Up to 2,000 anti-LGBT protters broke up a Gay Pri ftival the Geian pal, Tbilisi, on July 8, scufflg wh police and stroyg props, cludg rabow flags and plards, though there were no reports of juri. Organizers acced the thori of actively lludg wh the monstrators to dispt the ftival, but a ernment mister said was a difficult event for police to protect as was held an open area, addg that ftival participants had been evacuated to safety. Geian Print Salome Zurabishvili, a equent cric of the ernment, echoed the cricism of the police, sayg they had failed their duty to uphold people's right to assemble safely.
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PRI FLAGS 101: EVERYTHG YOU'VE EVER WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT GAY, TRANS, AND OTHER PRI FLAGS
It go back to 1978, when the artist Gilbert Baker, an openly gay man and a drag queen, signed the first rabow flag. Baker later revealed that he was urged by Harvey Milk, one of the first openly gay elected officials the U. S., to create a symbol of pri for the gay muny.
As he later said an terview, “Our job as gay people was to e out, to be visible, to live the tth, as I say, to get out of the lie. The first versns of the rabow flag were flown on June 25, 1978, for the San Francis Gay Freedom Day para. He was missned to create a flag by another gay in, polician Harvey Milk, for San Francis’s annual pri cisn to enlist Baker proved serendipo, as the ia of a flag to reprent the gay and lbian muny had occurred to him two years earlier.
As Baker told the Mm of Morn Art durg a 2015 terview, he had been spired by the celebratns markg Ameri’s bicentennial 1976, notg that the nstant display of stars and strip ma him realize the cultural need for a siar rallyg sign for the gay muny.