First world problem.

The rainbow flag was not necessarily an instant hit.

I remember coming out in the mid-1980s. At that time all I saw were pink triangles in the gay community, despite the rainbow flag having been around for several years. The pink triangle was used by a lot of early AIDS activist groups, which was perhaps appropriate, since pink triangles were a visible acknowledgement of extreme oppression. I remember back then people would sometimes ask what the pink triangle was for, and they were often surprised and appalled when I told them it was the patch the Nazis used for gays in concentration camps. Not exactly a joyful celebratory symbol.

So I'm glad that we've adopted the rainbow flag. It is a much happier symbol. But it was something that happened over many years. Through the 1990s, I slowly saw fewer pink triangles and more rainbows. Now a lot of young gays don't even know what the pink triangle was.

"I proudly support gay marriage and gay rights I just disagree about your use of the rainbow."

You sound like a guy born to pick fights. Are you often unhappy when others are happy?

I immediately tune out any guy who claims something queer should be abolished because it might encourage dudes to hit on him. Smells like homophobia, the kind that's really just another flavor of misogyny. Anything that makes a man get treated like a woman must be bad, because there's nothing worse than being a woman, right?

I mean, if he find something as charming, harmless, and representational of diversity offensive, I can only imagine the sort of other things that come out of the guy's mouth out of "helpfulness".

Oh, and the Deaf community is about 0.5% of the population, about a tenth of the LGBT-identified population. Why does this person think his community is so much more expansive and diverse than the queer community?

Yeah, I get an "I don't care if you're gay, but why do you have to shove it in my face" vibe.

The time to make this complaint was about 20 years ago. At least I figured the rainbow thing out before I bought that T-shirt that turned the Stars and Stripes into a rainbow flag. I liked the shirt (I like blasphemy), but I wouldn't want to be a dick tease.

@7: Exactly. "I support gay rights, but why do they have to be so FLAMBOYANT?! Why do they need parades?"

Judy, Judy, Judy!

Breaking news...

Straight Richard Gere 65, dating rich be…

Begin hypocritical Age Racism here:

None of us are in Kansas anymore. And God sent mankind the rainbow as a promise that the world will not be destroyed again by flood. At least, not by God. The GOP is doing it's damnedest to raise the oceans but everyone knows that God has nothing to do with Republicans.

Straight people need to stop whining about how gay people are better at generating cultural symbols. We'll keep "the rainbow" and you can keep "throws like a boy" and "doesn't have to lie about the reason why you're not bringing your significant other to the company picnic for fear of losing your job." Fair?

I don't trust anybody who earnestly uses the word "heck".

Yeah, I don't get it. He's really burned that he can't wear his sweet rainbow suspenders out and about without all the gays throwing themselves at him?
That's some quality trolling there...
Reminds me a bit of white guys who complain the they don't "get to" us the n-word like all those rappers do. Wow, you have truly known deprivation and persecution.

I'm confused. Was this LW wearing a rainbow flag and that's why gay men were following him?
Or rainbow pants or socks or shirt?
Surely gay men don't follow everyone who likes and wears a rainbow, do they.. I mean, they'd be tracking after a lot of hippies if they did.

There were apparently complaints when "gay" was beginning to mean homosexual instead of "happy". "Queer" meant something else, too. Of course, most of the complaints about 'queer' came from unappreciative gay and lesbian people.

Well, I'm tired of the rainbow everywhere. It's a little too precious.
Try telling the young folks today that in reality, the first 'markers' were the lambda and the color lavender. Lavender because that's what you got when you mixed pink and blue--and it spread pretty fast. The Lavender Menace, for one. Love that name.
I was told lambda was used because it meant change and energy.

A week ago Richard Gere was sitting at His Holiness the Dalai Lams's feet, taking some advanced Teachings, in Australia.
I assume that's one 65 yr old who can still get it up - wonder how long this will last? Enjoy it while you can Richard, you old Buddhist stud, you.

@15: http://www.theonion.com/blogpost/why-do-…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jSFLZ-Mz…

Kermit in the swamp kicks Willie's ass!

I remember when gay men checked me out & hit on me. Then I got older, and they slowly faded. Enjoy it while it lasts, honey.

Ms Lava - To which post did #19 belong?

I'm thinking there's a lucrative market in being the Gay Friend(s) of people like this, evangelicals, right-wing politicians, etc. One could hire oneself out - ideally, befriending half the Republican candidates for President and then starting a bidding war about which of them is one's bestest BFF.

@20 - That is a classic! And spot-on for this LW. This one is not as appropriate, but still one of my faves:
http://www.theonion.com/article/church-g…

But yes, of course the LW is completely right. No more rainbows for the gays. Let's give them a tan square. That's festive enough.

According to the Bible, the rainbow represents hope, specifically God's promise never to repeat the Great Flood. This makes it an excellent choice, well in keeping with Milk's speech.

Dan, it's a shame that since you were responding to a Deaf person, that you did not include those video versions that had captioning that could be turned on so that the words could be read.

"I am part of the culture that is so much more diverse than the LGBT community"

Then why are you being such a closed-minded bigot? Show us you care, don't parrot this faux-diversity at us as if your words are more important than deeds. Because as you mentioned, racists and bigots are apparently a part of "deaf culture" too, and embracing them for their deafness and sidestepping their hate is promoting their hate. If you see someone signing hatespeech, are you going to give a friendly wave?

Anyway, trolls is trolls.

Dear reader: The rainbow flag is also the unofficial flag of Peru (just as an aside) Would you be ok if that were its only connotation or would you be writing to them asking for a release of ownership? .. I, like the writer hate the rainbow as the banner for my sexuality ... I think less is more.. But with age I have come to respect the need for diversity in the flag, in my own country and indeed the world. The reality of the rainbow is that somewhere .. over it .. is the land of freedom, the freedom to love, the freedom to pursue our dreams and the freedom to achieve equality ... so While I firmly believe in a 3 color minimum for most things, House's car interiors, outfits ... I have learned to love, if not the rainbow itself ... what all the colors of it are meant to represent ... PS, your homophobic comment about being followed into bathrooms completely defeated your complaint ...

I'm originally from Peru and the rainbow flag was the flag of the Inca empire, at least that's what we were taught in school growing up and if you ever travel to Peru you'll see rainbow flags everywhere especially in the city of Cuzco (close to Machu Picchu). I had a friend visit Cuzco last year and he thought it was a very gay friendly city because of the flags lol I had to explain it was not an LGBT symbol. For me personally the rainbow flag represents my Indian heritage, but I don't mind that the LGBT movement also uses it, hey who doesn't like rainbows :)

I'm afraid the LGBTQ community already has to proudly share the rainbow with the Brownies, hippies, crystal geeks, people who take E and fans of leprechauns, and let's not forget people who like real-life rainbows too. If they can deal with it, why not you?

You posted two song recordings for a deaf reader. Okaaaay Dan.

The whole initial complaint is dumb. I love stars. But there are stars on the flag of the United States, whose policies I sometimes disagree with!!! What will I do?? Oh yeah, not care. The Rainbow flag is lovely and a recognizable symbol but rainbows still exist for all life capable of seeing the same visible spectrum as us, including the deaf or members of any other group. We should be more concerned for those with profound visual impairment since birth who cannot experience rainbows, except in Skittles form.

I've re-read the letter about six times, and i still don't get his beef. Is his problem that the rainbow used to be a symbol of the deaf community and he's mad that the gay types - who follow him home all.the.time and oh.my.gosh might check him out - might think he's gay if he flies it?

Firstly, I've never associated the rainbow with the deaf community nor hear of that correction. But no one has trademarked the rainbow. There are fifty million different ribbon colors that represent this and that organization, but breast cancer managed to coopt and effectively market the pink one.... so?

Secondly, whether you have a rainbow or not, men are going to check you out. Sorry. Men check me out too. Welcome to being female - you must have been oblivious this whole time. I hope girls check me out too.

Thirdly, you gotta problem with the rainbow, take that up with the merry and happy rainbow Hawaii with their rainbow license plates, U of H football team the rainbows... and the many rainbows that adorn that lovely and captivating state. If a man hits on you about your rainbow, tell em your half hawaiian in your heart. Its what my little brown eyed girl does ;)

Interesting re; Peru. Want to go there for the fortieth.

Thanks for mentioning what when down in Olympia. Those nuts are still hammering their facebook page.

Venn @11 gave a reference to it. Just struck me as funny. The guy is all religious one week then off with a girl he could be the father of, the next.

...and he's deaf? So bloody what.

Didn't the rainbow flag lose a strip between design and general adoption? (quick wiki-check lists changes, mostly due to availability of colors, hot pink having been dropped early and restored later.)
At least hot pink isn't part of the spectrum of meteorological rainbows, so if someone follows you into the bathroom, just indicate the missing color and I'm sure they'll apologize.

Or maybe they just needed the damn' bathroom. And do ANY straight guys really have that much trouble getting hit on by gay guys? I worked in the Opera for ten years without a ripple of misplaced interest. And I ain't exactly an eyesore...

A straight man who fears gay men will hit on him if he wears a rainbow now knows how many women feel every day--even when they wear sweat pants. Luckily for you, DAHLR, gay men are probably better at taking rejection than a lot of entitled straight boys.

Think of the Maryland woman--a straight widow with four kids--whose yard was labeled "relentlessly gay" in a nasty anonymous letter. She wants to make it even more aggressively gay and doesn't care what people think.

So, don't worry what people think. If you wanna wear a rainbow flag, wear one. You can consider it the mark of a straight ally.

This reminds me of a letter many years ago to Dear Abby:

A man whose surname was Gay wrote to her (or perhaps it was her sister) asking us to stop using the word gay because it embarrassed him and his family's had it longer.

She replied that he may have had it longer, but we outnumber him!

Both letters share the same absurd premise - that the columnist is actually in a position to do a damn thing about it!

@40: "A straight man who fears gay men will hit on him if he wears a rainbow now knows how many women feel every day--even when they wear sweat pants."

Projecting how they feel about women onto men. It'd be sad if it wasn't so aggressive.

As I remember, the 'rainbow' theme was associated to the dreams of a little girl who felt oppressed and lost. Somewhere. over the rainbow. That's where the hope was. The rainbow flag came later. In fact, as I recall, it was a purple triangle before a rainbow flag. I'm not married to the rainbow flag thing, but leave my song alone!!!!! It is the gay Anthem!!!

btw, it isn't a 'gay parade'. It is a Pride parade and it's loaded with people of diversity. Of all kinds. Even if you attach it to the LGBTetc. community, it's about diversity and pride, it's not a gay party. It took me years to get over that. What happened to the party I always wanted? So you see, PRIDE is about PRIDE! Come and join the PRIDE.

Eh, I have some sympathy for the guy. I have a lovely tablecloth my grandmother embroidered as a child. It is covered with hundreds of little embroidered swastikas. I can't take it out with explaining to everyone present that my grandmother made it before teh swastika meant _that_.

Of course, it's more awkward to be taken for a nazi sympathizer than to be taken as a gay sympathizer. But I can see him feeling awkward about it.

Nothing to be done about either, of course.