What do all the Pride flags mean?

Many countries around the world celebrate Pride Month in June. Watch this video to find out about some other flags within the LGBTQ+ community.

Do the preparation task first. Then watch the video and do the exercises.

Transcript

Sacha Coward: The rainbow flag is a really important symbol for the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer community. It has changed a lot since it was originally invented. When you see the rainbow flag, that tends to symbolise queer people, no matter who they are, how they define or who they love.

Reeta Loi: This is the new lesbian flag. I think it's amazing that there are ways for us to feel that we can self-identify. I think, for lesbians, we are marginalised within the broader queer community. And I think it's great that a flag like this exists, so that we know that there are spaces that are inclusive and that we can participate in or belong to.

Amelia Abrahams: This is the bisexual flag. It was designed by Michael Page in 1998, and the point of it was to make bisexuality more recognisable or visible within the LGBTQ+ community and society more broadly.

The trans flag. It represents people who have a different gender identity to the one they were born with.

Non-binary. For people who don't identify exclusively as a man or woman. 

The progress flag. 

Sacha Coward: This flag here is one of the more contemporary rainbow flags. It also includes a brown and black strip as well as part of the trans flag.

Reeta Loi: This kind of does the job best for me. And I think, potentially, the flags are always going to keep evolving. So, who knows? Maybe we won't need a flag at some point. That would be my ideal.

© BBC

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Profile picture for user Andres Felipe Murillo Ayala

Submitted by Andres Felipe … on Fri, 07/04/2023 - 04:14

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What I learned from this activity and video, is that we all have feelings, and the greatest way to live is happy, with no hate, racism and loving us each other.

Submitted by chayounha on Thu, 16/02/2023 - 13:10

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from this video, I learned that everyone has the right to be acknowledged for their existence. This flag isn't just a symbol, indirectly it gives them power and confidence about how they identify him/her self, also communicates that they can participate in or belong in this society

Submitted by bren_agm on Tue, 17/01/2023 - 21:31

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I have a question, why does the progress flag has a black and brown stripe? Does it belong to another group that was not mentioned?

Hello bren_agm,

There's some controversy around these two stripes, but it looks as if they were meant to represent racial diversity. There are quite a few posts about this around the internet, but here's one I looked at.

All the best,
Kirk
The LearnEnglish Team

Submitted by Maria Buzzetti on Sun, 04/12/2022 - 15:56

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I learnt that today an effort is being made to combine all the flags in one, so to be as inclusive as possible instead of creating divisions among the queer community.
Nevertheless, I believe it is quite impossible to include all nuances of human nature in an icon or a flag. That's why ideas are more important that the symbol carrying them, in my opinion.

that's what I was thinking, there are many other identities that are not mentioned on this video...

Submitted by pedroLopez on Sat, 12/11/2022 - 14:35

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I learned a lot in this topic,it is great to know about this .
Thanks

Submitted by Ivy Tran on Thu, 03/11/2022 - 10:03

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What did you learn from the video?
No matter what gender they are , they are still human and they have feeling ,emotion , everyone want to be recognised and respected.

Submitted by Saw Henry on Thu, 29/09/2022 - 08:59

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Everywhere for everyone have each identity. So the rainbow flag it also one of an identity for LGBT.