[elizschro]

Just an FYI -- in the history section of this web site, it reads: "On June 30, 1934, the "Night of the Long Knives," Hitler ordered the assassination of homosexual leaders of the SA, the Nazi paramilitary group headed by Ernst Röhm. In justifying this purge, which helped Hitler consolidate his control of the military, the Nazi leader specifically evoked Paragraph 175 to explain the massacre as a cleansing of the party of degenerate corrupters of youth."

This implies that ONLY the gay leaders of the SA were killed that night, and that there were enough of these murders to bring about the decline of the SA. I've checked a number of other sources, and this is not accurate. I don't know whether the content editors of the site read these postings, so I thought I'd give it a shot. :)

Thanks.

[Claude]

Thanks for the posting. The passage quoted, from the entry on Paragraph 175 in the Social Sciences Department, is accurate. But I agree that it may be misleading in the sense that it might imply that only homosexuals were massacred in the Night of the Long Knives. Therefore, we will change the wording from "Hitler ordered the assassination of homosexual leaders of the SA" to "Hitler ordered the assassination of the leaders of the SA."

In any case, the crucial point that the author is making is that Hitler invoked Paragraph 175 as a justification for the massacre.

Please also see the discussion of the Night of the Long Knives in the entries on Germany and on Ernst Rohm, also in the Social Sciences department. The entry on Nazism and the Holocaust also discusses the purge of the SA and recounts the Nazi persecution of homosexuals.