How the Pride Flag of Gay and Lesbian Liberation Has Been Corrupted

I came out in the 1980s as a teenager to a thriving lesbian and gay community.

You could go out every night of the week in Melbourne and find lesbian only events. We had bars, discos, women’s balls, bookshops, cafes and even a sex shop. We even had a huge lesbian festival in the early 1990s with Festival Hall packed with 4,000 odd women at a big dance party. 

Gay and bisexual men had their saunas, and the Peel and Laird hotels. We respected each other’s need for single sex spaces and we came together in mixed spaces quite happily.

Back then, there was no TQ. It was just the lesbian and gay community which also took in bisexual people. Back then anything T was transvestites, usually gay men who liked to cross dress, and very rarely,  transsexuals; people who had had a “sex change”. 

Transgender and queer were not included with the "rainbow community" as these were not recognised communities at the time. It was simply the LGB community. In fact queer was a slur that many of us found offensive. Some of us still do.

The original movement of gay and lesbian liberation bares little resemblance to the Rainbow movement of today ; a movement of forced teaming, a movement of gaslighting, a movement of such polarising opinions, that many LGB are shut down, silenced and de-platformed when they try to stand up for same-sex attracted peoples’ rights, in our own movement mind you! 

Back in the 1970s and 1980s, we marched under the pink triangle which was reclaimed from the Nazi’s who used it to identify male homosexuals in concentration camps. 

Lesbians often used the double-headed labrys as their symbol of liberation. Superimposed on a black triangle and purple background. Many lesbians wore earrings and necklaces of the double-headed labrys as a way of identifying each other.

It was during the AIDs crisis in the 1980s that lesbians and gay men united as one movement. Lesbian women helped their gay and bisexual brothers who were dying in their millions, often when no one else would help. The catch cry then was Silence = Death

The rainbow flag did not come into prominent significance until the 1990s. To many older gay and lesbian people, the pink triangle and labrys have more meaning than the rainbow flag.

The original rainbow flag was designed by gay artist and drag queen, Gilbert Baker in 1978 as a symbol of pride for the gay community in San Francisco. The original flag had eight colours, each colour having it’s own meaning; hot pink for sex, red for life, orange for healing, yellow for sunlight, green for nature, turquoise for art, indigo for harmony, and violet for spirit.

Baker said in an interview “Our job as gay people was to come out, to be visible, to live in the truth, as I say, to get out of the lie. A flag really fit that mission, because that’s a way of proclaiming your visibility or saying, ‘This is who I am!’” 1.

Due to production issues, the pink and turquoise were removed and indigo was replaced with the blue of today’s flag.

Many of us proudly marched under the rainbow flag in the 1990s and 2000s.

The trans flag was designed by a trans woman in 1999 and I wholeheartedly support trans people having their own flag and movement. Monica Helms, designer of the flag, based it on baby blue and baby pink colours, colours incidentally also used by pedophile groups. Helms wrote sexualized stories of underage characters and was also known for stealing women’s underwear. You can read more about this here.

However, with the manufacturing of the Trans and Queer movement, since 2018, we have seen our beloved rainbow flag “evolve” to take in the trans and queer baby blue, baby pink and white colours and also black and brown to represent  people of colour. This is now called the Progress Flag and was designed by non-binary American artist Daniel Quasar. As the rainbow flag was designed to represent all LGB people, it already included people of colour.

Since then, the flag has had another iteration, taking in the intersex community with a purple circle overlaid over a yellow triangle. I am not sure if the intersex community want to be part of the ever growing groups added to the gay and lesbian liberation movement.

Then, this most recent iteration of the flag popped up in the last couple of weeks on social media.

Note how the addition of all these other groups, who have nothing to do with same-sex attraction, are pushing out and taking over the original rainbow pride colours. We are slowly being erased. Where will it end?

Tech giant, Microsoft also released their version of a pride flag recently, trying to take in 40 marginalised groups.

These include: ‘Abrosexual, Aceflux, Agender, Ambiamorous, Androgynous, Aroace, Aroflux, Aromantic, Asexual, Bigender, Bisexual, Demifluid, Demigender, Demigirl, Demiromantic, Demisexual, Gay/MLM/Vinician, Genderfluid, Genderflux, Genderqueer, Gender questioning, Graysexual, Intersex, Lesbian, Maverique, Neutrois, Nonbinary, Omnisexual, Pangender, Pansexual, Polyamorous, Polysexual, Transgender, Trigender, Two Spirit, Progress Pride, Queer, Unlabeled.’

This vomit-fest of colour reminds me of the old test pattern on televisions from years ago.

Gays, Lesbians and Bisexuals were never consulted about adding all these other groups and who have little to nothing in common with same-sex attracted people. Sadly, many of us are abandoning the rainbow flag because it has been so changed, and so misappropriated, that we no longer feel it represents us. What was originally designed as a symbol of pride for homosexuals has also become a marketing device for new customer segments by the trans medical-industrial complex.

We need to reclaim the rainbow as same-sex attracted people and politely tell all the other groups to create their own movements and flags. Respect our need for single sex spaces and be happy to come together in mixed space. That’s all we ask.

Melton Mowbray for LGB Alliance Australia