LGBT history in Yugoslavia
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Homosexuality in Yugoslavia was firstly decriminalized in the Socialist Republics of Croatia, Slovenia, Montenegro and the Socialist Autonomous Province of Vojvodina in 1977. In other regions anti-LGBT legislation was, to varying degrees, progressively not implemented. The capital city of
Belgrade Belgrade ( , ;, ; Names of European cities in different languages: B, names in other languages) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Serbia, largest city in Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers a ...
, together with Zagreb and Ljubljana, became some of the first spots of an organized LGBT movement in the Balkans. Following the violent
breakup of Yugoslavia The breakup of Yugoslavia occurred as a result of a series of political upheavals and conflicts during the early 1990s. After a period of political and economic crisis in the 1980s, constituent republics of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yu ...
some authors analyzed regional cooperation and networks in former Yugoslavia as a form of conscious rejection of nationalism representing important features of contemporary LGBTQ activism in
South East Europe Southeast Europe or Southeastern Europe (SEE) is a geographical subregion of Europe, consisting primarily of the Balkans. Sovereign states and territories that are included in the region are Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia (al ...
.


Kingdom of Yugoslavia

In the first post-medieval Criminal Code of the Principality of Serbia, named "Kaznitelni zakon" (Law of Penalties), adopted in 1860, sexual intercourse "against the order of nature" between males became punishable by from 6 months' to 4 years' imprisonment. Like in many other countries' legal documents of the time, lesbian sexuality was ignored and not mentioned. In 1937,
Belgrade Belgrade ( , ;, ; Names of European cities in different languages: B, names in other languages) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Serbia, largest city in Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers a ...
-based daily newspaper '' Politika'' published news about a young man from
Central Serbia Central Serbia ( sr, централна Србија / centralna Srbija), also referred to as Serbia proper ( sr, link=no, ужа Србија / uža Srbija), is the region of Serbia lying outside the autonomous province of Vojvodina to the nort ...
who arrived in Belgrade with his brothers to change his gender.


World War II


Independent State of Croatia

In the Nazi Germany puppet state Independent State of Croatia (NDH), homosexuals were persecuted and sent to concentration camps such as Jasenovac, regardless of their nationalities or ideological orientations. Very little research has been done on the experiences of homosexuals during the World War II in Yugoslavia; only a small insight was given by the Croatian author
Ilija Jakovljević Ilija may refer to: * Ilija, Iran, a village in Ardabil Province, Iran * Ilija, Slovakia, a village and municipality in the Banská Štiavnica District, in the Banská Bystrica Region * Ilija (given name), South Slavic given name *ilija (puki) kante ...
in his text ''Konclogor na Savi'' (), in which he mentioned that in prison on Square N16 in Zagreb he met a "lover of the male body", referring only to the man's identity and not whether he was imprisoned for his sexual orientation.


National Liberation War 1941–1945

There are two accounts about homosexual Yugoslav Partisans during World War II in Yugoslavia. One known death sentence was issued by a Croatian detachment of the National Liberation Army for the commander of the Croatian Partisans' communication network,
Josip Mardešić Josip () is a male given name found among Croats and Slovenes, a cognate of Joseph. In Croatia, the name Josip was the second most common masculine given name in the decades up to 1959, and has stayed among the top ten most common ones throughout 2 ...
, after he was discovered to have had affairs with his male subordinates. The other account was given by Milovan Djilas in his war memoirs, where he tells a story from Sandžak where "one
Muslim Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...
, a good soldier and a zealous communist" was exposed as
homosexual Homosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction, or sexual behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" to peop ...
by other soldiers to the Regional Secretary, Rifat Burdžović. The Regional Secretary in doubt asked Djilas if he should "execute hefreak?", while Djilas remained in doubt, admitting that, at the time, he neither knew
Communist Party of Yugoslavia The League of Communists of Yugoslavia, mk, Сојуз на комунистите на Југославија, Sojuz na komunistite na Jugoslavija known until 1952 as the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, sl, Komunistična partija Jugoslavije mk ...
(KPJ) practice nor anything said on such matters by Marx and Lenin. At the end, he concluded that "from such vices suffer
proletarians The proletariat (; ) is the social class of wage-earners, those members of a society whose only possession of significant economic value is their labour power (their capacity to work). A member of such a class is a proletarian. Marxist philo ...
, and not only
bourgeoisie The bourgeoisie ( , ) is a social class, equivalent to the middle or upper middle class. They are distinguished from, and traditionally contrasted with, the proletariat by their affluence, and their great cultural and financial capital. They ...
decadents" and that it cannot be tolerated for homosexuals to have any party functions, nor to be among the leaders of the partisan movement. Djilas said that he only later learned that "that homosexual, who in appearance was sheer manhood, was very brave and courageously fell in battle".


Socialist Yugoslavia


Postwar persecution

In the postwar period, there were more examples of persecution and inhumane treatment of homosexual individuals. One of the cases took place in 1952 in Dubrovnik, where members of Communist Party arrested homosexuals, put bags with pejorative inscriptions on their heads and led them through the city. When the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was formed, it adopted the Yugoslav Criminal Code of 1929, a previous law of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia which forbade "lewdness against the order of nature" (
anal intercourse Anal sex or anal intercourse is generally the insertion and thrusting of the erect penis into a person's anus, or anus and rectum, for sexual pleasure.Sepages 270–271for anal sex information, anpage 118for information about the clitoris. Ot ...
). In 1959, male homosexuality was officially criminalized in Yugoslavia to one year of imprisonment. Around five hundred male homosexuals have been imprisoned between 1951 and 1977, about half of which served probation, and others served shorter sentences. For comparison, many Western European countries (such as West Germany, United Kingdom and Italy) convicted several tens of thousands homosexuals during the same period.


Liberalization in the 1970s

In the 1970s, following the
sexual revolution The sexual revolution, also known as the sexual liberation, was a social movement that challenged traditional codes of behavior related to sexuality and interpersonal relationships throughout the United States and the developed world from the 1 ...
in much of Western Europe, the legal and social sphere of Yugoslavia started to liberalize towards LGBT rights. In 1973, the Croatian Medical Chamber removed homosexuality from the
list of mental disorders The following is a list of mental disorders as defined by the '' Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders'' (DSM) and the International Classification of Diseases (ICD). The DSM is the American Psychiatric Association's standard refe ...
. In 1974, a law professor at the University of Ljubljana, Ljubo Bavcon, urged the
decriminalization of homosexuality Criminalization of homosexuality is the classification of some or all sexual acts between men, and less frequently between women, as a criminal offense. Most of the time, such laws are unenforced with regard to consensual same-sex conduct, but ...
as one of the members of the Commission for the Adoption of Criminal Law of the Socialist Republic of Slovenia. The
League of Communists of Yugoslavia The League of Communists of Yugoslavia, mk, Сојуз на комунистите на Југославија, Sojuz na komunistite na Jugoslavija known until 1952 as the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, sl, Komunistična partija Jugoslavije mk ...
held debates on the topic at least three times until 1976, when it requested decriminalization in all republics. First federal subjects that decriminalized homosexuality were the Socialist Republics of Croatia, Slovenia, Montenegro and Socialist Autonomous Province of Vojvodina in 1977. Other parts of the Federation made this move only after the
breakup of Yugoslavia The breakup of Yugoslavia occurred as a result of a series of political upheavals and conflicts during the early 1990s. After a period of political and economic crisis in the 1980s, constituent republics of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yu ...
: Serbia (excluding Vojvodina) in 1994,
Macedonia Macedonia most commonly refers to: * North Macedonia, a country in southeastern Europe, known until 2019 as the Republic of Macedonia * Macedonia (ancient kingdom), a kingdom in Greek antiquity * Macedonia (Greece), a traditional geographic reg ...
in 1997 and finally Bosnia and Herzegovina (both the
Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina The Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina is one of the two Political divisions of Bosnia and Herzegovina, entities within the State of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the other being Republika Srpska. The Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina consists ...
and the Republika Srpska) in 1998.


LGBT activism

The first six-day long festival of gay culture in Yugoslavia was organized in April 1984 in Ljubljana. In the same year, the first gay organization Magnus was founded in Ljubljana and in 1987, the first lesbian organisation founded was Lezbijska Lilit (LL). The first regular radio broadcast that, amongst other marginalized groups, dealt with gay issues was the 1985 Zagreb-based ''Frigidna utičnica'' () on Omladinski radio, whose host Toni Marošević was openly gay. Because of disapproval from '' Večernji list'' and the '' Večernje novosti'' program, it was quickly removed from the station programming. In its 1986 proclamation, the organization Magnus demanded the introduction of prohibition of discrimination based on sexual orientation in the Yugoslav Constitution, decriminalization of homosexuality in the whole of Yugoslavia, the introduction of curriculum that would present homosexuality and
heterosexuality Heterosexuality is romantic attraction, sexual attraction or sexual behavior between people of the opposite sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, heterosexuality is "an enduring pattern of emotional, romantic, and/or sexual attractions" to ...
on equal terms and demanded a protest of the Federal Government of Yugoslavia against the Socialist Republic of Romania, the Soviet Union, Iran and other countries where homosexuality was still criminalized at that time. In 1990 in Hotel Moskva in Belgrade, which was a popular gay gathering place in the 1970s, one gay and lesbian group began to organize meetings and, in January 1991, they founded the organization
Arkadija Arkadija was the first group to affirm lesbian and gay human rights and culture in Serbia, established on January 13, 1991, and registered in 1994 in Belgrade. The basic function of the organization was lobbying the media in order to decriminaliz ...
.


LGBT topics in pop culture


Music

In the second half of the
1970s File:1970s decade montage.jpg, Clockwise from top left: U.S. President Richard Nixon doing the V for Victory sign after his resignation from office following the Watergate scandal in 1974; The United States was still involved in the Vietnam War i ...
first songs that deal with issues of lesbian and gay population appear. They were very different in genre, from
rock Rock most often refers to: * Rock (geology), a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals or mineraloids * Rock music, a genre of popular music Rock or Rocks may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * Rock, Caerphilly, a location in Wales ...
, post-punk,
electropop Electropop is a hybrid music genre combining elements of electronic and pop genres. Writer Hollin Jones has described it as a variant of synth-pop with heavy emphasis on its electronic sound. The genre was developed in the 1980s and saw a re ...
to the traditional folk music. Some of the most popular songs with LGBT themes are "Neki dječaci" (''Some Boys'') by Prljavo kazalište, 1982 song "Moja prijateljica" (''My Friend'') by Xenia, "Preživjeti" (''To Survive'') by KUD Idijoti, 1974 song "Ramo, Ramo" by
Muharem Serbezovski Muharem "Mumo" Serbezovski ( mk, Мухарем Сербезовски; born 2 May 1950) is a Muslim Roma singer, popular in former Yugoslavia. He is also a writer and translator and was briefly in Bosnian politics in the 2000s. Although born in ...
, 1980 song "
Retko te viđam sa devojkama "Retko te viđam sa devojkama" ("I Rarely See You With Girls") is the second song which appeared on the first single by Serbian new wave band Idoli (the first being " Pomoć, pomoć"). History The band recorded two songs which would appear as ...
" (''I Rarely See You With Girls'') by Idoli, "Javi mi" (''Notify Me'') by
Zabranjeno Pušenje Zabranjeno pušenje () is a Bosnian rock band formed in Sarajevo in 1980. The group's musical style primarily consists of a distinctive garage rock sound with folk influences, often featuring innovative production and complex storytelling. Curre ...
, and "Balada o tvrdim grudima" (''Ballad About the Rough Chest'') by Šarlo Akrobata.


See also

* LGBT history in Bosnia and Herzegovina * LGBT history in Croatia * LGBT history in Kosovo * LGBT history in Montenegro * LGBT history in North Macedonia *
LGBT history in Serbia Homosexuality in Serbia was first criminalised from 1860 through various regimes, until its first decriminalization in the Socialist Autonomous Province of Vojvodina in 1977. When Vojvodina was reintroduced fully into the Republic of Serbia legal ...
* LGBT history in Slovenia *
Communism and LGBT rights Communist attitudes towards LGBT rights have evolved radically in recent years. In the 19th and 20th century, Communist party, communist parties and Communist state, Marxist–Leninist states varied on LGBT rights; some were among the first poli ...


References

{{Yugoslavia topics Yugoslavia History of Yugoslavia by topic LGBT in Yugoslavia Yugoslavia