A prentatn of the major symbols associated wh the gay, lbian, bisexual, and trangenr movements (and some general symbols thrown for good measure) and their histori.
Contents:
- THE PK TRIANGLE: FROM NAZI LABEL TO SYMBOL OF GAY PRI
- PRI FLAGS 101: EVERYTHG YOU'VE EVER WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT GAY, TRANS, AND OTHER PRI FLAGS
THE PK TRIANGLE: FROM NAZI LABEL TO SYMBOL OF GAY PRI
Pk triangl were origally ed ncentratn mps to intify gay men. * triangle gay symbol *
Before the pk triangle beme a worldwi symbol of gay power and pri, was tend as a badge of shame. In Nazi Germany, a downward-potg pk triangle was sewn onto the shirts of gay men ncentratn mps—to intify and further humanize them.
Homosexualy was technilly ma illegal Germany 1871, but was rarely enforced until the Nazi Party took power 1933. As part of their missn to racially and culturally “purify” Germany, the Nazis arrted thoands of LGBT dividuals, mostly gay men, whom they viewed as Uned Stat Holot Memorial Mm timat 100, 000 gay men were arrted and between 5, 000 and 15, 000 were placed ncentratn mps. Jt as Jews were forced to intify themselv wh yellow stars, gay men ncentratn mps had to wear a large pk triangle.
)Corbis/Getty ImagHomosexual prisoners at the ncentratn mp at Sachsenhsen, Germany, wearg pk triangl on their uniforms on December 19, the mps, gay men were treated pecially harshly, by guards and fellow prisoners alike. “There was no solidary for the homosexual prisoners; they belonged to the lowt ste, ” Pierre Seel, a gay Holot survivor, wrote his memoir I, Pierre Seel, Deported Homosexual: A Memoir of Nazi timated 65 percent of gay men ncentratn mps died between 1933 and 1945. Even after World War II, both East and Wt Germany upheld the untry’s anti-gay law, and many gays remaed rcerated until the early 1970s.
PRI FLAGS 101: EVERYTHG YOU'VE EVER WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT GAY, TRANS, AND OTHER PRI FLAGS
In 1972, The Men wh the Pk Triangle, the first tobgraphy of a gay ncentratn mp survivor, was published.
The next year, post-war Germany’s first gay rights anizatn, Homosexuelle Aktn Wtberl (HAW), reclaimed the pk triangle as a symbol of liberatn. Horac Villalobos/Corbis/Getty ImagMemorial plaqu for homosexuals, Jehovah's Wns and Wehrmacht serters are placed where once stood one of the molished barracks Buchenwald ncentratn mp near Weimar, Germany. In 1986, six New York Cy activists created a poster wh the words SILENCE = DEATH and a bright pk upward-facg triangle, meant to ll attentn to the AIDs crisis that was cimatg populatns of gay men across the untry.
Strewn across flags, banners, and ps, the rabow symboliz the diversy of gays and lbians around the world.