.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: While filming a dance scene in the theater Debbie Reynolds pulled a muscle, Singer recalled Reynolds saying, "You know what, I've been doing this for years and years. I've danced with pulled muscles and pain and I'm not going to hold [production] up." Singer went on to say how impressive it was for the young actors on set to see what "real work ethic" was.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: The final scene shot was of Marnie and Aggie flying. Filming took a whole day, and used the actors against a blue-screen.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 80% based on reviews from 5 critics, with an average rating of 5.7/10.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: "Complex" magazine put "Halloweentown" as number nine on its "The 40 Best Disney Channel Original Movies" list. Katie Heaney for BuzzFeed called the first three movies one of the best things about Halloween.


title: Halloweentown (film)

text: "Halloweentown" was followed by three sequels: "" in 2001, "Halloweentown High" in 2004 and "Return to Halloweentown" in 2006.


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: Shrill is an American comedy streaming television series developed by Aidy Bryant, Alexandra Rushfield, and Lindy West, based on West's book "". The series premiered on March 15, 2019, on Hulu, and stars Bryant in the lead role.


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: In April 2019, the series was renewed for a second season that premiered on January 24, 2020. In March 2020, the series was renewed for an eight episode third season, which was later confirmed to be the final season; it was released on May 7, 2021.


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: "Shrill" follows "Annie, described as a fat young woman who wants to change her life — but not her body. Annie is trying to make it as a journalist while juggling bad boyfriends, sick parents, and a perfectionist boss, while the world around her deems her not good enough because of her weight. She starts to realize that she's as good as anyone else and acts on it."


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: On April 24, 2018, it was announced that Hulu was developing a television series adaptation of Lindy West's memoir "" with a pilot written by West, Ali Rushfield, and Saturday Night Live's Aidy Bryant. Executive producers were expected to include Lorne Michaels, Andrew Singer, Elizabeth Banks, and Max Handelman. Production companies involved with the series were set to consist of Broadway Video and Brownstone Productions.


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: On June 13, 2018, it was reported that Hulu had given the production a straight-to-series order. On August 1, 2018, the series order was confirmed and it was clarified that it was for a first season consisting of six episodes. It was further announced that the first episode of the series would be directed by Jesse Peretz and the second by Carrie Brownstein. Additionally, Rushfield and West were added as executive producers, Bryant as a co-executive producer, and Dannah Shinder as a producer.


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: On December 11, 2018, it was announced that the series would premiere on March 15, 2019. On April 15, 2019, the series was renewed for a second season that premiered on January 24, 2020. On March 31, 2020, the series was renewed for a third season. On January 27, 2021, Hulu announced that the third season would be the final season.


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: Alongside the initial development announcement, it was confirmed that Aidy Bryant would star in the production. Alongside the series order confirmation, it was announced that the series would co-star Lolly Adefope, Luka Jones, Ian Owens, and John Cameron Mitchell. On September 5, 2018, it was reported that Julia Sweeney had been cast in a starring role.


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: Principal photography for season one took place from the week of July 30, 2018, until the week of September 10, 2018, in Portland, Oregon. Season two began shooting in July 2019 until the week of September 7, 2019, again in Portland. Filming for season three started in October 2020, and ended on December 26, 2020, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Coincidentally, it started shooting around the time Bryant returned for her ninth season on "Saturday Night Live", so she took time off from "SNL" to film the season (she appeared in the first episode of the season, and appeared once in a pre-taped segment in the third episode, during the first half of the season).


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: The series held its world premiere during the 2019 South by Southwest film festival in Austin, Texas as a part of the festival's "Episodic Premieres" series of screenings.


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the first season holds an approval rating of 93% based on 54 reviews, with an average rating of 7.91/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Sharp social commentary and a star-making performance from Aidy Bryant help "Shrill" overcome its familiar comedic sensibilities to create a show that proves self-acceptance isn't one size fits all." On Metacritic the first season has a score of 74 out of 100, based on reviews from 27 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: Kelly Lawler from "USA Today" gave the series a positive review, calling it an "unflinchingly authentic depiction of a fat woman in the modern world" and acknowledging that it "flies past positivity and shoots for fat acceptance." Pop Culture Happy Hour's Linda Holmes, who is plus-sized, applauded the writers for giving the protagonist the best lines, instead of handing them off to secondary or supporting characters. Holmes writes: "seeing her perform such strong material is a delight".


title: Shrill (TV series)

text: "The Washington Post" gave the show a more negative review, writing, ""Shrill" is mostly just another show that wants to make fun while also making essentially unarguable points about modern manners." Robyn Bahr of "The Hollywood Reporter" criticized the series, opening with, "Warning: A fat woman has written this review" and later stating that the show is "not as sharp as it should be". She also criticized the show's writing, saying, "her relationships are too underdeveloped to emotionally invest in." Verne Gay from "Newsday" also criticized the series, writing, ""Shrill" too often feels more like that extended trope than fully developed series."


title: Persecution of homosexuals in Nazi Germany

text: Before 1933, homosexual acts were illegal in Germany under Paragraph 175 of the German Criminal Code. The law was not consistently enforced, however, and a thriving gay culture existed in German cities. After the Nazi takeover in 1933, the first homosexual movement's infrastructure of clubs, organizations, and publications was shut down. After the Röhm purge in 1934, persecuting homosexuals became a priority of the Nazi police state. A 1935 revision of Paragraph 175 made it easier to bring criminal charges for homosexual acts, leading to a large increase in arrests and convictions. Persecution peaked in the years prior to World War II and was extended to areas annexed by Germany, including Austria, the Czech lands, and Alsace–Lorraine.


text: The Nazi regime considered the elimination of all manifestations of homosexuality in Germany one of its goals. Men were often arrested after denunciation, police raids, and through information uncovered during interrogations of other homosexuals. Those arrested were presumed guilty, and subjected to harsh interrogation and torture to elicit a confession. Between 1933 and 1945, an estimated 100,000 men were arrested as homosexuals; around 50,000 of these were sentenced by civilian courts, 6,400 to 7,000 by , and an unknown number by special courts. Most of these men served time in regular prisons, and between 5,000 and 6,000 were imprisoned in Nazi concentration camps. The death rate of these prisoners has been estimated at 60 percent, a higher rate than those of other prisoner groups. A smaller number of men were sentenced to death or executed at Nazi euthanasia centers. Nazi Germany's persecution of homosexuals is considered to be the most severe episode in a long history of discrimination and violence targeting sexual minorities.


text: After the war, homosexuals were initially not counted as victims of Nazism because homosexuality continued to be illegal in Nazi Germany's successor states. Few victims came forward to discuss their experiences. The persecution came to wider public attention during the gay liberation movement of the 1970s, and the pink triangle was reappropriated as an LGBT symbol.


text: Germany was the home of the first homosexual movement. The word "homosexual" was coined by a German-language writer; the first periodicals intended for a gay, lesbian, and transgender readership were published in Germany, and the world's first homosexual rights organization was founded in Berlin in 1897. In the 1920s, gay culture flourished in Germany's major cities, especially Berlin. Political compromises allowed many homosexuals to live freely in their private lives and in dedicated subcultural spaces, provided they did not significantly infringe on the public sphere. One theory holds the Nazis' rise to power was fueled by a conservative backlash against perceived immorality, but according to historian Laurie Marhoefer, this was not a significant factor.


text: Paragraph 175 of the German penal code, which was passed after the unification of Germany in 1871, criminalized sexual acts between males. The German supreme court ruled that a conviction required proof the men had had penetrative sex, typically anal but sometimes oral sex; other sexual activities were not punishable. The "Rechtsstaat" limited the enforcement of the law because men were not arrested or indicted without concrete evidence. As a consequence, conviction rates were low and a significant number of those convicted were sentenced to pay a fine rather than serve a jail sentence. Terms exceeding one year were rare.


text: In 1928, the Nazi Party responded negatively to a questionnaire about their view of Paragraph 175, saying: "Anyone who even thinks of homosexual love is our enemy". Nazi politicians regularly railed against homosexuality, saying it was a Jewish conspiracy to undermine the German people. In 1931 and 1932, the Social Democrats publicized the homosexuality of Ernst Röhm, a prominent Nazi politician, in an attempt to discredit the Nazis. The Röhm scandal fueled the long-lasting but false idea the Nazi Party was dominated by homosexuals, a recurring theme in 1930s left-wing propaganda. The Nazi Party temporarily tolerated a few known homosexuals, including Röhm, but never adopted such tolerance as a general principle or changed its views on homosexuality. There is no evidence that homosexuals were over-represented in the Nazi Party.


text: In mid-1932, a crackdown on homosexual subcultures in Prussia began after Chancellor Franz von Papen deposed the Prussian government. Some homosexual bars and clubs in Berlin had to shut down after police raids. In January 1933, the Nazi Party took power; immediately, their real and perceived enemies were the subject of a violent crackdown. On 23 February that year, the Prussian Ministry of the Interior ordered Berlin police to shut down any remaining establishments catering to "persons who indulge in unnatural sexual practices". This order was extended to other parts of Germany. In Cologne, almost all gay bars were forced to close. In Hanover, all had closed by the end of the year. In Hamburg, police targeted both prostitutes and homosexual spaces, including the main train station, public toilets, and gay bars, leading to a more-than-sixfold increase in indictments under Paragraph 175 by 1934. The anti-homosexual crackdown was intended to please the Nazis' conservative backers, who had put them into power, as well as socially conservative voters. Both the Vatican and Protestant churches praised the crackdown. For example, in October 1933 Clemens August Graf von Galen, the Bishop of Münster, wrote approvingly of the Nazis' efforts to "eradicate" the "open propaganda for godlessness and immorality".


text: In March 1933, the Nazi authorities began to confiscate printed material on homosexual topics. Any LGBT-related magazines that had survived earlier censorship were closed down and copies were burned. Their publishers were targeted; Adolf Brand's house was raided five times and police stole all of his photographs, 6,000 magazine issues, and many books. Friedrich Radszuweit's company was subjected to similar raids. During the Nazi takeover, German–Jewish homosexual-rights campaigner Magnus Hirschfeld was abroad on a lecture tour for the World League for Sexual Reform. On 6 May, the Nazis' paramilitary wing, the SA, raided his Institute for Sex Research in coordination with German students. The institute's library of more than 12,000 books was publicly burned on 10 May on the Opernplatz; and its offices, together with those of The World League for Sexual Reform, were destroyed.


text: On 8 June, the law-reform organization Scientific-Humanitarian Committee voted to dissolve itself. In 1933, many homosexual organizations attempted to destroy membership lists and other information the Nazis could use to target dissidents. Former activists made agreements to keep quiet to protect others. Some homosexuals, including Thomas and Klaus Mann, went into exile. The Swiss city Basel in particular was a destination for homosexuals fleeing Nazi Germany. Other homosexuals of a more right-wing inclination, including Hans Blüher, who initially welcomed the Nazi takeover, remained in Germany. Some joined the SA, mistakenly believing that Röhm would protect them.


text: The most-visible members of the LGBT community, including prostitutes, transvestites, and activist leaders, were targeted, and high-profile locations were shut down. The average homosexual's daily life, however, did not change, and some gay bars in Hamburg and smaller cities remained open. Some men were able to adapt to the closures by meeting with gay friends in primarily heterosexual establishments. Most homosexuals were not yet afraid of the Gestapo. They believed they could keep a low profile until the end of the Nazi regime, seen as coming soon. During the initial years of Nazi rule, the number of men sentenced to prison under Paragraph 175 increased, from 464 in 1932 to 575 in 1933 and 635 in 1934. There was no systematic persecution of individual homosexual behavior, and until 1935, convictions remained below the high of 1,107 convictions set in 1925.


text: After the 1933 revolution, Hitler began to see Röhm as a threat to his power and the SA as a liability due to their random acts of violence, which detracted from the Nazis' desired image as the party of law and order. On 30 June 1934, Röhm and several other SA leaders were suddenly arrested and executed. This event was later justified in Nazi propaganda, mainly by the alleged corruption and scheming with foreign powers, but also citing Röhm's homosexuality and the fact one of the victims of the purge, Edmund Heines, had allegedly been arrested while in bed with another man. Heinrich Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich, leaders of the SS (a rival of Röhm's SA), supported the purge to assert their control over the Nazi police state. Eventually Himmler, who is described by historian Nikolaus Wachsmann as "one of the most obsessive homophobes" in the Nazi government, became commander of the SS, the Gestapo, and the concentration camp system, making him the second-most-powerful man in Nazi Germany. The purge ended the sense of safety many German homosexuals still felt. Some homosexual Nazis ceased participating in the party while others, themselves former perpetrators of violence against Nazi opponents, became victims.


text: Anti-gay repression began immediately after the purge, initially focusing on alleged homosexual cliques in the party and state bureaucracy. In October 1934, Heydrich ordered the police of all large cities to make a list of homosexuals. A separate Gestapo department, the Special Commission for Homosexuality in Berlin, was set up. In late 1934, the Gestapo targeted Berlin and Munich, raiding gay bars and making mass arrests of homosexual men; most of those arrested were not involved in politics. Many men accused of homosexuality would admit to acts that were not punishable under Paragraph 175, expecting to be released; instead, they were mistreated and incarcerated in Columbia-Haus, Lichtenburg, or Dachau concentration camp. By early 1935, 80 percent of the prisoners held in protective custody in the concentration camps were there for alleged homosexuality. To convict these men, it was decided to change the criminal code.


text: Almost exactly a year after Röhm was killed, Paragraph 175 was amended. The changes were demanded, especially by prosecutors and other legal professionals. The new version of the law punished all sexual acts, defined broadly; "objectively when a general sense of shame is harmed and subjectively when there exists the lustful intention to excite either of the two men or a third party". In theory, it became a crime to look at another man with desire. Men were convicted for mutual masturbation or simply embracing each other, and in a few cases when no physical contact had occurred. Under the new law, typically all participants were viewed as equally guilty, whereas under the previous law, the "active" and "passive" participants were differentiated. The new law made it much easier to arrest and convict homosexual men, leading to a large increase in convictions. Under a new section 175a, the law also introduced harsher penalties for male prostitution, sex with a man younger than 21, or sex with a student or employee. The change in the law was not publicized for fear of spreading knowledge of homosexuality. Most Germans were unaware the law had changed and many of those arrested under the new law had no knowledge they were committing a crime. The law was also applied retroactively.


text: From 1936 to 1939, German police focused on homosexuality as a top priority. In 1936, the Special Commission for Homosexuality in Berlin became the Reich Central Office for the Combating of Homosexuality and Abortion, working with Gestapo Special Bureau II S. The new office organized conferences and issued directives to increase the effectiveness of anti-homosexual persecution. During the first years of Nazi rule, regional differences in the prosecution of homosexuals reflected pre-Nazi trends in policing but in 1936, the police launched a nationwide campaign against homosexual meeting places. This campaign was less effective in rural than urban areas, which saw a greater number of prosecutions. If the Gestapo believed there were not enough charges for homosexuality being brought in a certain area, they would send in a special unit to train and encourage local criminal police. In March 1937, Himmler ordered police departments to make lists of suspected homosexuals and oblige them to register changes of address, and to monitor suspected homosexual meeting places, hotels, and personal ads in newspapers.


text: The assigning of responsibility for carrying out the anti-homosexuality campaign to police and courts, which were not given any additional personnel or resources, caused serious operational difficulties. Besides the significant increase in the number of criminal cases to be prosecuted, cases of homosexuality demanded more time and attention because of the difficulty of proving private conduct. Because of the difficulty in identifying homosexuals, some police departments resorted to calling in entire classes of teenage boys and asking them about their sexual experiences. In this manner, it was possible to increase the number of charges of homosexuality brought; by 1939, such youthful relationships were the basis of 23.9 percent of charges. Himmler approved of such methods, arguing that without them, homosexuality would spread unchecked in all-male Nazi institutions.


text: Between 1937 and 1939, nearly 95,000 men were arrested for homosexuality—more than 600 per week—representing a major investment from the Nazi police state. From 1936 to 1939, nearly 30,000 men were convicted under Paragraph 175. Unlike in the past, these men were virtually guaranteed to receive a jail sentence. The length of sentences increased; many men were sentenced to years in jail. Prosecutors, judges, and others involved in the cases increasingly cited Nazi ideology to justify harsh punishment, adopting the regime's rhetoric of "stamping out the plague of homosexuality". The use of concentration camp imprisonment increased; after 1937, those considered to have seduced others into homosexuality were confined to concentration camps.


text: From 1939 to 1940, the number of men sentenced in civil courts under Paragraph 175 fell from 7,614 to 3,773. More men were subject to military jurisdiction and, with the onset of war, homosexuality was no longer the top priority of the security police. In anticipation of the outbreak of war, at the end of August 1939, Heydrich ordered the Gestapo to transfer most homosexual cases to the "Kriminalpolizei" (criminal police or "Kripo") to free up resources for the persecution of opposition groups. It is unknown how many Paragraph 175 cases were handled by the special courts.


text: An estimated 6,400 to 7,000 men were convicted by the under Paragraph 175. The military considered homosexuals to be predators who disrupted morale and unit cohesion. Prior to the war, homosexuals were offered re-education and if this failed, they could be dismissed and incarcerated in a concentration camp for the duration of their compulsory military service. Under the manpower requirements of war, it was felt necessary to recruit all available men; it was also a concern that rejecting homosexuals from military service could open a loophole for draft evaders. Men considered sex offenders, including homosexuals, rapists, and child molesters, could serve in the "Wehrmacht" assuming they were willing to bear arms and remain celibate during their military service. Known homosexuals and some former concentration camp prisoners were conscripted. Even castrated homosexual men could be drafted.


text: Military courts were generally more lenient than civilian courts with cases involving consensual sex but harsher in cases falling under 175a. Although military courts followed the 1935 version of Paragraph 175, they generally only issued a conviction when there was attempted or actual contact with another man's genitals. More than 90 percent of those convicted were reintegrated into the military. Although innate homosexuals were considered dangerous to the military, the "Wehrmacht" assumed that most cases of homosexuality were situational. Younger men, often seen as the victims of homosexual seducers, and one-time offenders were shown leniency. On average, soldiers convicted of homosexuality were sentenced to one-year prison sentences but served only a fraction of this before being paroled to the front. The length of time served decreased because of the increasing manpower shortage. In 1943, Himmler, who believed that the military was not hard enough on homosexuality, demanded a classification system that would see "incorrigible" homosexual offenders sent to concentration camps. The military attempted to ensure as many men as possible were retained under military jurisdiction to preserve vital manpower but cooperated with the Gestapo to rid itself of a few men who were seen as a threat to the military. Beginning in 1944, some homosexual concentration camp prisoners were forcibly enlisted in the army, which continued until a week before the unconditional surrender of Germany. These men were typically recruited into penal battalions, especially the Dirlewanger Brigade.


text: The persecution of homosexuals was extended to the annexed territories but not to the rest of German-occupied Europe; the Nazis were mostly uninterested in punishing homosexuals who were not considered ethnically German. Criminal prosecutions of men for homosexuality in Austria almost doubled under Nazi rule. Both regular and special courts applied draconian punishments, including the death penalty. German law was applied in the Sudetenland after its annexation in late 1938 and, in the case of homosexuals, applied retroactively. German law was imposed in Alsace–Lorraine in January 1942; homosexuals there soon faced a harsh legal crackdown, including retroactive application of the law.


text: In the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, German law applied to ethnic Germans and the old Austrian criminal code, which imposed lower penalties for male homosexuality, applied to non-Germans. Czech men were not deported to concentration camps solely because of conviction for homosexuality, but sometimes they were deported in combination with other reasons, such as anti-Nazi activity. Although prosecutions increased dramatically during the German occupation, the police focused their efforts on breaking up male prostitution rings rather than homosexual relationships between Czechs. In 1945, Edvard Beneš, president of Czechoslovakia, offered an amnesty to those convicted for homosexuality during the occupation, although the law remained in effect.


text: The Nazis were influenced by earlier ideas conflating homosexuality, child molestation, and the "seduction of youth". Before the Nazis' rise to power, there was a widespread belief among Germans that homosexuality is not inborn but instead could be acquired and spread. The Nazis were particularly concerned that their all-male organizations such as the Hitler Youth, SS, and SA must not be seen as hotbeds of homosexual "recruitment." Based on the theories of Karl Bonhoeffer and Emil Kraepelin, the Nazis believed homosexuals seduced young men and infected them with homosexuality, permanently changing their sexual orientation. Rhetoric described homosexuality as a contagious disease but not in the medical sense. Rather, homosexuality was a disease of the (national body), a metaphor for the desired national or racial community ().


text: The Nazis, especially Himmler, held conspiratorial beliefs about homosexuals, believing they were more loyal to each other than to the Nazi Party and Germany. After the Röhm purge, he told Gestapo personnel they had narrowly avoided the capture of the state by homosexuals. In 1937, a headline in the SS magazine "Das Schwarze Korps" declared homosexuals "enemies of the state", explaining they must be eradicated because "they form a state within a state, a secret organization that runs counter to the interests of the people". The newspaper argued only two percent of those who engaged in homosexual acts were committed homosexuals and the rest could be turned away from homosexuality. Forty thousand homosexuals were considered capable of "poisoning" two million men if left to roam free. Homosexual men were also considered to be shirking their duty to repopulate the German nation after World War I and create sons who could be drafted into the military to fight Hitler's planned wars of aggression. On 18 February 1937, Himmler gave a speech about homosexuality in Bad Tölz that was based on the 1927 book "Eroticism and Race" by Herwig Hartner, which claimed homosexuality was a Jewish plot against Germany. According to Himmler, homosexuality could lead to the end of Germany and cause depopulation by reducing the number of men who were available for reproduction.


text: The Nazis distinguished between congenital homosexuals who would require permanent imprisonment and others who had engaged in homosexuality but were thought to be curable with a short stay in a concentration camp or psychiatric treatment. Distinguishing between these categories was a difficulty that preoccupied the Nazis, especially after many cases of homosexuality surfaced in the supposedly racially pure SS. Succumbing to a homosexual act once, especially when drunk, was not necessarily considered evidence of homosexual inclination. The Göring Institute offered treatment to homosexuals referred by the Hitler Youth and other Nazi organizations; by 1938 it claimed to have changed the sexual orientation in 341 of 510 patients and by 1944, it claimed to have eliminated homosexuality in more than 500 men. The institute intervened to reduce sentences in some cases. The converse of the Nazis' persecution of homosexuality was their encouragement of heterosexual relations, including extramarital sex, for racially desirable people.


text: After 1934, homophobia became a regular theme in Nazi propaganda; most Germans came into contact with this homophobic propaganda. Although one of the Nazi regime's goals was to eliminate all manifestations of homosexuality in Germany, there was never a Nazi policy of exterminating all homosexuals in the way the Final Solution targeted Jews.


text: Homosexuals were more difficult to round up than other groups the Nazis targeted. Police were given detailed instructions on spotting homosexuals; they were instructed to look for flamboyant men, those who avoided women or were seen walking arm-in-arm with other men, and anyone who rented a double room at a hotel. Hairdressers, bathhouse attendants, hotel receptionists, railway station porters, and others were asked to report suspicious behavior. Complicating the Nazis' efforts, many homosexual men did not fit these stereotypes and many effeminate men were not homosexual.


text: According to one estimate, denunciations resulted in 35 percent of arrests of homosexuals. Men were denounced by neighbors, relatives, coworkers, students, employees, or even ex-boyfriends seeking to settle grievances, passers-by who overheard suspicious conversation, and Hitler Youth and other Nazi supporters who voluntarily acted as the morality police. State employees working in youth welfare and rail stations, Nazi functionaries in the German Labor Front (DAF), the SA, the SS, and the Hitler Youth brought cases to the attention of the authorities. A disproportionate number of denunciations concerned child abuse or "youth seduction" because there was an injured party to complain. Some men were falsely denounced as homosexual by other Germans. The snowball method involved arresting one man, interrogating him, and searching his belongings to find additional suspects; this method accounted for 30 percent of arrests. Some men were observed before their arrests or temporarily released in hopes they would lead the police to additional suspects. Some were shown photograph albums of other suspected homosexuals; male prostitutes were often willing to identify other homosexuals this way. Another 10 percent of victims were arrested in police raids, which were often conducted in parks, public toilets, and areas frequented by male prostitutes. In Hamburg, the police watched restaurants that served a mixed heterosexual and homosexual clientele as well as the most-trafficked public toilets. Entrapment was also used to ensnare homosexuals.


text: Charges of homosexuality were sometimes deployed against people who were not guilty. Nazi propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels commented; "When Himmler wants to get rid of someone, he just throws §175 at him". About 250 Catholic clergy in the mid-1930s. Many of the charges, which included sexual abuse of minors and consensual homosexual sex, were true but others were probably invented. The trials were of limited efficacy in their intended purpose of discrediting the Catholic Church. Catholic authorities alternated between reprimanding the guilty and covering up the scandal.


text: Active policing tactics were mainly limited to the larger cities; in rural areas, the police relied on denunciation. The difference in policing strategy, and likely over-representation and greater visibility of homosexuals in urban areas, led to vastly different conviction rates in different parts of Germany. Convictions in Bavaria and Mecklenburg were below the national average while in Rhine Province, Hamburg, and Berlin, they exceeded the average. Within states, urban areas had more cases than rural areas. Because of the reliance on denunciation in rural areas, a disproportionate number of cases involved child abuse or "youth seduction".


text: Young and working-class men, who may have been less able to evade the authorities, were over-represented among those who were arrested and prosecuted. Half of the suspects were working-class men and another third came from the lower middle class. In Austria, where working-class homosexuals were traditional targets of criminalization, arrests were extended to the middle class but more egregious behavior was required for a higher-class man to be punished for homosexuality. The first homosexuals to be targeted by the Nazis, prior to the Röhm purge, were also Jewish and left-wing political activists. A considerable number of those persecuted for homosexuality were also targeted for other reasons, for example being Romani, disabled, a sex worker, accused of other criminal offenses, a political opponent of the Nazis, or a deserter.


text: After arresting a man, he was presumed to be guilty, especially if there was a history of homosexual acts or a previous conviction. Police would tell his family the reason for his arrest. With a conviction, the victim could expect a complete life breakdown, often including loss of home and job, expulsion from professional organizations, and revocation of awards and doctorates. Harsh interrogations were aimed at forcing the victim to confess to the acts the police believed him guilty of. Austere cells of temporary detention facilities were sufficient to obtain confessions in some cases. Other suspects would crumple in the face of "screams, curses, threats, and endless questions", and some were beaten. Some men were held for weeks with nothing to do but await interrogation, and suffered mental breakdowns. Some men were sent to concentration camps under protective custody to encourage them to confess or to incarcerate them when there was not enough evidence to obtain a conviction. The police would tell suspects they would get a lighter punishment if they confessed, and indefinite detention in a concentration camp if they did not.


text: Both the Gestapo and the Kripo targeted homosexuals, a rivalry that may have encouraged the latter to adopt the more-brutal tactics of the former. Torture was regularly used to extract confessions and the use of "enhanced interrogation" () was explicitly approved of by Josef Meisinger, head of the Reich Central Office for the Combating of Homosexuality and Abortion. After 1936, cases were processed more quickly and the accused rarely had a legal defense. Most had already confessed, guaranteeing a guilty verdict. An unknown number of men who were found unfit to stand trial were confined to psychiatric hospitals.


text: Most men who were persecuted for homosexuality were convicted in the civil legal system and imprisoned. In Germany, it had long been the practice to isolate homosexual prisoners in individual cells but because of the vast increase in arrests, this proved to be impractical. In addition, the economic exploitation of prisoner labor meant many prisoners were held in labor camps and housed in barracks. While some officials built tiny, one-man cells to keep homosexual prisoners isolated, other officials distributed homosexuals among the general prison population and encouraged "brutal homophobia" to isolate homosexuals. Homosexual prisoners did not have to wear a badge but could be identified by red underlining on their name tags.


text: Before 1933, prison sex had been common but its prevention and punishment became much more important under Nazi rule. Any prisoner who tried to initiate a same-sex relationship, even if it did not result in any physical contact, could expect harsh punishment. The wardens relied on informers among the inmates to deter same-sex activity. Despite facing discrimination, however, homosexual prisoners were much better off in the prisons than in concentration camps.


text: In June 1935, the was amended to allow individual convicted criminals to be "voluntarily" sterilized to eliminate their "degenerate sex drive". During the Nazi era, the regime considered extending the policy of involuntary castration that was previously applied to child molesters and other sex offenders to homosexuals but such a law was never passed. In 1943, Gestapo chief Ernst Kaltenbrunner advocated for a law for involuntary castration of homosexuals and sex offenders but withdrew this request because he believed the Gestapo could ensure castrations were carried out where it desired.


text: Although the fiction of voluntary castration was maintained, some homosexuals were subject to severe pressure and coercion to agree to castration. There was no age limit; some boys as young as 16 were castrated. Those who agreed to castration were exempted from being transferred to a concentration camp after completing their legal sentence, a threat which was leveraged to encourage men to "volunteer" for the procedure. An estimated 400 to 800 men were castrated in this manner.


text: Unlike the legal punishment system, prisoners in concentration camps were held in indefinite detention at the mercy of the SS and Gestapo. The use of concentration camp detention for homosexuals began in 1934 and 1935; it was initially seen as a temporary re-education measure. In May 1935, the Prussian police detained 513 accused homosexuals in protective custody. Himmler did not consider a time-limited prison sentence was sufficient to eliminate homosexuality. After 1939, it was a policy to send men who were convicted of multiple homosexual acts to a concentration camp after they served their prison sentences. On 12 July 1940, the Reich Security Main Office formalized this policy, decreeing "in future, all homosexuals who seduced more than one partner shall be taken into preventive custody by the police after their release from prison". According to research in some parts of Germany, non-aggravated homosexuality, as a rule, was not punished with concentration camp imprisonment, which was mostly reserved for those who were considered "youth seducers", or had been convicted of male prostitution or child molestation. In other cases, men who were convicted with homosexuality combined with other criminal offenses or political opposition could be transferred to a concentration camp.


text: Historian Clayton J. Whisnant states homosexual concentration camp prisoners "experienced some of the worst conditions that humans have ever been forced to endure". In the prewar camps, Jewish and homosexual prisoners ranked at the bottom of the prisoner hierarchy, and homosexual Jews fared the worst. Along with Jews, homosexuals were often assigned to segregated labor details and had to perform especially dirty and backbreaking work, and endured worse conditions than the rest of the camp. Homosexual prisoners rarely benefited from solidarity from other prisoners—even Jews—because of widespread homophobia. Surviving the camps often required either building social networks with other prisoners or being promoted to a position of authority. Homosexuals were disadvantaged in both of these aspects; some younger, more attractive men could obtain advantages from a sexual relationship with a "kapo" (prison functionary) or SS guard. After 1942, conditions improved because of the need for forced labor, and some homosexual prisoners were promoted because of the influx of non-German prisoners who were ineligible for "kapo" positions.


text: About 5,000 to 6,000 homosexual men were imprisoned in the concentration camps. Sociologist Rüdiger Lautmann examined 2,542 known cases of homosexual concentration camp prisoners and determined their death rate was 60 percent, compared with 42 percent of political prisoners and 35 percent of Jehovah's Witnesses. Assuming a death rate of between 53 and 60 percent, at least 3,100 to 3,600 men died in the camps. SS guards murdered homosexual prisoners out of cruelty or during sadistic games, disguising the deaths as natural causes. At camps like Mauthausen and Flossenbürg, it was standard practice to work homosexual prisoners to death. In mid-1942, almost all of the homosexual prisoners at Sachsenhausen—at least two hundred—were executed. Many homosexual prisoners at Ravensbrück died at the same time. The chances of survival depended on which camp the men were incarcerated in; Neuengamme was considered less harsh for homosexual prisoners than Buchenwald, Dachau, or Sachsenhausen.


text: Initially, homosexuals were differentiated from other prisoners with a badge bearing capital letter "A" that was used at Lichtenberg. The standardized Nazi concentration camp badges that included a pink triangle for homosexual prisoners were adopted in 1938. Homosexual prisoners were a preferred target of Nazi human experimentation during the last years of Nazi rule. The best-known experiments involving homosexual men were attempts by endocrinologist Carl Vaernet to change prisoners' sexual orientations by implanting a pellet that released testosterone. Most of the victims, non-consenting prisoners at Buchenwald, died shortly thereafter. Homosexual and Jewish prisoners were also given experimental treatments for typhus at Buchenwald, for phosphorus burns at Sachsenhausen, and were used for testing opiates and Pervitin. Some homosexual prisoners were castrated.


text: In a 1937 speech, Himmler argued SS men who had served sentences for homosexuality should be transferred to a concentration camp and "shot while trying to escape". This policy was never implemented, although a few death sentences against SS men for homosexual acts were pronounced between 1937 and 1940. In a speech on 18 August 1941, Hitler argued homosexuality in the Hitler Youth should be punished by death. After learning of Hitler's remark, Himmler drafted a decree mandating the death penalty to any member of the SS or police who were found guilty of engaging in a homosexual act. Hitler, who was worried the decree might encourage left-wing propaganda that homosexuality was especially prevalent in Germany, signed the decree on 15 November 1941 on the condition there was no publicity. After the decree, only a few death sentences were pronounced. Himmler often commuted the sentence, especially if he thought the accused was not a committed homosexual. Many of those whose sentences were commuted were sent to serve in the Dirlewanger Brigade, where most were killed. After late 1943, because of military losses, it was policy to send SS men who were convicted of homosexuality into the "Wehrmacht".


text: The 1933 law on habitual criminals allowed for execution after the third conviction. On 4 September 1941, a new law allowed the execution of dangerous sex offenders and habitual criminals when "the protection of the "Volksgemeinschaft" or the need for just atonement require it". This law enabled authorities to pronounce death sentences against homosexuals and is known to have been employed in four cases in Austria. In 1943, Wilhelm Keitel authorized the death penalty for "Wehrmacht" soldiers who were convicted of homosexuality in "particularly serious cases". Only a few such executions are known to have occurred, mostly in conjunction with other charges—especially desertion. Some homosexuals were executed at Nazi euthanasia centers such as Bernburg and Meseritz-Obrawalde. It is difficult to estimate the number of homosexual men who were directly killed during the Nazi era.


text: Historian estimates about one quarter of German homosexual men were investigated during the Nazi era, and that up to one tenth of those were imprisoned. According to Zinn, this rate is evidence of indifference among the general German population towards homosexuality; denunciation of consensual homosexual relations was less common. Zinn said that while all homosexuals in Nazi Germany suffered from the indirect effects of criminalization, their lives cannot be reduced to fear of arrest, and they retained a limited degree of personal freedom. Even before 1933, many homosexual men married women, and the Nazis' rise to power provided an added incentive, although such marriages were usually unhappy. Homosexual desires did not go away; some men sought homosexual contact outside of marriage, risking denunciation by an unhappy wife. Some men organized lavender marriages with lesbians they had known before 1933. Although nearly all homosexuals tried to avoid the attention of the authorities, men continued to find sexual partners at Kreuzberg bathhouses and movie theaters, and by cruising in places such as Alexanderplatz and the Friedrichstrasse in Berlin. Many suffered from disrupted relationships, loneliness, or loss of self-esteem. A significant number of homosexual and bisexual men, including 25 percent of those persecuted in Hamburg, committed suicide.


text: According to historian , homosexual men and women who avoided persecution "belonged to the willing subjects and beneficiaries of the Nazi state just like other German men and women". The likelihood of being persecuted was lower for those who suppressed their sex lives or served the higher goals of Nazism. Some German homosexuals joined the Nazi Party or fought for Germany during World War II. War and armed service provided an opportunity for sexual encounters with other men, both civilians and members of the armed services. There were also opportunities for non-consensual sex with other soldiers, subordinates, people from occupied countries, and prisoners. Both types of sex might be practiced by men who did not identify as homosexual. During the last years of the war, there were increased opportunities for sexual encounters in bombed-out cities.


text: Himmler ordered culturally prominent German homosexuals to be ignored and required his permission to be obtained before they were arrested. For example, writer Erich Ebermayer continued living with his male partner during the Nazi dictatorship; other homosexual couples, and the bisexual actor Gustaf Gründgens, were left alone.


text: Nazi Germany's persecution of homosexuals is considered to be the most-severe episode in a longer history of discrimination and violence against homosexuals; never before or since have so many homosexuals been sentenced to prison in such a short period, even disregarding concentration camp imprisonment. An estimated 100,000 men were arrested and of these, half spent time in prison. Post-war attitudes towards homosexuality were influenced by Nazi propaganda associating homosexuality with criminality and medical illness. Because the various Allied countries considered homosexuality a crime, those prisoners who had not finished serving their sentence under Paragraph 175 had to do so, but those who had never been convicted or who had already served the full time were released. Arrest and incarceration of men for consensual homosexual acts continued to be commonplace in West Germany and Austria through the 1960s; between 1945 and 1969, West Germany convicted about 50,000 men; the same number of men as the Nazis had convicted during their twelve-year rule.


text: The 1935 version of Paragraph 175—one of the few Nazi-era laws that remained in force and unaltered in West Germany—was upheld by the Federal Constitutional Court in 1957 and remained in force until 1969, when homosexuality was partially decriminalized. In 1962, historian Hans-Joachim Schoeps commented; "For the homosexuals the Third Reich has not yet ended". Although not entirely accurate, this statement captured the view of many West German homosexuals. In East Germany, homosexuality was rarely prosecuted after 1957 and was decriminalized in 1968; the number of convictions there was much lower. The decriminalization did not result in widespread social acceptance, and Paragraph 175 was only repealed in 1994.


text: Homosexual concentration camp prisoners were not recognized as victims of National Socialism. Just as there was a hierarchy among prisoners in the concentration camps, there was a hierarchy among survivors. Reparations and state pensions available to other groups were refused to gay men, who were still classified as criminals. Political prisoners and persecuted Jews could be disqualified from victim status if they were discovered to be homosexual. In the 1950s, Rudolf Klimmer unsuccessfully petitioned the East German government to recognize homosexuals as victims of Nazism and offer them compensation in line with that for other victims. In West Germany in the 1970s, activists made similar demands, but these were rejected.


text: In 1985, the Nazi persecution of homosexuals was officially recognized for the first time in by West German president Richard von Weizsäcker. In 2002, Germany annulled the Nazi-era judgements under Paragraph 175, and in 2017, victims were offered compensation. The 2017 annulment of judgements and compensation extended to men who were convicted after 1945, making this the only case in which the German state offered reparations for acts not considered "typical Nazi injustice" that would not be possible in a democratic state.