Manhattan, Kansas, held its pride celebration on April 20.
I recorded this year’s Little Apple Pride Parade.
Manhattan, New York, is known as the Big Apple.
Manhattan, Kansas, is known as the Little Apple.
I observed
signs with the following messages in my video of the parade.
-
Real Men
Wear Hello Kitty (1:50)
-
Queer Jew
for a Free Palestine! (2:24)
-
Jesus didn’t
reject people. Neither do we. (3:23)
I took photos of Aggieville, a business district along the parade route, before and after the parade.
Here's the outfit I wore to the pride celebration.
I purchased a shirt with a rainbow phoenix from Second Wind, a worker-owned company that publishes video game reviews.
The shirt works quite well as a pride outfit.
I wore a button with a transgender symbol in the colors of the trans flag. I also wore a button of a dragon nestling a heart in the colors of the genderfluid flag.
I wrote an article about my LGBT button collection earlier this year.
I painted my nails dark blue for the celebration.
Pride Flags
Many colorful pride flags were displayed during the Little Apple Pride Parade.
Here are the flags I noticed, along with a brief description of the identities they represent.
As always, it’s worth bearing in mind that not everyone defines these terms in the same way.
But pride celebrations create a wonderful opportunity to spread awareness about different LGBT identities.
Let’s begin with the rainbow flag and its descendants.
Rainbow
A group of gay activists created the first rainbow flag in 1978.
The flag flew in the San Francisco Gay Freedom Day Parade in June 1978.
Originally, the rainbow pride flag primarily represented gay people, but over the years it has come to represent the LGBT community as a whole.
The Los Angeles Times has published a great article about the creation of the first rainbow flag.
The current six-stripe version of the rainbow flag was adopted in 1979.
Progress Pride
Daniel Quasar, a nonbinary artist and designer, created the Progress Pride Flag in 2018.
Nonbinary refers to someone with a gender identity that isn’t exclusively male or female.
The Progress Pride Flag represents the LGBT community as a whole.
In addition to the stripes from the rainbow flag, Quasar added triangular stripes on the left of the flag to represent certain groups.
The white, pink, and blue stripes represent transgender people. The black and brown stripes represent people of color. The black stripe also represents people living with AIDS, and those who have died from the disease.
According to Quasar, the arrow created by the new stripes symbolizes forward movement, while recognizing that progress still needs to be made.
Intersex Inclusive Progress Pride
The Intersex Inclusive Progress Pride Flag was the first flag that appeared in this year's Little Apple Pride Parade.
Valentino Vecchietti, a British Intersex Activist, designed the Intersex Inclusive Progress Pride Flag in 2021.
Intersex refers to people who have physical traits different than those traditionally considered male or female.
The Intersex Inclusive Progress Pride Flag also represents the LGBT community as a whole.
The design adds symbols from the Intersex flag to the Progress Pride Flag.
Specifically, the flag adds a purple circle and yellow triangle to the base of the triangular stripes on the left of the Progress Pride Flag.
Vercchietti founded “Intersex Equality Rights,” an organization that advocates for the rights of Intersex people in the UK.
I discussed the history of the Intersex flag, which was created in 2013, in an earlier article for Meticulous Musings.
Powercat Rainbow
The Powercat Rainbow flag was the final flag in this year's Little Apple Pride Parade.
The powercat is a symbol of Kansas State University, whose main campus is located in Manhattan, Kansas.
This flag represents pride in both K-State and the LGBT community.
The Powercat Rainbow Flag also appeared in last year’s Little Apple Pride Parade.
Next, let’s take a look at the flags that appeared in this year's Little Apple Pride Parade that represent specific LGBT identities.
Bisexual
Someone who is attracted to men and women.
Although, to be clear, bisexual people can be attracted to nonbinary people as well.
Pansexual
Someone who is attracted to men, women, and nonbinary people.
For all intents and purposes, bisexual and pansexual are synonyms.
Some people just prefer one term over the other.
Transgender
Someone whose gender identity is different than the gender they were assigned at birth.
Lesbian
A woman who is attracted to women.
Bisexual women sometimes describe themselves as lesbians.
Trans women who are attracted to women often identify as lesbians.
Nonbinary people, who are attracted to women, sometimes identify as lesbians as well.
Asexual
Someone who experiences little to no sexual attraction.
Nonbinary
Someone with a gender identity that isn’t exclusively male or female.
Genderfluid
Someone whose gender identity or expression changes over time.
I discussed these identities, and their flags, in two in-depth articles on Meticulous Musings, Sexual and Romantic Orientations and Gender Identity and Biological Sex.
These articles were part of the first season of LGBT by the Numbers.
I noticed three flags representing identities I haven’t yet discussed on Meticulous Musings: demigirl, demiboy, and two-spirit.
Demigirl
Someone who is partially female.
This identity can be most easily understood by imagining a continuous line with male on one end and female on the other.
Some nonbinary people identify with the midpoint between male and female.
Demigirl would be halfway between female and the midpoint on this spectrum.
Demiboy
Someone who is partially male.
This identity can be most easily understood by imagining a continuous line with male on one end and female on the other.
Some nonbinary people identify with the midpoint between male and female.
Demiboy would be halfway between male and the midpoint on this spectrum.
Salem created the demigirl and demiboy flags on Tumblr in 2014.
Salem, who is agender, created the agender flag on Tumblr in 2014 as well.
The 2024 Little Apple Pride Parade was the first time I have seen the demigirl and demiboy flags in person.
The Gender Census is an annual online survey of people whose identity falls outside the gender binary.
Among other questions, the Gender Census asks respondents whether they identify with various identity terms.
Cassian, who administers the Gender Census, is currently processing the results of the 2024 Gender Census.
Demigirl and demiboy weren’t listed among the checkbox terms available in the 2023 survey.
But they did appear in the 2022 survey.
In 2022, 7.7% of respondents identified as demigirls, and 7.5% of respondents identified as demiboys.
Neither of these terms were among the top 20 identity words chosen by respondents that year.
I discussed the results of the 2023 Gender Census on Meticulous Musings.
Two Spirit
A Native American who is LGBT.
The term Two-Spirit was created in 1990 during the Third Annual American Indian Gay and Lesbian Conference in Winnipeg, Canada.
The term was adopted in part to replace a word used by anthropologists to describe LGBT Native Americans that was widely considered offensive due to its history and origin.
Two-Spirit Native Americans might also use an identity term from their tribal language to describe their sexual or gender identity as well.
Flags for Sale
A vendor at the Little Apple Pride Festival sold pride merchandise, including pride flags.
I noticed two interesting flags for sale.
One featured a snake with the slogan, “Don’t Tread on Me,” set against the backdrop of the rainbow flag.
Another rainbow flag featured an eagle sitting on a cactus devouring a snake, which is a symbol found on the Mexican flag.
After the parade, several confident and energetic drag performers put on a show at Wefald Pavilion in City Park.
You can learn more about upcoming pride events by following Little Apple Pride on Instagram.
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