The rainbow has become politicized due to its association with gays and lesbians, a group at the center of controversy among conservative Americans who disagree with their lifestyle. ( Moore, 2001 ) Uses of the Rainbow in Culture Purple was also popular symbol of gay pride in the 1960s and 1970s, and lavender has now become a symbol of lesbians in particular. Yellow was used for the same purpose in Australia. During the Holocaust gay men were forced to wear pink triangles on their sleeves, and that symbol has since been reclaimed by the gay community, though leaving some uncomfortable with its origin. Oscar Wilde famously wore a green carnation on his lapel, a symbol thought to have been used by Londoners and Parisians of his time to express their orientation. Gilbert Baker ( Hallowell, 2012) Other colors in LGBT historyīright colors were historically used by closeted gay people to discreetly signal their homosexuality to each other. That really fit us as a people because we are all of the colors.
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It’s beautiful, all of the colors, even the colors you can’t see. The rainbow is a symbol and celebration of the diversity of genders and sexual orientations. Later the remaining seven colors were eventually dropped to six with the exclusion of indigo to keep the number of colors even. Baker’s original flags were hand-made and had 8 colors, but when the flag’s popularity demanded mass production pink had to be dropped because it wasn’t commercially available. Hippies are sometimes associated with the rainbow because of its use during peace rallies in the 1960s and 1970s. Rainbows are also used the world over as as a sign of diversity, inclusiveness, and hope and rainbow flags have appeared all over history from the Inca Empire to Italy’s cooperative movement and during the German ‘Peasant’s War’ ( Conradt, 2011 )īut the rainbow flag known internationally today first appeared in San Francisco in 1978. Gilbert Baker was commissioned to design a flag for gays to hold high in that year’s pride parade and his original design included 8 colors, each with a different intended meaning.Īfter the 1978 assassination of Harvey Milk, an openly gay politician in San Francisco, the flag became a symbol of solidarity. The rainbow is still being used by some Christian groups in their iconography ( Wickman, 2012 ) According to Quasar, the colors in the chevron represent trans individuals, people of color, those living with HIV/AIDS, and deceased members of the LGBTQ+ community.The rainbow is mentioned in the Bible as a symbol of peace and promise from God to Noah that there would never again be a great flood. The flag was unveiled at Philadelphia’s Pride celebration in 2017 and remains the official LGBTQ+ flag of the City of Philadelphia.ĭesigner Daniel Quasar creates the “Progress Flag”, which combines elements of the 2017 Philadelphia flag and the trans flag with the traditional rainbow flag. “o matter which way you fly it, it is always correct, signifying us finding correctness in our lives,” Helms said of the flag.įollowing an outcry over racism in Philadelphia’s Gayborhood, the city commissioned the design of a new eight-color flag with black and brown stripes to recognize the contributions of LGBTQ+ people of color. The light pink and blue represent the colors traditionally associated with girls and boys, and the white represents transitioning, neutral or undefined genders, and intersexuality. Monica Helms, a transgender woman, creates the transgender pride flag. Page explained that the pink represents same-sex sttraction, the blue represents opposite-sex attraction, and the purple overlap represents attraction to both. Michael Page designs the bisexual pride flag, a three-color design. The six-color flag is the most common LGBTQ+ flag worldwide. With only seven colors, activists noticed it was impossible to split in half to be displayed more easily in public, and so the turquoise stripe was eliminated as well. The six-color flag enters popular use following the assassination of Harvey Milk.The hot pink stripe was eliminated over the difficulty obtaining the fabric. From top to bottom, the colors represent sex, life, healing, sunlight, nature, magic and art, serenity, and spirit.
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The eight-color flag first flew over the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade in June of 1978. Gilbert Baker, a friend of San Fancisco’s openly gay City Supervisor Harvey Milk, designs the first rainbow flag. Here’s a timeline of some of the major LGBTQ+ flags and what they stand for.
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The history of the Pride Flag goes back to the 1970s, and the design has changed numerous times over the years. Colorful flags are flown at many LGBTQ+ events.