It has that much color that everybody is attracted to it, we see it on clothing items, souvenirs, in bars, nightclubs, hotels and some other places. On the PRIDE month, brands use it as a sign of loftiness, and it is common to see hundreds of them in marches and PRIDE events, but do you know how it was created, who was responsible and what is the meaning of the LGBT flag?

It was at the end of the 70’s that the “rainbow flag” was used for the first time, as a symbol of gay pride. Gilbert Baker, its creator; a designer and activist born in Kansas, USA.

Baker, who sewed each of the colored fabrics by hand, was inspired by the song Over the rainbow, from the famous film The Wizard of Oz, starring by the beautiful Judy Garland. In the beginning, it was made from eight colors, each one with a different meaning. The pink color represented sexuality, red color represented life and the orange was about health. From those, followed the yellow color, representing the sun light, the green as symbol of nature. And turquoise color was allusive to magic or art, blue color represented serenity and purple was about the spirit.

The flag, which at the beginning was named as the “Freedom flag”, was waved for the first time on June 25th, 1978 by Baker himself and a group of thirty people in San Francisco, California, U.S. The artist and also former soldier, who died in March of this year, repeatedly declared that he had set out to create a symbol that was an icon of his community, a beacon of hope and freedom to face the pink triangle, with which the nazis identified the LGBT community, And he made it!

With the death of the activist and member of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, Harvey Milk; the protests became bigger and the demand for the new gay icon increased. It had such acceptance that it started to be sold everywhere, but there was a problem, the turquoise color was hard to manufacture, so by the first year it was left out. The same happened to color pink months after.

Currently, the flag is composed by six colors, with which the LGBT community identifies and fights for their rights, proudly carrying them each time they feel the need to show others their identity.

Photo: muyinteresante.es