Mahide Lein
German LGBT activist
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mahide Lein (born 1949) is a German LGBTQ+ activist, organiser and head of a concert agency. She has also campaigned for sex workers' rights and with the anti-psychiatric movement.
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Mahide Lein | |
|---|---|
At the 2009 Side by Side Festival | |
| Born | 1949 (age 76–77) Höchst, Germany |
| Education | Goethe University Frankfurt |
| Occupation | Activist |
Biography
Lein was born in 1949 in Höchst, Frankfurt am Main, Hesse, Germany.[1] Her mother was an accordionist and draftsman, and her father worked as a master goldsmith.[2] She was raised as a Protestant.[1] Lein studied political science and religion at Goethe University Frankfurt and apprenticed as an office clerk for two years after graduating.[3]
Lein became involved with the New Women's Movement and ran the women's café Café Niedenau in a squatted house on Kettenhofweg in Frankfurt am Main from the 1970s.[4] The café hosted exhibitions, political discussions and concerts.[5] She was also one of the founders of the first lesbian centre in Frankfurt.[4]
After moving to Berlin, Lein is credited with shaping Berlin's lesbian scene in the 1980s and 1990s.[6][7] She was an organiser of the Berlin Christopher Street Day (CSD, Germany and Switzerland's counterpart to pride parades),[8] the anti-psychiatric Irren-Offensive Tribunals,[5] and the KultHur-Festival to promote sex workers' rights.[5]
During the 1990s, Lein worked with gay men on a Russian-German cultural exchange.[5] In May 1992, Lein, the German filmmaker and LGBTQ+ activist Andreas Strohfeldt and the Tschaikowsky Foundation in Saint Petersburg organised the first Russian CSD.[4]
Lein launched the lesbian magazine television programme Läsbisch TV,[6][1] with 27 one-hour episodes broadcast on the Berliner Kabel station from 1991 to 1993.[4][9][10] She has also been interviewed for lesbian documentaries, commenting on "the problems of speaking openly about taboo desires in sexually less tolerant societies"[11] and on queer aging for Vice magazine.[12] She sat on the jury for the queer film prize TEDDY for two decades[4] and spoke at the 2nd Side by Side LGBT Film Festival in 2009.[citation needed]
Lein is the founder and head the international concert agency AHOI Kultur.[3][4][6][13]