Okay so I âmadeâ a new gender apathetic/apagender flag because the one I found/we have was just kinda lacking for me?? Like itâs okay and I donât dislike it, but I thought it needed something
So the current one, according to gender fandom wiki or whatever (https://gender.fandom.com/wiki/Gender_Apathetic), is by @pridearchive (idk why I canât tag them but I also just donât understand tumblr so oh well)
But anyway, Iâm not a huge fan of the fact that a lot of the definition relies upon the usage of the word âlazyâ a lot, because like, while itâs true that laziness and apathy are similar, they are not the same. I was confused for MONTHS as to why everyone around me cared so much about their gender, both cis and trans people, and I just didnât. Like, I thought my dad might understand cause we talk about queer stuff all the time and he was like â???⌠but I am a man, thatâs just a fact⌠are you saying thereâs people who donât care??â And that confused me more cause I was like âwait even cis people care that much about their gender expression??â Because for me, I thought that trans people really cared about their gender identity and expression because of the dysphoria they dealt with from being born as the opposite sex. So, to hear that cis people also have a strong sense of gender and really care about the way they present and are perceived threw me for a loop.
So I went down this rabbit hole for, as stated previously, MONTHS, just trying to figure out if anyone felt the way I did because I felt fucking crazy. No one else spoke about not caring about their gender identity, not caring if someone called them a guy or a girl or something in between. I found labels like Aporagender (âa gender identity that is neither masculine, feminine or inbetween the two but nonetheless involves a strong sense of gender; a term similar to maverique.â - https://en.pronouns.page/dictionary/terminology#aporagender) and genderfluid (âa gender that varies, or changes over time.â - https://gender.fandom.com/wiki/Genderfluid) and bigender (âa gender identity which can be literally translated as 'two genders' or 'double gender'.â - https://gender.fandom.com/wiki/Bigender) but none of them felt right, even if I liked their flags.
But then, out of frustration, I decided to google âwhat is it called when you donât care about your genderâ and gender apathetic popped up. And I read the description and I felt so⌠understood. I felt like, no matter how small the group was, I had finally found people who understood me and felt the way I did. And then, because Iâm annoying and visual, I saw the flag⌠and I was just⌠feeling very⌠ehhhâŚ
Like, the brown, purple/lavender/light blue, white, and gray on their own arenât inherently bad, but something about it just felt bland and⌠nothing like the sense of relief I felt when discovering I wasnât alone.
And then I clicked through onto the post about the meanings of each color and began to like it even less
But, I pushed forward, ignoring my dislike of the color arrangement and meanings behind them and sharing my newfound label/identity and flag with my friends. I finally felt like I had something I understood.
That is, until one night when I got bored. And I started searching for flag makers to see what was out there. I came across a Reddit post about a custom flag builder (https://www.reddit.com/r/lgbt/comments/ooz3tb/custom_pride_flag_builder/) which lead me to Team Ultimaâs custom pride flag maker: https://www.teamultima.org/flag/
Needless to say, as an artist and someone whoâs nitpicky about colors and designs, I was stoked to find something that allowed so much creative control! After messing around with it for a bit, I made this:
Now, I know itâs not really that different from the current flag. But, to me, this feels a lot more balanced and cohesive. With the one by pridearchive, the âlight blue,â which we all know is just lavender tbh, was the only color that had a bright saturation besides the white. Our eyes are naturally drawn to it and this does not allow our eyes to flow along the flag and take it all in. We kinda see the purple and get stuck there. Not only that, because we expect white to be in the middle of pride flags (as well as Im sure a lot of other color theory reasons that Iâm not knowledgeable enough to know of or explain), the flag felt top heavy and uneven, with no equivalent saturated color along the bottom. The flag was lacking horizontal symmetry and I think/hope I did a good job of bringing it to this flag without it feeling like itâs too much or too little.
With all that being said here are my/the new and improved color meanings:
Brown - The natural human desire to find a sense of belonging and community, even if said community is formed around having a label for not caring about labels. It can also represent the warmth and security felt by having a label that represents how you truly feel.
Light Blue - A feeling of tranquility and peace towards oneâs gender identity and expression
White - The limitless void of possibilities in which one can express themselves
Lavender - The mixture of all genders, feminine, masculine, neither, and everything in between
Gray - Lack of gender stagnation, not caring if oneâs gender presentation is not as simple as black or white
Anyway, Iâve never posted anything like this before so⌠lemme know if Iâm totally doing it wrong and all my color meanings are terrible and way off base or whatever. Iâm gonna make a separate post of just the flag and the color meanings and whatever so that people donât have to read all my dumb backstory to get to the actual âredesignâ đ đ
