Scientific-Humanitarian Committee
The Scientific-Humanitarian Committee (Wissenschaftlich-humanitäres Komitee, WhK) was founded in Berlin on the 14th or 15 May 1897, to campaign for social recognition of gay, bisexual and transgender men and women, and against their legal persecution. It was the first such organization in history.
History
The WhK was founded on 15 May 1897 (four days before Oscar Wilde's release from prison) by Magnus Hirschfeld, a Jewish-German physician, sexologist and outspoken advocate for gender and sexual minorities. Original members of the WhK included physician Magnus Hirschfeld, publisher Max Spohr, lawyer Eduard Oberg and writer Franz Joseph von Bülow. Adolf Brand, Benedict Friedländer, and Kurt Hiller also joined the organisation. A split happened in 1903. In 1929, Hiller took over as chairman of the group from Hirschfeld. At its peak, the WhK had about 500 members, and branches in approximately 25 cities in Germany, Austria and the Netherlands.
The Committee was based in the Institute for Sexual Sciences in Berlin, until 1933 when it was destroyed by the Nazis, from which it took a great deal of scientific theories on human sexuality - such as the idea of a third sex between a man and a woman. The initial focus of the Committee was to repeal Paragraph 175, an anti-gay piece of legislation of the Imperial Penal Code, which criminalized "coitus-like" acts between males, and the goal of this categorization of human sexuality was to demonstrate the innateness of homosexuality and thus make the criminal law against male-male gay sex in Germany at the time inapplicable.
WHK
WHK may refer to:
Broadcasting
Other
See also
WHK (AM)
WHK (1420 AM) – branded AM 1420 The Answer – is commercial talk radio station licensed to Cleveland, Ohio, serving Greater Cleveland. WHK was the first radio station to broadcast in Ohio, and is the 15th oldest station still broadcasting in the United States.
Owned by Salem Media Group, WHK serves as the Cleveland affiliate for the Salem Radio Network, The Mark Levin Show, and Akron Zips football. The station also airs coverage of Cleveland State Vikings men's basketball, and shares limited local coverage of the Lake Erie Monsters. The WHK studios are located in the Cleveland suburb of Independence, while the station transmitter resides in neighboring Seven Hills. Besides its standard analog transmission, WHK is available online.
History
Experimental license
WHK began on July 26, 1921 when experimental station 8ACS signed on under a license obtained by Warren C. Cox in the name of Cox Mfg. Co. He broadcast on a wavelength of 200 meters (which translates to a frequency of 1500 kHz) from his home at 3138 Payne Avenue. Only about 1000 listeners were able to hear the first broadcast, and most of them were members of the Cleveland Radio Association. By 1922, licensees were barred from broadcasting on 200 meters, so Cox applied for a commercial broadcasting license.
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