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" In 1978, when I thought of creating a flag for the gay movement, there was no other international symbol for us than the pink triangle, which the Nazis used to identify homosexuals in concentration camps. Even though the pink triangle was and still is a powerful symbol, it was very much forced upon us. "

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" The rainbow is a part of nature, and you have to be in the right place to see it. It's beautiful, all of the colors, even the colors you can't see. That really fit us as a people because we are all of the colors. Our sexuality is all of the colors. We are all the genders, races, and ages. "

Gilbert Baker

You

Beautiful

Colors

" In 1978, the first flag was organic everything. It did have eight colors: the six colors of the rainbow we see today plus hot pink and turquoise. But pretty quickly on I realized that I would never be able to satisfy the demand for them by hand-dying fabric and these colors. "

" Anita Bryant is an important figure in gay history because she enraged a generation of people who got active. "

" That's really how I ended up making the first flag - I was the guy who could sew it. "

Gilbert Baker

Making

Who

" The rainbow flag is beautiful because it's about love. The Confederate flag is ugly because it's about hate. It's pretty simple from the art level: beautiful versus ugly. "

" When I was young, they thought I was from outer space. I was the only gay person they probably knew, and they struggled with that. Everybody knew I was gay. They just didn't want to talk about it. "

" Our job as gay people was to come out, to be visible - to live in the truth, as I say - to get out of the lie. "

" We needed something to express our joy, our beauty, our power. And the rainbow did that. "

" The rainbow flag is a symbol of freedom and liberation that we made for ourselves. "

" What the rainbow has given our people is a thing that connects us. "

Gilbert Baker

Rainbow

People

" I was afraid my family would lock me up and give me electroshock. I was a screaming queen. "

Gilbert Baker

Family

Queen

" I came out because I fell in love. It wasn't a terrible, horrible, damn thing. I was in love with somebody, and I wanted to scream it from the rooftops. "

" A true flag is not something you can really design. A true flag is torn from the soul of the people. A flag is something that everyone owns, and that's why they work. The Rainbow Flag is like other flags in that sense: it belongs to the people. "

" Vexillography is a very big word! Vexillography is really the high science and art and understanding of flags and their history - the academic word for flag making and heraldry. "

" I decided that we should have a flag, that a flag fit us as a symbol, that we are a people, a tribe if you will. And flags are about proclaiming power, so it's very appropriate. "

" Flags say something. You put a rainbow flag on your windshield, and you're saying something. "

" I think the Rainbow Flag will survive forever, primarily because it's the perfect flag, regardless of whatever political meaning it may have or evolve to. "

" You don't have to live a lie. Living a lie will mess you up. It will send you into depression. It will warp your values. "

" I love going to cities around the world and seeing the rainbow flag, knowing that it's a safe place where I can be myself. "

" I was astounded nobody had thought of making a rainbow flag before because it seemed like such an obvious symbol for us. "

" Anita Bryant had the effect of galvanizing the whole gay movement. She was somebody whom everybody could hate. She was easy to hate. "

" Flags are about proclaiming power... that visibility is key to our success and to our justice. "

" A rainbow is something in the sky, so a rainbow flag fits. "

" Harvey Milk was a friend of mine, an important gay leader in San Francisco in the '70s, and he carried a really important message about how important it was to be visible, how important it was to come out, and that was the single most important thing we had to do. "