Leather Pride flag
Encyclopedia
Leather subculture
The leather subculture denotes practices and styles of dress organized around sexual activities. Wearing leather garments is one way that participants in this culture self-consciously distinguish themselves from mainstream sexual cultures...
since the 1990s. It was designed by Tony DeBlase in 1989, and was quickly embraced by the gay Leather community. It has since become associated with Leather in general and also with related groups.
History
International Mister Leather
International Mister Leather is an international conference and contest of leathermen held annually in May since 1979 in Chicago, Illinois....
event in Chicago, Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
, U.S.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
on May 28, 1989.
Initial reaction to the flag was mixed. According to DeBlase's article A Leather Pride Flag,
"Some, particularly on the east coast, reacted positively to the concept, but were quite concerned, some even offended, that I had not involved the community in helping to create the design."
The original flag is on display at the Leather Archives and Museum
Leather Archives and Museum
The Leather Archives & Museum , based in the Rogers Park neighborhood of Chicago, USA, has much information and details on the beginning of the leather subculture and BDSM community...
.
Design
Creator DeBlase gave this explanation of the design:
"The flag is composed of nine horizontal stripes of equal width. From the top and from the bottom, the stripes alternate black and royal blueRoyal blueRoyal blue describes both a bright shade and a dark shade of azure blue. It is said to have been invented by millers in Rode, Somerset, a consortium of which won a competition to make a dress for the British queen, Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz....
. The central stripe is white. In the upper left quadrant of the flag is a large red heartHeart (symbol)The heart has long been used as a symbol to refer to the spiritual, emotional, moral, and in the past, also intellectual core of a human being...
. I will leave it to the viewer to interpret the colors and symbols."
Popularity
Although the flag is common in the gayGay
Gay is a word that refers to a homosexual person, especially a homosexual male. For homosexual women the specific term is "lesbian"....
leather community, it is not an exclusively gay symbol and represents the entire leather community.
Furthermore, while designed as a symbol for the Leather subculture
Leather subculture
The leather subculture denotes practices and styles of dress organized around sexual activities. Wearing leather garments is one way that participants in this culture self-consciously distinguish themselves from mainstream sexual cultures...
, it is also widely
used within the BDSM
BDSM
BDSM is an erotic preference and a form of sexual expression involving the consensual use of restraint, intense sensory stimulation, and fantasy power role-play. The compound acronym BDSM is derived from the terms bondage and discipline , dominance and submission , and sadism and masochism...
(bondage, discipline, dominance and submission, sadism and masochism) subculture.
Variations
Although DeBlase is quoted as saying the design is copyrighted in the U.S. (as well as all countries where the Berne ConventionBerne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works
The Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, usually known as the Berne Convention, is an international agreement governing copyright, which was first accepted in Berne, Switzerland in 1886.- Content :...
standards apply), copyright is automatic, and need not be obtained through official registration with any government office. Once an idea has been produced as a tangible form, for example by securing it in a fixed medium (such as a drawing, sheet music, photograph, a videotape, or a computer file), the copyright holder is entitled to enforce his or her exclusive rights.
Various groups have adapted the design and sold it commercially.
See also
- Leather subcultureLeather subcultureThe leather subculture denotes practices and styles of dress organized around sexual activities. Wearing leather garments is one way that participants in this culture self-consciously distinguish themselves from mainstream sexual cultures...
- Rainbow flag
- Bisexual pride flagBisexual pride flagThe bisexual pride flag was designed by Michael Page in 1998 in order to give the bisexual community its own symbol comparable to the Gay pride flag of the larger LGBT community...
- Rubber pride flagRubber pride flagThe rubber pride flag, also known as the latex pride flag is a symbol used by members of the rubber and latex fetish community. It was designed in 1994 by Peter Tolos and Scott Moats...
- Folsom Street FairFolsom Street FairThe Folsom Street Fair is an annual BDSM and leather subculture street fair held on the last Sunday in September and caps San Francisco's "Leather Pride Week"...
- The Triskelion