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Rolf Gindorf, Düsseldorf (Germany):
31 Years of Gay Counseling:
The Success Story of the DGSS-Institute
In the autumn of 1971, under the roof of the newly founded DGSS (at that time still GFSS: Society for the Advancement of Social Scientific Sexuality Research), we began counseling "homosexually loving men and women". Only one year later we succeeded, by giving an Expert Opinion, in procuring protection from military draft for a gay man. In 1973, by another Expert Opinion written by Prof. Dr. Dr. Rüdiger Lautmann and myself, we had the official state "School Guidelines for Sexuality Education" reformed and freed of its anti-homosexual rhetoric, and in 1976 we organized - for the very first time in Germay - public Adult Education College courses labelled "Learning to be Gay!" Since 1978 our "Gay Counseling Unit at the DGSS-Institute" is a full-time counseling institution of the DGSS - the first of its kind in Germany. Some 29.000 men and women have been counseled since. Most probably no one in Europe knows more gay, lesbian, and bisexual people.
Over the nearly 31 years of our work at the DGSS some 29.000 clients were counseled. Over those years living conditions for gay, lesbian, and bisexual people improved vastly - and most recently include a legal institute ("Federal Registered Partnership", popularly called "gay marriage") closely resembling marriage, in force in all of Germany since August 1, 2001. Openly gay politicians have been elected Prime Ministers, and polls tell us that two thirds of the German population wouldn't mind having a gay chancellor (president). - How have these three decades changed our counseling work? Which problems came to the fore, which receded to the back?
About the Author:
Rolf Gindorf, Research and Clinical Sexologist. Born in 1939. Director (since 1978), DGSS-INSTITUT (counseling and research) in Düsseldorf (Germany). Founder (1971), President (until 1979), since then Vice President of the German Society for Social Scientific Sexuality Research (DGSS).
Main fields of interest: gay and bisexuality research and counseling; sexual counseling and therapy; AIDS prevention and counseling; theoretical foundations of sexology. Author and (co-)editor of about 60 sexological publications, including eight books (latest: Bisexualities. The Ideology and Practice of Sexual Contact with Both Men and Women. New York: Continuum Publishing Co. 1998, 270 pp., ed. with E. J. Haeberle) and two book series.  Publications. Numerous lectures and seminars at scholarly conferences and universities. TV, radio, and print media appearences and interviews. Member of academic and political committees.
More information
Address:
Rolf Gindorf, c/o DGSS-Institut, Gerresheimer Str. 20,
D-40211 Düsseldorf. Phone: (+49 211) 354591;
Fax: (+49 211) 360777; eMail: Rolf.Gindorf@sexologie.org 
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