I'm not in Berlin, I'm near Cologne, the queer capital of Germany,

I am a lesbian living in Germany

I am on the board of a queer organisation and am very involved in the organising of our local Pride, including the security measures we need to protect our Pride from terrorist attacks

OUR. SMALL. LOCAL. PRIDE!

from attacks just like the one in Berlin today.

every time I see those security measures, especially at the Pride I'm a part of, I'm reminded of how much the queer community is still hated and I hate it. I hate that we need those measures, I hate that we have to take them to protect ourselves, I hate that we live in a world where a celebration of love and happiness needs those security measures.

I can't even put words into how much this hurts. for something like this to happen to us, to happen in Berlin.

my heart is broken, my soul is broken, my hope is broken

Victim was released in the UK on 31 August 1961.

Screenwriter Janet Green was a proponent of gay rights (when homosexuality was still a crime) and wrote Victim with her husband John McCormick in order to bring attention to the issue and instigate reform.

39-year-old Dirk Bogarde was one of the most popular film stars in the UK, and while it had been rumored that he was gay, he frequently played romantic lead roles. Bogarde quickly agreed to take the lead role of Melville Farr, a married man who is blackmailed for his past gay life (it is said that Bogarde himself wrote the scene in which Farr admits to his wife that he is gay and has continued to be attracted to other men). It was the wisest decision I ever made in my cinematic life,” Bogarde said in a 1988 interview. “It is extraordinary to believe that this modest film could ever have been considered courageous, daring or dangerous to make. It was, in its time, all three.”

Director Basil Deardon described the film as “an open protest against Britain’s law that being a homosexual is a criminal act.”

While Hollywood remained reticent, British films began to tackle homosexuality head-on, with a major star like Dirk Bogarde as the screen’s first gay hero.

Victim (1961) dir. by Basil Dearden

I stopped seeing him (Because I wanted him)