The rainbow symbol

You have the old rainbow flag, with all the bright vibrant colours happily existing side by side. Then, from the sinister side a spear head invades and starts to spread across and smother them. I love how the white triangle symbolises the core of rich white males behind the new movement, hiding behind the wishy washy pink and blue trans, who in turn are portrayed pushing the black and brown lines/people in front of them, to act as human shields and cannon fodder on the front lines.

For several years now, I have shuddered whenever I've seen [a rainbow]. They don't symbolise hope, just oppression, totalitarian thinking and erasure to many women.

I would feel the same way, TedImGoingMad. But I've noticed that the trans rainbow shows only six colours instead of the genuine rainbow's seven. So we still have the real rainbow as a symbol of hope.

I think we generally just go for a generic purple somewhere between the two rather than specifically indigo (a bluey purple) or violet (a pinky purple).

Violet

The first thing I think of when you say rainbows is the youngest section of girlguiding.

Then I remember the things in the sky.

After that I think about LGBT.

If I see rainbows, what I think of friends on the context. In the shape of an actual rainbow, I think of all the rainbows that people painted/displayed as symbols of hope during lockdown. Just rainbow colours worn on clothing/lanyards/flags, that's what I associate with LGBT (mostly LGB actually because when I was growing up the T weren't attached to the end)

Okay, I'm looking at the pictures supplied up thread on a tiny phone screen with possible unreliable colour display.

Can someone tell me whether it's indigo or violet that has been left out of the Pride flag's horizontal stripes?

It’s not the colours that are arbitrary, it’s the divisions between them. It’s a continuous spectrum, so you could equally well say there were 17 or 71 colours. But Newton had some fairly magical thinking going on and liked the number 7.

Odd bloke.

[quote SpringCrocus]@DeeJayLippy
Love the additions, very apt!

I too thought of the Nazi invasion of England on the "Dad's Army" opening credits, when I first saw the alphabet soup lot new flag[/quote]
Me too

Well - I don’t think that went the way the OP wanted.

Also, it was Isaac Newton who decided rainbows had 7 colours, entirely arbitrarily

Hardly arbitrary. I've done the experiment many times and you can clearly see the 7 colours. Just because it's not always obvious in all natural rainbows doesn't mean he was wrong.

Back when orange wasn't traditionally included there was no word for orange, for example.

@Wandawomble
Get your twangers out.
www.google.com/amp/s/amp.radiox.co.uk/features/was-there-a-banned-rude-episode-of-rainbow/

I thought the rainbow belonged to George and Zippy.

@DeeJayLippy
Love the additions, very apt!

I too thought of the Nazi invasion of England on the "Dad's Army" opening credits, when I first saw the alphabet soup lot new flag

@Stealhsquirrelnutkin
Fabulous comment!

1970s rock band anyone?

Also, it was Isaac Newton who decided rainbows had 7 colours, entirely arbitrarily.

www.nature.com/articles/520436a

I'm with Cartman. I hate those things.

The LGBT "symbol" isn't an actual rainbow though is it? Its 6 different coloured vertical stripes used in various different ways.

This. It's at best a spectrum without the violet.

I do love the picture DJlippy has posted. I will be using that.

Rainbows have the following features:

1. Lots of different colours - symbol of diversity, e.g. South Africa used to (still does?) get referred to as the Rainbow Nation
2. Comes our when sun shines after the rain - symbol of hope, especially after time of difficulty/sadness e.g. rainbow babies
3. Generally pretty looking - gets slapped all over "girl" clothes, often paired with unicorns/flowers/etc

No one owns rainbows or the rainbow symbol.

As someone above pointed out, there was no need to add the black and brown stripes as the rainbow colours were already inclusive of of all lesbian, gay and bi people.
They are simply being used as a human shield for the male activists to hide behind whilst ploughing through with their hostile takeover.

Yet another group's oppression to appropriate.

Fantastic analysis of that flag. It needs to go on Twitter.

[quote Waitwhat23]@Lovemusic33 you've reminded me about the rainbow-colored infinity symbol which represents the diversity of the autism spectrum, which is beginning to be used instead of a linear spectrum.[/quote]
I prefer the rainbow to the puzzle piece, rainbows are far nicer 😉.