What do you think about the rainbow flag?

[DJLippy]

Does anyone else get a shudder when they see a rainbow flag outside a venue? Harry the Owl compared it to a Nazi flag and I'm inclined to agree.

I'm Bisexual so I should be thrilled to find all these inclusive spaces but I just feel a stab of anxiety and make a mental note to steer well clear. It's a real physiological reaction not something I can control.

A few years ago I used to love seeing the pride flag outside bars. I guess back then it actually meant something. Now I feel like it's actually a sign of exclusion - that anyone who doesn't believe that twaw is not safe there.

Also it does kind of imply that all the other venues are a threat to the LGBTQI++ people. I actually get a lot less grief being with a woman in a normie bar than I would in a gay bar. What's more its often just random cafes and shops which as far as I am aware have no gay history. Just feels like a cheap virtue signal by straight woke folk.

I'd be interested in hearing from people who are same sex attracted. Do you feel that the flag which used to represent your community been appropriated by male supremacists? Do you self exclude from spaces which fly the rainbow flag?

If the rainbow flag = gay pride why couldn’t lesbians march asserting their right to same-sex attraction without being accused of being transphobic? Why couldn’t they march at Gay Pride, and the trans rights activists with the trans flag march on another day?

Erm well this is exactly what happens at Brighton Pride. I proudly march for my right to be same sex attracted and nobody has ever accused me of being transphobic. Perhaps if I held up a transphobic placard they might do, but I don't.

There is an entirely different trans pride.

For SapphosRock
Here's the thread from last year where a horrified civil servant discovered in a training session that the right to leave a toilet if there is a transwoman in there is forbidden to biological women. Presumably cementing our role as props and validators for transitioning men.

isabellerosingol speaks the truth - inconveniently for those who believe that abuse of women like this doesn't happen.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3520371-civil-service-trans-policy-what-can-i-do

@Needmoresleep I am assuming you are straight as you have a DH so it is incredibly arrogant of you to assert to me, a lesbian, that the rainbow flag which represents me and my community is 'pointless and meaningless'.

I am sure it is pointless and meaningless to you because you've never experienced homophobia in your life

Some of us have actual hate and discrimination to deal with.

True. I think my experiences might override yours in the oppression Olympics. I propose we replace rainbow lanyards with ones for racism and sexism. Sound good?

@NonnyMouse1337 if there were lanyards for anti racism / sexism then I would absolutely wear them. I am all for minority groups being allies to one another.

Why should the rainbow be replaced by these and why is one more important than the other?

Anyone who isn't a middle class, white, heterosexual male is likely to face discrimination on the workplace

Wow, Sapphos, you’ve been denying women’s experiences this entire thread, but actually accusing Isabelle lying about what has happened to her in her workplace? Wtf, where do you get off with that? Really nasty.

Btw - I think everyone agrees that lesbians and bisexual women are being thrown under the bus - who’s doing the throwing though? It’s sure as hell not women defending same-sex attraction.

There has never been a demand to have one before - where were there when there were anti gay laws? Where’s the woman’s rights ones or disability ally ones?

As a lesbian and ex member of Stonewall I can confirm that I now see Stonewall and the rainbow flag as representing misogynists and anti women and our rights. I find it hard to believe that this is where we are now - that they have actively campaigned to remove women's rights but they did - so I withdrew my support.

Cwenthryth - oh, there are some women tagging along (not often leading the charge).

SapphosRock what if a middle class, white, heterosexual male wore lanyards for racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, islamophobia and non-binary phobia? Would the six lanyards around his neck shield him and others from the offensive privilege emanating from his middle class, white, heterosexual male presence?
Would he be a better ally than someone like myself - a middle class, Asian, bisexual female - who doesn't wear any lanyards?

Erm well this is exactly what happens at Brighton Pride. I proudly march for my right to be same sex attracted and nobody has ever accused me of being transphobic. Perhaps if I held up a transphobic placard they might do, but I don't

So did you vocalise your right to be same sex attracted at Brighton Pride? Did you hold a sign saying “I have the right to be same sex attracted” at Brighton Pride? I suspect not. What do you think would have happened if you did?

What would you call a “transphobic” placard?

This was Brighton Pride’s response to lesbians marching to assert their right to be same sex attracted:

www.google.com.au/amp/s/www.pinknews.co.uk/2018/07/10/brighton-pride-transgender-protesters-hijack/amp/

So do you think you could say your right allowed without fear?

There are 2 things a rainbow flag says to me:

1. Corporate virtue-signalling bollocks
2. Misogyny. "No TERFs on our turf," bullying lesbians, demonising middle aged and older women, baseball bats and intimidation.

Back in the early 2000s, I thought it was so positive.

Aloud, sheesh.

I avoid corporates who rainbow-up these days. It was suggested that we rainbow our website and I asked for the business case.

I suggested we raise money for other causes and it was rejected - but I still organise food bank collections at work and a donation to an industry mental health charity. Next week we are doing a ‘bring and share lunch’ on Friday to raise money for a soup kitchen charity.

I am assuming you are straight as you have a DH
Nice biphobia you have there!

Cwenthryth my real life experience as a lesbian and a woman is I am being thrown under a bus by straight women who claim to care about gay rights.

And no I don't believe anyone would ever be disciplined and sacked for choosing to leave a female toilet at work and there is no evidence that this has ever happened. Ever.

So did you vocalise your right to be same sex attracted at Brighton Pride? Did you hold a sign saying “I have the right to be same sex attracted” at Brighton Pride?

I don't go to Brighton Pride with an anti-trans agenda. I go to proudly hold the hand of my DW and celebrate that we live in a time when two women can legally marry. For me it's a day of celebration.

Most lesbians have been on a journey to come out as gay and reject men as partners. It's not an easy thing to do and most have been told 'it's just a phase' or 'wait until you find the right man'. No lesbians I know feel threatened by nonsense TRA claims that same sex attraction is transphobic. It's just another part of the journey.

Placards and protests just give it oxygen, much better to ignore and concentrate on our happy same sex relationships.

Sappho, I was not saying that.

The rainbow flag clearly = gay pride to you.

That's fine. But you can't enforce how I interpret it.

I have never been on a pride march. I hope though that the same-sex attracted people I know would confirm that I have demonstrated my support by, well, doing nothing special or different. I had understood that acceptance was the goal.

I don't disagree that homophobia still exists. And that there is still work to be done by organisations who represent LGB interests.

However I am entitled to my view that enforced or encouraged rainbow lanyards on Southwest trains, or Barclays turning their app rainbow is meaningless virtue signalling. As I see it, visibly Muslim or orthodox women travelling on their own would be as entitled to fear for their safety when travelling alone late on a Friday night as a lesbian woman.

But then you would probably argue that as a white heterosexual woman, any views I hold are automatically arrogant as I have not walked the walk. Obviously because it is for you to decide what I think, and if I don't agree, it is fine for you to minimise and insult.

No wonder people are starting to see the rainbow symbol as oppressive.

Most lesbians have been on a journey to come out as gay and reject men as partners. It's not an easy thing to do

Nope. And it's made infinitely harder when women are being bullied into accepting that they are not in an exclusive category defined by biological sex, but must obediently admit any male who claims to be a woman for whatever motivation. Your obdurate refusal to acknowledge this point is laughable.

I'm so sick of the rainbow flag too. It's rammed down everyone's throats, prioritised above everything else (disability awareness, ageism, sexism, racism) and nobody feels they can say anything or they'll be labelled 'homophobic'. It's tyranny. I'm also sick of how Pride month became Pride season, now it's all bloody year. My local Sainsbury's had rainbows every bloody where for 'Pride month'. Ended up being about five months. Put me off going there.

I don't go to Brighton Pride with an anti-trans agenda.

So saying out loud “I have the right to be same sex attracted” is an “anti trans agenda”? Why is it anti trans?

You come across as being of the opinion “it doesn’t bother me, so I don’t see why others should be bothered by it”.

You show no empathy at all.

BovaryX are you a lesbian?

In my experience the difficult parts of being a lesbian are telling family and friends (particularly if religious), coming out at work, accepting you and your partner will never have biological children, accepting the NHS only funds IVF for straight couples, facing discrimination and hostility for deliberately having children without a father involved...

Being 'bullied' by strangers on Twitter for not wanted to sleep with trans women is so far down on our list of things to get upset about.

If you are a lesbian, which things do you find difficult?

Er, you are the one who claimed it was difficult for lesbians to come out and reject men. Yet you simultaneously refuse to acknowledge that rejecting men is made impossible if any man can identify as a woman and anyone who rejects that is denounced as a transphobia. Do you understand the concept of doublethink?

my real life experience as a lesbian and a woman is I am being thrown under a bus by straight women who claim to care about gay rights.
How, exactly? What are these straight women doing, to throw you under what bus, exactly?

Our experience is that lesbian and bisexual women’s rights to express our same-sex attraction are being thrown under the bus of gender ideology, denying our reality of recognising our female sex and being attracted to others of the female sex, by so-called ‘trans rights’ activists and those that support them, accusing us of bigotry and transphobia for this. The appropriation of the rainbow flag is part of this, and has lead to us developing the emotional responses to that flag that have been described on this thread.

Honestly, I think it’s great that this is not your experience as well. Brilliant. No one is denying that you feel what you feel and you’ve experienced what you’ve experienced (although I will ask you to clarify what you mean when you make blanket statements such as the above - it’s up to you if you wish people reading this to more fully understand your position or not). So, please stop denying other women’s experiences, just because they’re not your own.

The OP specifically asked people who are same sex attracted to share their experiences and feelings re the rainbow flag. I shared mine and some other lesbians and bisexual women shared theirs. I may not agree with these opinions but I respect them.

I stand my my statement that it's incredibly arrogant of straight women to wade in, dismissing the rainbow flag and what it means, claiming it doesn't represent lesbians and they are sick of the sight of it and telling me my feelings and opinions aren't valid.

No one is saying your opinions are not valid. The problem is that you are suggesting that others should agree with you.

Up to OP to police her own thread.