Rainbow bags, badges. laces, tops and dresses. I have seen them all today walking down the high street in Exeter.
Have you ever felt like going up to the person you see with a rainbow t'shirt on and asking.....do you know the heritage of those colours.....do you have any idea what the importance of those six colours are? No!
Back to the Rainbow.
The original gay-pride flag was hand-dyed by Baker. It flew in the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade on June 25, 1978. (However, it was by no means the first time that spectrum or rainbow colors had been associated with gay and lesbian peoples.) The flag consisted of eight stripes; Baker assigned specific meaning to each of the colours as follows:
hot pink - sexuality
red - life
orange - healing
yellow - sunlight
green - nature
turquoise - magic
blue - serenity
violet - spirit
Today many LGBT individuals and supporters of gay rights often put rainbow flags in the front of their yards and/or front doors, or use rainbow bumper stickers on their vehicles to use as an outward symbol of their homosexuality or support.
I have friends who live at 'Rainbows end', friends with rainbow flags flying off the top of their house, friends with rainbow tatoos and others who blow their rainbow laced whistle once a year in support of pride days.
We have so much more to say about the rainbow flag.
Civil partnership leaflets with rainbow flags in registra's offices.
On the windows of hotels and bed and breakfasts.
Replaced weekly on age concern windows (who is the person who removes them every week?)
In flourist windows
On the spine of books.
Rainbow luggage straps, rainbow hair slides, rainbow teedy bears, rainbow phone covers, rainbow jewellery, rainbow pens and paper..................
This symbol has travelled across the world, it has been a method of knowing a place or person is likely to be accepting and safe.
It is also a fashion item.
Our gay apparel.
Wednesday 29 August 2007
Lesbian people; History
According to Julienne Bourge, the historian from Gaul (as written in Monique Wittig's Book Lesbian Peoples), " the lesbian peoples who began our history - if this history had a beginning - were gathering fruit from trees, hunting, raising their infants together and moving in small groups all over the earth, which at the time was a garden. they were called the amazons and they created harmony on earth.
Harmony was easy as their world was gentle and good to live in. Work, suffering, death did not yet exist in the garden. They loved one another, it is said it was a Golden Age.
One day an amazon thought of building a place to return to or everyone to live in. This was a good enough idea and the start of cities.
some amazons carried on walking and traveling, enjoying the diversity of places they wandered through. they did not want to settle. They said that an established amazon was no longer free. Others constructed larger and larger cities without defensive ramparts.
" in the beginning of this new state of things all went well. Wanderers stopped from time to time in large and small cities to greet amazons who lived there. They brought news. They served as a connection between cities as much as they could."
Slowly the city amazons changed and didn't want to leave the cities. They stopped taking part in violent physical activity.
The wanderers became less welcome. They city dwellers became less interested in other city news they had their own problems. Retreating behind their walls they were struck by wonder at the physiological processes, childbearing. they stopped calling themselves amazons and called themselves Mothers. They developed a 'new' culture in which they became fascinated by myths and germination and earth and trees. Mothers began to make representations of themselves in mud and stone or on flat surfaces with pigments and colour.
This brought about the procession of pregnant goddesses that history has know.
representations of the mothers were fascinating to the people and they made many many more.
Although the amazons at times became pregnant they did not want to go along with the mothers. At that time they were banned from the cities. At that time the most contemptuous term used to describe someone in the cities was amazon. They were considered those who did not have children.
The amazons began their wars.
The mothers became goddesses who demanded sacrifice.
Confined to the cities mothers were no longer free, complete individuals. They merged into a collective with collective ideas and aspirations.
The unhappy situation between amazons and mothers ended The Golden Age.
The Silver Age that followed had its happy times. Mothers threw great celebrations on festive occasion.
The amazons banned from the mothers cities built cities of their own.
The garden on earth became less fruitful and the mothers developed ways of turning over the soil and planting crops. The experimented with soil and discovered some soil was good from food, other soil good for baking into pots. The saw that plants could have beneficial effects on health and well being. They discovered that some plants could be spun and learned to make different items with this thread. They perfected the raising of silk worms, they chose hair and wool instead of animal skins for clothes. They decorated their homes with carpets and blankets and tapestries. The mothers domesticated animals for food and milk after watching ants milking greenfly in order to collect their nectar.
The amazons during The Silver Age passed through great areas, they also built empires. Being huntresses and riders they kept their weapons and became the violent ones. They did not plant or domesticate cattle, they domesticated mares instead. Forging was important to them for weapons, fabricating bricks from clay for their preposses. They mainly used animal skins and leather for clothing and decorating their homes. They carried on making music and invented numerous instruments. they ate their food raw and slept when they wanted in the open or under tents.
The amazons were good at attack, they developed many weapons, bow and arrow, spear, double axe, shield. They made instruments from leather and wood to fire stones at the walls of their enemy.
During The Silver Age language changed. The amazons who had been a link between mother cities stopped and language became modified. The mothers called this new language 'the slow language'. The amazons uninterested in modification kept their old language of letters and numbers. When communication between the mothers and the amazons started again, it was hard work for both to understand each other.
During the following ages, mother who had not the skill of warfare and less exercised lost on a large scale. The amazons scattered all over and fighting till the death rather than being enslaved by the mothers died out.
" after their total disappearance there is nothing more to add except for the final defeat and enslavement of the mothers which led to the last and chaotic period before The Glorious Age. The courage of the rebels who never bore with much patience the name 'woman' has survived.
Monique Wittig and Sande Zeig: Lesbian people Materials for a dictionary
Harmony was easy as their world was gentle and good to live in. Work, suffering, death did not yet exist in the garden. They loved one another, it is said it was a Golden Age.
One day an amazon thought of building a place to return to or everyone to live in. This was a good enough idea and the start of cities.
some amazons carried on walking and traveling, enjoying the diversity of places they wandered through. they did not want to settle. They said that an established amazon was no longer free. Others constructed larger and larger cities without defensive ramparts.
" in the beginning of this new state of things all went well. Wanderers stopped from time to time in large and small cities to greet amazons who lived there. They brought news. They served as a connection between cities as much as they could."
Slowly the city amazons changed and didn't want to leave the cities. They stopped taking part in violent physical activity.
The wanderers became less welcome. They city dwellers became less interested in other city news they had their own problems. Retreating behind their walls they were struck by wonder at the physiological processes, childbearing. they stopped calling themselves amazons and called themselves Mothers. They developed a 'new' culture in which they became fascinated by myths and germination and earth and trees. Mothers began to make representations of themselves in mud and stone or on flat surfaces with pigments and colour.
This brought about the procession of pregnant goddesses that history has know.
representations of the mothers were fascinating to the people and they made many many more.
Although the amazons at times became pregnant they did not want to go along with the mothers. At that time they were banned from the cities. At that time the most contemptuous term used to describe someone in the cities was amazon. They were considered those who did not have children.
The amazons began their wars.
The mothers became goddesses who demanded sacrifice.
Confined to the cities mothers were no longer free, complete individuals. They merged into a collective with collective ideas and aspirations.
The unhappy situation between amazons and mothers ended The Golden Age.
The Silver Age that followed had its happy times. Mothers threw great celebrations on festive occasion.
The amazons banned from the mothers cities built cities of their own.
The garden on earth became less fruitful and the mothers developed ways of turning over the soil and planting crops. The experimented with soil and discovered some soil was good from food, other soil good for baking into pots. The saw that plants could have beneficial effects on health and well being. They discovered that some plants could be spun and learned to make different items with this thread. They perfected the raising of silk worms, they chose hair and wool instead of animal skins for clothes. They decorated their homes with carpets and blankets and tapestries. The mothers domesticated animals for food and milk after watching ants milking greenfly in order to collect their nectar.
The amazons during The Silver Age passed through great areas, they also built empires. Being huntresses and riders they kept their weapons and became the violent ones. They did not plant or domesticate cattle, they domesticated mares instead. Forging was important to them for weapons, fabricating bricks from clay for their preposses. They mainly used animal skins and leather for clothing and decorating their homes. They carried on making music and invented numerous instruments. they ate their food raw and slept when they wanted in the open or under tents.
The amazons were good at attack, they developed many weapons, bow and arrow, spear, double axe, shield. They made instruments from leather and wood to fire stones at the walls of their enemy.
During The Silver Age language changed. The amazons who had been a link between mother cities stopped and language became modified. The mothers called this new language 'the slow language'. The amazons uninterested in modification kept their old language of letters and numbers. When communication between the mothers and the amazons started again, it was hard work for both to understand each other.
During the following ages, mother who had not the skill of warfare and less exercised lost on a large scale. The amazons scattered all over and fighting till the death rather than being enslaved by the mothers died out.
" after their total disappearance there is nothing more to add except for the final defeat and enslavement of the mothers which led to the last and chaotic period before The Glorious Age. The courage of the rebels who never bore with much patience the name 'woman' has survived.
Monique Wittig and Sande Zeig: Lesbian people Materials for a dictionary
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