A 2017 survey by the Center for American Progress found that nearly one in 10 LGBTQ+ individuals reported that a health care professional wouldn’t see them in the prior year because of their actual or perceived sexual orientation. Far too often, LGBTQ+ people don’t get the same level of care as people who identify as heterosexual. LGBTQ+ identity and sexuality intersects with all aspects of health (mental, physical and sexual). The bigger picture is that a flag is more than just a flag. RELATED: 6 Major Health Disparities Affecting the LGBTQ+ Community The colors of the flag also represent attraction to different genders.
The way that bisexual people can blend into the straight community and the gay community. His idea for the flag represents pink and blue blending to make purple. “People sometimes see these flags, wonder what they mean, go and look them up, and end up learning something in the process,” says Eckler. The bi pride flag was created in 1998 by Michael Page. Additionally, the flags can serve as an important teaching tool. The purple also represents that the pink and blue can blend unnoticeably and in varying degrees. “Having a wide range of flags helps those groups feel more seen and offers them a simple visual way to identify themselves to others if or when they want to,” Jo Eckler, licensed clinical psychologist and author of I Can't Fix You-Because You're Not Broken: The Eight Keys to Freeing Yourself From Painful Thoughts and Feelings, tells Health.Įckler explains that the different flags can help people find others who share their sexual or gender identity. The pink represents sexual attraction to the same sex, the blue represents sexual attraction to the opposite sex, and the resultant overlap creating the purple represents sexual attraction to 2 or more genders. This flag was created by a member of the network in 2010 for a contest on their forum boards.
While everyone is probably familiar with the rainbow gay pride flag, there are many groups within the vast LGBTQ+ community that are less well-known, and many have their own flag. Asexual Pride Flag Meaning The black, gray, white, and purple flag for asexuality was designed to replicate the logo of The Asexual Visibility and Education Network (AVEN). The brightly colored flags you see online and IRL to celebrate Pride and support LGBTQ+ rights are great to look at, but they serve an important purpose.