Sex as the new religion. Cologne is the most liberal city in the world
May 20, 2023 5:42 p.m
The German city of Cologne is the most sexually liberal in the world. At least according to the ranking compiled by Lust magazine. He compared the number of pride marches to the population or the availability of contraception and came to the conclusion that "sex is the new religion" in Cologne. Germany also has Berlin on the list. Prague did not place.
"Cologne is most famous for its carnival and its cathedral. But for many residents of this cosmopolitan, tolerant city, the new religion is sex," writes Lust magazine in its review of the German city of one million. He pointed out that twenty-three events associated with the local LGBT community and four large pride marches take place in Cologne every year.
There are also seventeen gay bars and nineteen sex shops. "The city on the Rhine is a true model of enlightenment and openness, especially in the sexual sense of the word," say the authors of the ranking. It was created not only on the basis of the number of gay bars per population, but also according to other criteria.
Lust ranking
1. Cologne
2. West Hollywood
3. Amsterdam
4. Madrid
5. Berlin
6. Santiago
7. Vienna
8. San Francisco
9. Montreal
10. Vancouver
11. New York
12. Toronto
13. San Diego
14. London
15. Barcelona
16. Los Angeles
17. Chicago
18. Miami
19. Paris
20. Atlanta
21. Rome
22. Sydney
23. Melbourne
24. Dallas
25. Houston
These include the approach that local legislation has to trans people. That is, whether people can legally change their gender. Furthermore, the evaluator was interested in whether same-sex marriages are legal, whether they have local access to contraception, or whether prostitution is legal.
"When minorities such as the LGBTQI community or women are limited in their opportunities for development, it says a lot about society in general," explains the magazine, why it compiled the ranking in the first place. "Such restrictions can be justified by so-called traditional values as well as political arguments," he writes, noting that emancipation and sexual openness go hand in hand.
Last year's winner New York is eleventh this year. His competition grew. "Citizens of Cologne wholeheartedly welcome like-minded visitors who share their values. And rather than insisting on equality in Cologne, they celebrate the uniqueness of each individual," emphasizes Lust.
The Times also notes that the Cologne city hall has had its own "LGBT office" since 2010 and that the local "Pride" or pride march is one of the largest in Europe. Nevertheless, New York still has the most gay bars (82) and sex shops (99) per population. In second place this year is the Californian city of West Hollywood, practically a part of Los Angeles.
After all, it only finished sixteenth. The third place was "somewhat unsurprisingly" taken by the Dutch Amsterdam and the fourth by Madrid. "Berlin finished in fifth place. Two German cities thus managed to reach the top ten. In addition to the high number of sex shops and LGBTQI events, both Cologne and Berlin benefit from a relatively stable legal situation for sexual minorities and sex workers. It's probably not surprising that the very first sex shop was created in Germany!" points out Lust.
It refers to the business of German acrobat and war pilot Beate Uhse. She started her business career first by distributing contraceptives and brochures about sex, before opening the world's first sex shop in 1962. It was based in Flensburg in the north of Germany under the name of the Institute of Matrimonial Hygiene and from the beginning it aroused not only interest but also outrage.
The ambitious businesswoman opened her own erotic museum in Berlin, also offered lingerie and started operating an erotic TV channel. She died in 2001 at the age of eighty-one. However, the network of sex shops itself ended up in insolvency in 2017, succumbing to competition on the Internet.
Source:
https://www.idnes.cz/zpravy/zahrani...ce=twitter&utm_medium=wall&utm_campaign=idnes
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