"Just look at all that pink and purple!"
"Our money sure is gay."
"Our money sure is gay."
The LGBTQ+ rainbow flag was created in 1978 as a symbol of queer pride. Since then, it's become a recognizable symbol of the LGBTQ+ community, and several other flags (such as the Orange, white, and pink lesbian flag; the pink, purple, and blue bisexual flag; the blue, pink, and white transgender flag; the black, grey, white, and purple asexual flag, and several others) have followed in representing the specific communities in the non-heterosexual continuum. Historically, pink and lavender have also been used as queer color symbols.
In fiction, a queer character will often be associated with their pride flag colors to emphasize their sexuality or gender identity. These colors can show up in their physical appearance or outfits (which often shows they are proud to be themselves) or in more subtle cues like cinematography, lighting, or a specific Color Wash. For example, the trend of "bisexual lighting," where bi characters are lit with blue, purple, and pink, arose in The New '10s. This can be a meaningful way to express LGBT+ pride.
Compare Queer Flowers, when different flower species are used to symbolize queer love, and Rainbow Motif.
Compare Alternate Rainbow, when queer colors are incorporated into a stylized rainbow.
Note: Please limit examples to characters confirmed in the story or by Word of Gay to be queer.
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- Wonder Egg Priority: In episode 10, Momoe must protect Kaoru, who the audience is led to believe to be a girl. But as the two talk, Kaoru eventually admits to being a boy "on the inside." Notably, Kaoru wears a light blue jacket with white and light pink stripes. He's also introduced standing in front of an ad with the same color scheme.
- Go For It, Nakamura!: In the anime adaptation, there's a shot of Nakamura, a closeted gay teenager, in front of a gradient background
colored like the gay man flag.
- Zombie Land Saga: When Lily reveals that she's transgender to Sakura, the latter is wearing a skirt that's got light blue, pink, and white stripes◊, the colors of the Trans Pride Flag. In the fifth episode of Revenge, she wears an outfit that incorporates the colors of pink, white and teal. Her bow◊ in particular is striped pink/white/pink and her teal hair makes it look similar to the transgender flag.
Comic Books
- DC Pride: The logo is a "DC PRIDE" written on a progress pride flag, and cover of nearly every issue has prominent rainbow imagery. The issue where Connor Hawke comes out as asexual also has an asexual pride flag on the cover. In one issue, John Constantine wears a tie with a bisexual flag pattern, and other pride flags appear throughout the comics as well.
- Galaxy: The Prettiest Star: Taylor "Galaxy" Barzelay, a trans woman, is shown wearing a t-shirt with the trans pride flag on the cover art.
- How to Be Ace: In Chapter 3, Rebecca starts wearing a black jacket and pants along with a purple-and-white shirt and shoes, the colors of the ace flag. This "true self" is compared to the version of what Rebecca believes society expects them to be — a Hard-Drinking Party Girl in bright clothes.
- Runaways (Rainbow Rowell):
- In the issue where Nico Minoru officially comes out as bisexual, the cover shows her profile framed in blues, pinks, and purples.
- During her brief career as a freelance superhero, Karolina's costume consists of a white, pink, and magenta bodysuit, with the colors arranged in the style of the lesbian pride flag.
- Throughout issue #11, as Gert deals with her discomfort with how openly gay everyone seems to be since her resurrection, the colors pink, purple, and magenta keep appearing in greater and greater quantities, including on people on the street (some of whom are queer-coded), in Molly's room at the hostel, and throughout Klara's foster dads' house (especially her bedroom and her clothes.) The same issue has Gert dying her signature purple hair back to its natural brown color.
- In the issue where Nico Minoru officially comes out as bisexual, the cover
- In Issue #61 of Sonic the Hedgehog (IDW), one panel shows Tangle the Lemur and Whisper the Wolf holding hands against a background colored near-identically to the 2018-present lesbian flag. Both characters are implied to be gay and many creatives, including longtime head writer Ian Flynn, support this idea. Due to Sega's mandates against romance, however, they're currently Just Friends, not an Official Couple.
- Top 10: Jackie "Phantom" Kowalski's costume is black, purple, and white, and has an upside-down triangle emblem that makes it vaguely reminiscent of the "labrys flag" used by lesbians in the late nineties, when the series was written.
Fan Works
- Angel of the Bat: Cassandra Cain’s revised superhero costume after she takes on the Angel of the Bat title is mostly black and white, but bears a yellow bat symbol and a thin strip of purple around the collar. In the third story, Cassandra’s girlfriend mentions, after mistakenly thinking that she was bi or pansexual, that she's probably demisexual, and the black and white with a purple stripe of her uniform is already extremely close to the demisexual flag's design.
- Burning Bridges, Building Confidence: Cole is a lesbian and has a bracelet in the colors of the lesbian pride flag.
- Codex Equus: Moon Ray Vaughoof's poncho and royal cloak(s) bear the colors of black, white, purple, and gray, which make up the asexual pride flag. Various entries and drabbles explicitly describe him as asexual, but in his case, he sees sex as a way to express love for his beloved wife, Velvet Heart.
- Elementals of Harmony: Sideboard of Harmony: "Ave Discordia", Rainbow Dash, who has rainbow hair, is called the "The ambiguously gay wonder" by Discord.
- Everyday Craziness in Pontypandy:
- Gabby, a prominent lesbian character, wears a sweatshirt with pink and orange stripes, which are the colours of the lesbian flag.
- In "The Pontypandy Pride Protest", Dr. Moumin wears a blue, purple, and magenta scarf, which are the colours of the bisexual flag. This serves as her Queer Establishing Moment.
- In "A Merry Pontypandy Christmas", Krystyna weaves a wreath using pink, yellow, and blue tinsel, which are the colours of the pansexual flag.
- Guys Being Dudes: Candela has a pin of the Team Valor emblem in the bisexual flag colors.
- he sees your dreams: When Stefanie and Denise are dancing together, the lights around them are pink and orange, the colours on the lesbian flag. The tags on this fic state that the two are indeed lesbians.
- HSETAU: In the first panel of this page, Nepeta and Equius are holding asexual and pansexual pride flags respectively.
- Infinity Train: Seeker of Crocus:
- A passenger in the Palimpsest Car is named Tres who wears a heart-shaped earring and bracelet colored cyan, pink, and white, which are the colors of the transgender flag. Asher confirms that Tres is a trans man just by having a look at him.
- Specter is confirmed demiromantic — someone who can't have a romantic relationship unless they have an emotional bond with someone — with the colors of the flag being black (his leather jacket), white (blouse and pants), grey (his hair) and dark green (his number)
- In the sidestory Infinity Train: Orchid Observer, Colette's main colors are pink and blue, along with her weapon being a purple pen that turns into a rapier/pistol. She reveals that she's "bi-curious", as she openly states that she has Ship Tease with her male partner but also admits she's trying to understand her feelings for her gal pal Regina.
- Ma Fille: In "Roses and Clovers", Li Wei ices some baked goods with blue, pink, and white icing (the colours of the trans flag) for a mother who wants to celebrate with her recently-out-of-the-closet son.
- Pokémon Untamed: Papellaude's shiny coloration is the yellow, white, black, and purple of the nonbinary pride flag, to reflect how all Mazian Burmies evolve into a single "androgynous" evolution, with a roughly Mothim-like form but Wormadam's long snout and a small remnant of their cocoon worn as a poncho, instead of two distinct male and female forms.
- The Sunjackers: Candy Chip has a coat and hair in pastel pink and blue which, along with white, are the colors of the transgender pride flag. Candy is confirmed in-story to be a trans woman (or rather trans mare).
- Total Drama Do Over: When Giselle reveals that Harrison is bisexual, she throws blue, purple, and pink confetti into the air.
- We Are All Pokémon Trainers: Chiyo, a pansexual School escapee, is capable of generating a rainbow Aura.
- With Pearl and Ruby Glowing: The sub-collection "Stories About the Closet of Colours" invokes this — every installment is based around the experiences of LGBTQ+ individuals and each chapter is named after a color, such as the first installment being called "Stories About Vexillum Iris" — "Vexillum Iris" literally meaning "Rainbow Flag".
Film — Animated
- The Mitchells vs. the Machines: Katie Mitchell can be seen wearing a rainbow-colored button on her jacket; she is thus confirmed to be a lesbian at the end of the movie.
- Trolls Band Together: Boom from Kismet has rainbow hair and is voiced by Lance Bass.
- Turning Red: Priya dances with another girl during a birthday party, and the shot is saturated in pink, blue, and purple lighting. This was confirmed after release to have been a queer moment by a member of Pixar’s Cultural Trust.
Film — Live-Action
- Prior to the main storyline in Atomic Blonde, Cold War-era spy Lorraine Broughton had a relationship with fellow agent James Gascoine. Her scenes with French agent Delphine Lasalle in an East Berlin restaurant have heavily saturated pink, purple, and blue lighting, and they have a whirlwind affair. These are used as the colors of the bisexual pride flag. Lorraine's bisexual, judging by this.
- One film poster for Bohemian Rhapsody depicts Freddie Mercury — whose bisexuality is a major plot point in the film — awash in blue, pink, and purple lighting.
- Crazy Rich Asians: Oliver, a campy member of a stuffy Old Money family, confirms to Rachel that he is gay by saying he's the "rainbow sheep" of the clan.
- The Hobbit: When asked about the sexuality of Gandalf the Grey, his actor Ian McKellen said that the character seems asexual to him. The color grey is on the asexual flag, and there's even a specific identity on the asexual spectrum referred to as "grey asexuality."
- I Saw the TV Glow: The film has persistent motifs of glowing pink, white, and blue lights, from the blue static inside Owen and his TV, the glowing pink of Tara and Isabel's tattoos, to the pink title text. Color filters that give strong blue and pink washes are also used throughout, and give the chalk art in Owen's neighborhood the appearance of neon pink, blue, or white depending on the lighting. These three colors are also used exclusively, along with black, in all the promotional posters. Blue, pink, and white are the colors of the trans flag, and Owen is heavily implied in-story (and confirmed by the film's director) to be trans.
- Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: In a couple of early scenes, Ramona wears a purple sweater with horizontal blue and pink stripes reminiscent of the bi flag, foreshadowing a later reveal that she's had relationships with women as well as men.
Literature
- The cover art of "Dreadnought", the first book in the Nemesis Series, a series about a trans girl who becomes a superhero, features a silhouette of the protagonist against a sunset with the pink, white, and blue of the trans pride flag.
- In In My Daddy's Belly, Daddy L, a trans man, receives a seahorse plushie with the colors of the trans flag for his baby shower. Also, one of his friends wears a rainbow bowtie, while Daddy L's daughter wears rainbow clothes to support her gay parents. Additionally, other pride colors such as the lesbian, bisexual, and Progress Pride flags are shown in the Pride Parade.
- Loveless:
- Sunil wears an ace badge on his suit, which bears the colors of the ace flag.
- Pip is revealed to have a big lesbian pride flag hanging above her bed in the short story Hands Against Our Hearts.
- Discussed in The Martian. When Mark learns that the probe Earth is sending to Mars is named after Iris, the goddess of rainbows, he jokingly refers to it as a "gay probe."
- The title character in Rick has an ace pin on his backpack on the cover art.
- Wild Cards: Minor character The Candle is openly bisexual and has the superhuman power to generate seven kinds of flame, each one a color of the rainbow. He is one of the contestants in the Reality TV show "American Hero". He's a good guy, but is said to have no chance to win in the show, because "America isn't ready for a Hero that is a switch-hitter."
- Wear Your Soul Round Your Neck: The cover shows Thyssa surrounded by grasping hands, in a garish neon version of the trans pride flag. Fittingly, it's a fundamentally transgender story, but also dark and weird.
Live-Action TV
- Black Mirror: San Junipero: Pink, blue, and purple lights are a recurring motif for Kelly. She's bisexual, having been married to a man in her life on earth and now in a relationship with Yorkie.
- Spoofed in The Boys where the marketing department of the lesbian (really bi) superheroine Maeve wants her to wave a rainbow flag as seen in this draft pitched to her. Maeve is not amused.
- Brooklyn Nine-Nine: Captain Holt, who is openly gay, displays his pride through his office accessories. He keeps a small rainbow flag in his desktop pen holder, and his shelves hold a row of six binders that are each one of the rainbow's colors. When one of his detectives, Rosa Diaz, comes out as bisexual, he adds a bi pride flag to the display as well.
- Crazy Ex-Girlfriend: Darryl sings "Gettin' Bi", a song about his bisexuality and dispelling negative bisexual stereotypes. It is sung on a stage with the bi flag as a background and pink, purple, and blue lighting to fit. To a lesser extent, the lighting also associates it with the '80s, as the song is a Musical Pastiche of Huey Lewis and the News.
- Doom Patrol (2019): A non-binary pride flag waves on the flag pole of Danny the Street, a sentient street who is explicitly referred to as non-binary and genderqueer onscreen. It Makes Sense in Context.
- Gotham Knights (2023): "Daddy Issues" features several scenes of Stephanie and Harper being bathed in blue and purple light, which both symbolizes their respective Color Motifs from the comics (Steph is Purple, while Harper is blue) and foreshadows Stephanie realizing that she is gay and in love with Harper. Significantly, they're the colors of the bisexual pride flag (Harper's bi).
- Heartstopper (2022):
- Bi protagonist Nick Nelson prints out an image of the bisexual pride flag and tapes it to his wall after realizing he's bisexual.
- During the main cast's trip to Paris, Darcy wears a button-down with a yellow, white, purple, and black pattern, foreshadowing their coming out as non-binary.
- The non-binary character Felix wears a rainbow sweater.
- Bi musician Sahar has stickers of the bi flag and the rainbow flag on her guitar.
- Interview with the Vampire (2022): In the Season 1 "Tonight" promo, the gay Louis de Pointe du Lac and the bisexual Lestat de Lioncourt are bathed in pink and purple lighting, which are traditionally associated with queerness. These colors emphasize that the series is a Queer Romance with Louis and Lestat as the Official Couple.
- Power Rangers Dino Fury: In season 2, Fern starts wearing purple and she's currently dating the Dino Fury Green Ranger, Izzy.
- Queer Eye (2018): One of the establishing shots of the show has the Fab Five (who are all into men) walking across a rainbow crosswalk in Atlanta.
- Riverdale: Toni and Cheryl are often depicted in bisexual lighting. Toni is bisexual and Cheryl is a lesbian.
- Sense8: Amanita Caplan has dreadlocks in shades of blue, purple, and pink which are the colors of the Bisexual Pride flag. She's bisexual, being in a committed relationship with her girlfriend Nomi but also participates in the psychic orgies which include men.
- Infamously in Supernatural, when Castiel breaks Naomi's mind control, the plain window of her office turns into the colors of the bisexual flag. Soon after, Dean tells Cas "I need you". In the final season, it's revealed that Cas does have feelings for Dean though it's unclear whether or not it's reciprocated.
- Vagrant Queen makes liberal use of pink, blue, and purple lighting around Elida, who is shown as attracted to women (possibly implying that she's bisexual given they're the bi flag colors, though we don't see her interested in any men onscreen-this might have come up if they had a second season).
- Yonderland: Elder Ho-Tan’s a trans woman, and her colour scheme includes shades of pink and white as well as the blue robe of the Council of Elders. During her Queer Establishing Moment, when she uses her wish with the Pipplefruit to change her physical appearance to that of a cisgender woman, the beads in her hair also change from plain silver to the colours of the trans flag.
Magazines
- One article in MAD issue 362 was called "When Other TV Shows Finally Come Out Of The Closet", with one of the shows being parodied was Sesame Street, which had the cast saying that "This episode was brought to you by the letters G, A, and Y, and by the colors pink and lavender".
Music
- Demi Lovato's song "Cool for the Summer", which is about a heavily implied same-sex relationship, employs blue, purple, and pink lighting in a club setting.
- Vinny Marchi has the song "The Lesbian Hunter"note about a woman who hunts lesbians. The cover of the album art has a woman with a sword silhouetted in front of the lesbian flag.
- Janelle Monáe employs pink, purple, and blue lighting in her music video for "Make Me Feel." Monae is queer, and the video shows her flirting with both a man and a woman.
- The cover of Patricia Taxxon's album "Pix and Bit" features a pink mammal and an orange reptile with white flower patterns on their chests, reminiscent of the lesbian flag. Both characters are stated to be female and in love with each other.
- Teniwoha's "Villain" is about a trans youth in unrequited love with someone else who was assigned male at birth. The lyrics contain the words, "the crueler a town, the more beautiful its rainbow."
- Sufjan Stevens' Love Yourself / With My Whole Heart single was released to coincide with Pride 2019 and, along with the lyrics of self-acceptance and the fact that the proceeds were donated to charities supporting LGBTQ youth, the cover text is also rendered in rainbow colors.
- The cover art for blackgaze artist Violet Cold's album Empire of Love is a rainbow flag with a star and crescent superimposed over it. It's meant to represent the artist's experience as a queer person in Azerbaijan (a country whose flag also has the star and crescent motif). The bright colors are all the more striking given that it's a metal album.
- The Stupendium (who is openly nonbinary and pansexual) occasionally features queer colors in their music videos.
- In the video for "Can't Teach This", the Headmaster of Two-Point University boasts that their "Wizard School is big on inclusivity," prompting their magic wand to flash the colors of the trans pride flag.
- In the video for "Shine Through", Stupendium wears a rainbow-colored guitar strap, in reference to the game it's based on having openly LGBT main characters.
- In "Vending Machine of Love", the subtitles for the lyrics "If you're ace, demi, pan, flexible" change to the colors of those identities' pride flags.
- Eminem's song "Houdini", which was released the day before Pride 2024, is a song in which Slim Shady complains about increasing sensitivity around transgender and queer culture compared to his Heteronormative Crusader heyday of the Turn of the Millennium, but the lyrics and visuals indicate the song is sarcastic. Towards the end of the music video, Eminem is surrounded by a newly diverse crowd of Slim Shadies of various genders in a room painted in the stripes of a bisexual flag. The YouTube thumbnail for the video also shows Slim Shady with the pink, blue and white stripes of the transgender flag super-imposed over him.
Pro Wrestling
- Traditionally, a way for wrestlers to get Cheap Heat was to embrace a gay motif with pink and lavender colors and feminine characteristics. As late as the Early 2000's Billy and Chuck wearing pink and having a "commitment ceremony" only to swerve the audience into not being gay was the norm. Since the late 2010's, however, being openly gay (well, at least openly lesbian or female bisexual) is not an automatic heel heat card.
- Flash Forward to the 2020s and Billy Gunn would mentor/manager/trios wrestle with The Acclaimed wearing pink colors, gay antics and slang, and at least one member is openly gay as a faceteam.
- Subversion with the Hart Family: Bret Hart, the Hart Foundation, and younger Hart family members like Natalya Neidhart and The Hart Dynasty wear primariliy pink (and usually some black) as their trademark color on their outfits, posters, and action figures but none of them have ever identified as LGBTQ.
- Piper Nevin (who is openly bisexual in real life), when her character was called Doudrop in the WWE (sometimes used as slang for a woman sexually attracted to other women) would generally wear outfits with bi-flag colors. Since reverting back to Piper Nevin she has rearly worn bi-flag colors (mostly black with dark greens or light blues) but her tag team partner Chelsea Green tends to wear more hot pinks and also wears the pride flag as an ally especially in cities with large openly gay populations or during Pride Month.
Stand-Up Comedy
- Discussed by Demetri Martin:
"I love rainbows, but I'm not gay, so when I wear a rainbow shirt I have to write "Not Gay" on it. But I'm not against gay people, so then I have to put "But Supportive" under that. I just think it's odd one group took refracted light. Pretty greedy, gays!"
Toys
- Monster High:
- The Generation 3 incarnation of Frankie is nonbinary, and a lot of their dolls feature light blue, white, and pink, the colors of the transgender flag.
- In one of the Pride Month comics, we finally get to see the previously unseen Spelldon Cauldronello, and it's revealed that he has streaks in his hair resembling the purple and magenta of the bisexual flag (blue is the only color that's absent). Given that his comic is about him starting up a relationship with Kieran, this is likely not a coincidence.
Video Games
- Angry Birds 2 has a pride-themed microtransaction called "better together" where you can buy several different birds specific pride themed outfits:
- Matilda (the white bird) has an outfit with the colors of the pansexual pride flag. This is consistent with her characterization, as she has a girlfriend in Angry Birds Seasons and a boyfriend in The Angry Birds Movie.
- Jay, Jake, and Jim (the blue birds) have an umbrella with the colors of the bisexual pride flag. In Angry Birds Blues, Jay has a female love interest, Samantha.
- Bomb (the black bird) has an outfit with the colors of the intersex pride flag.
- Hal (the green bird) has an outfit with the colors of the transgender pride flag.
- Melody (the brown bird) has an outfit with the colors of the lesbian pride flag.
- Silver has an outfit with the colors of the non-binary pride flag. Seemingly non-canon, as the character is consistently treated as female and referred to exclusively as "she", although Rovio did make a social media post implying that she's genderfluid.
- Bubbles (the orange bird) has an outfit with the gay male pride flag. In Angry Birds POP, he reenacts the marriage of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle with Silver. It's unclear if they're an actual couple or if Bubbles is a gay man who reenacts celebrity weddings with his platonic female friends.
- Chuck (the yellow bird) is the most paradoxical of them all. Previously, Chuck was characterized as Ambiguously Bi. In Angry Birds Toons, he acts as The Tease, tauntingly kissing bomb on the lips at one point, and in another episode, he goes on a date with a rock in lipstick and a wig. In The Angry Birds Movie, he has a man-crush on the Mighty Eagle, and he expresses attraction to female birds. However, Rovio made a social media post[1] implying he's an ally. In the game, he waves an asexual pride flag.
- In Borderlands 3, one of the vault hunters is FL4K; a robot who uses they/them pronouns. They have a subtle, but visible pin in the colours of the nonbinary pride flag (Yellow, White, Purple, and Black).
- The car racing/fighting game Buck Up and Drive! has some billboards on the courses showing the Gay and Transgender Pride flag colors. There's an option to toggle them in the game's settings...which turns ALL the billboards into Gay and Transgender Pride flags.
- Bugsnax: Floofty is non-binary, and their color scheme matches the non-binary pride flag: black from their glasses, purple from their body, white from their eyes and hair, and yellow from their nose.
- Catherine: The Full Body edition of the game introduces Rin, who has light pink hair and dresses in pale blue and white - the color scheme of the transgender flag. He turns out not to be trans rather than a very feminine cis man (by human standards, anyway), though his character still brushes against trans-adjacent themes through playing off gender expectations and the perceived contrast between his presentation and body, and the explicitly trans Erica has an affinity for him as the other overtly LGBT character in the story (not counting Vincent coming out as bi in Rin's route).
- In Fate/Grand Order Chevalier D'Eon's outfits are primarily blue, pink, and white, and resemble the transgender flag, most obviously in the third ascension. The historical D'Eon was most likely transgender and lived the final years of her life as a woman, but Fate's version is best described as genderfluid.
- Fire Emblem Engage: Rosado's hair color is a mix of the cyan blue, light pink, and white of the trans pride flag. While he does identify as male, Rosado has no qualms with wearing women's clothes in public and is hinted to be Otherworldly and Sexually Ambiguous.
- Accompanying Testament's portrayal as non-binary in Guilty Gear -STRIVE-, their two new familiars have pink hair, light blue hair, and white(ish) skin for both, corresponding to the transgender flag.
- In Horizon Forbidden West, one of the many varieties of face paint you can unlock for Aloy is based off the Progress pride flag. Aloy is ultimately revealed to be queer in the Burning Shores DLC.
- Life is Strange:
- Used as foreshadowing in Life Is Strange 2. A photograph in episode 1 shows Sean wearing a shirt with pink, blue, and purple, the colors of the bisexual flag. His bisexuality is revealed in episode 3.
- In the first episode of Life Is Strange: True Colors, Steph Gingrich, a lesbian, is wearing a shirt with a d20 dice featuring the orange, white, and pink colors of the lesbian flag.
- In the "All Kinds of Love" ad for Love & Pies, the Progress Pride flag can be seen behind Eve as she has a video chat with her long-distance partner, who goes by they/them pronouns and whom she's planning to propose to.
- In Master Detective Archives: Rain Code Halara Nightmare's official art shows them with is a combination of black, purple, and yellow colors, and along with their white hair, it matches the colors of the nonbinary flag, and their bio states that they have no specified gender.
- Overwatch:
- The short story "As You Are", which reveals Baptiste as bisexual, has page headers and footers in the colors of the bi pride flag, and the illustration of Baptiste and Pharah shows the sky behind them in similar colors to the flag. The same story confirms that Pharah is a lesbian, and the aforementioned illustration has the airship's control panels in the colors of the lesbian flag. A later-released skin for Baptiste, "Flirty Flare", is themed with a blue, pink, and purple color scheme.
- Venture, who is non-binary, has a patch on their jacket's left shoulder in the colors of the non-binary pride flag. Their rare "Monarch" skin also uses the flag's colors for their entire outfit.
- In Princess Farmer, Rowan's shoppe has the lesbian and nonbinary stickers pasted on the side of the Hare Dye vending machine.
- Psychonauts 2: In the section of Bob's mind representing his and Helmut's wedding, some of the pieces of cake making up the environment consist of a blue layer, an aqua layer, and a green layer each with white frosting sandwiched between them, making for a color scheme very similar to that of the MLM gay flag.
- In Quilts & Cats of Calico, Tina's twin sister Mona has a masculine body and voice and has a quilt with the trans colors draped across her shoulder.
- Sticky Business: While some of your customers order any Pride stickers, Jae-won specifically asks for an asexual flag sticker for Hazel, a homoromantic ace.
- Super Lesbian Animal RPG has Claire, a transgender cow who wears the colors of the trans flag. If you examine the flag she has in her bedroom, the other characters will point this out to her and she'll claim it's just a coincidence and that she didn't even realise.
- In Unpacking, the protagonist's girlfriend/wife, whom she dates/marries and has a child with at the end of the game has rainbow-colored underwear that you can unpack.
Visual Novels
- In Crown Delights Deli, Maya and her partner Piper visit your bodega on Pride Day. Maya wears a tank top with the Progress Pride flag while Piper wears a jacket with the pansexual colors and a genderfluid flag pin.
- In Dawn Chorus, Jørgen, a trans man, wears a scarf with faded trans colors.
- In High School Story, Cameron (who goes by they/them pronouns) wears a necklace with green, white, and purple beads (the colours of the genderqueer flag).
- Reigning Passions: Galen is non-binary and their hair is primarily light blue and pink, two of the colors of the trans pride flag. Their shirt is white, the third color of the flag.
- A Year of Springs, the Compilation Re-release of one night, hot springs and its two sequels, includes a new epilogue that sees each character wearing a new outfit. Haru◊ is transgender, and wears the pink, blue, and white of the transgender flag; Erika◊ is bisexual and wears the pink, blue, and purple of the bisexual flag; and Manami◊ has realized she's asexual and is now wearing the purple, black, grey, and white of the asexual flag.
- ValiDate: Struggling Singles In Your Area: Among the many pins Inaya wears on her overalls, one of them is a bisexual pride flag pin. She also has a bi pride phone case.
Web Animation
- Chad Magical, the Doppelganger Sorcerer of JoCat's A Crap Guide to D&D, is transgender per a tweet by JoCat, and his outfit consists entirely of the colors blue, pink, and white.
- Burger Brawl: Triple Twofer Token Minority with Razu, Space, and Vince who identify as non-binary but are also respectively Bisexual, according to the stripes on their scarf, armless and the only Brit in the show.
- Rin Penrose, an independent (formerly of Idol Corp) British Virtual YouTuber, came out as asexual in August 2023, and her first/debut outfit had ace pride colours in it. While she admitted it was a coincidence, she repeatedly pointed out how appropriate it all was.
- The animated short "SUCCUBUSSTOP" has a young man who pays no attention to the advances of the ladies or gents attempting to seduce him. His clothing is striped in the colors of the asexual pride flag, heavily implying that he's genuinely not attracted to them because he's not attracted to anyone.
- At the end of "Make♡Cute", the ending is set to the backdrop of a sunset resembling the colors of the bisexual flag. Fitting, since it's all about a young man trying to instigate a Meet Cute with a woman he met in the library, only to have a genuine Meet Cute with a male librarian.
Webcomics
- Alienby Comics: The final panel of "Inanna and Trans People in Ancient Mesopotamia" shows the titular goddess blessing a Mesopotamian with the background colours aligned exactly like the transgender pride flag's stripes.
- Batman: Wayne Family Adventures: During Tim and Bernard's date the two are wearing jackets in the colors of the Bi flag, and the sunset is also in bi flag colors. This color choice was confirmed as intentional by the artists.
- Boyfriends.:
- Lady-Prep is a trans woman whose outfits frequently incorporate white and light blue, and her hair is dyed bubblegum pink.
- Invoked in the Pride Month comic, wherein the titular Boyfriends go to a pride event and invoke their colors through their outfits. Goth wears a jacket with the trans flag colors, Jock a tracksuit with the bisexual flag colors, Nerd's outfit invokes the yellow, pink, and blue of the pansexual flag, and Prep has rainbow-colored sunglasses alongside his rather tourist-y looking outfit.
- In the comic that kickstarts an arc where Nerd realizes he might be somewhere under the nonbinary umbrella, the sash he wears with his cosplay resembles the demiboy flag.
- Dumbing of Age: Dina Saruyama, a romantic asexual, is seen wearing a gray shirt with white, black and purple stripes on sleeves in two strips.
- Additionally, Becky is a lesbian (quite openly, and yellingly) and from this comic to this one, her hat, hair, face and then her dual-toned jacket make up the lesbian flag.
- Additionally, Becky is a lesbian (quite openly, and yellingly) and from this comic
- The majority of work by transgender webcomic artist Jamie Barker, most notably their signature comic Fake Gamer Comics, which explores themes of gender, uses a minimal palette of pastel pink, blue, and purple shades similar to the trans pride flag. However, this could also be just an aesthetic coincidence.
- In Goblins, which is created by a trans author, the goblin angel has a sword in the colors of the transgender pride flag. She also wears pink, white, and teal bracelets and rings on various parts of her body.
- I Want to Be a Cute Anime Girl:
- Cheryl’s first girl outfit consists of a blue choker and skirt, pink shirt, and white thigh highs, the same colors as the trans flag.
- When Cheryl and Delilah sit down together after their "hangout" at the mall, the setting sun illuminates them in pink and orange — the colors of the lesbian pride flag. Lampshaded in The Rant.
- In Muted Kallen, a trans man and Camille's father, shows up with a bouquet of flowers in the blue, white, and pink colors of the trans flag.
- Lucky from NEXT!!! Sound of the Future is a trans man whose colour palette matches the trans flag: his hair and tie are blue, his shirt is white, and the ribbon tying his hair is pink.
- In The Order of the Stick, the elven wizard Vaarsuvius, who was confirmed as genderqueer through Word of Gay, is rather fond of the spell Prismatic Spray, which is visualized as a rainbow-colored ray of light. An official t-shirt design has V using this rainbow spell against a troll, with the caption "Just an ordinary picture of a wizard defeating a monster with a high-level spell. No additional symbolism here, nope." which hints at the character's LGBTQ identity.
- In Questionable Content, Claire sometimes wears a transgender flag shirt.
- Used as a Visual Pun in the first syndicated Rae the Doe strip, which has her introduce herself. In the last panel, she points out that does don't normally have antlers while winking; the background changes to the transgender pride flag colours.
- R.A.M. the Robot: A pride month special comic shows R.A.M.'s clothes changing to bi flag colors while Jake's turn into an ace flag.
- Slice of Life (2021):
- Many of the covers feature pride flags somewhere in the art.
- Charlie, Kris' sister, is first introduced with a transgender pride flag in the background.
- One of the future vignettes sees Lucy and Yuriko attending a pride parade and being offered lesbian pride flags. While Lucy happily accepts hers, Yuriko politely declines hers, as she is pansexual. Lucy finds her a pansexual pride flag instead.
- Star Impact: Subverted with Lily. She wears a white-and-pink dress and has bright teal hair (the colors of the transgender flag), but Word of God has said that this correlation was unintentional.
- Sunflowers And Lavender: The main characters have color palettes based on their respective gender identity/orientation. For example, the protagonist Penny (who is pansexual) has a pink-yellow-blue-themed color palette.
- Thinking Too Much to Think Positively: Xan compares some Pokémon to pride flags based on their respective colour schemes in "Pokémon That Look Like Pride Flags".
RF (Xan's partner): It's weird that there isn't a Pokémon for the rainbow flag.
Xan: Well, technically Ho-Oh is the Rainbow Pokémon.
[Ho-Oh is shown in front of a rainbow flag, the two clearly don't match well.]
RF: That's not a rainbow! That's two-thirds of a rainbow at best!
Xan: In the Gameboy era, that was more colours than our brains could handle!
Websites
- Tumblr has a function where, if one tags a post with certain queer identities (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender, nonbinary, etc.), the tag will be colored like the flag for that identity.
Web Video
- Annoying Orange:
- In the 5 million subscriber special, Marshmallow is asked whether they have a crush on a boy or a girl, only to reveal that they like both. In the same video, Marshmallow is asked whether they prefer pink or blue, and they say that they love pale purple.
- When Marshmallow's Ambiguous Gender is finally revealed, the video prominently features a non-binary flag. Promotional images of the video depicted Marshmallow waving the rainbow flag, the non-binary flag, and the transgender flag.
- In the episode "All Dressed Up," Marshmallow wears a heart-shaped rainbow pin.
- Mollymauk Tealeaf from Critical Role is bisexual, his outfit consists of shades of purple, red, and blue, and as a Tiefling, he has purple skin (which is admittedly a rather rare color for the species).
- In The Nostalgia Critic's "Grading Cartoon Intros" episode, he interprets the rainbow color schemes in the She-Ra: Princess of Power title sequence as showing gay pride, compared to He Man And The Masters Of The Universe, who Critic perceives as stuck in a Transparent Closet.
NC: (as She-Ra) We even have rainbow-colored characters, because...we're not afraid to hide our pride over here. You're so deep in the closet, you're tap dancing with R. Kelly.
Western Animation
- 101 Dalmatian Street: Da Vinci has been implied to be a lesbian in an X post by series creator Miklós Weigert depicting her painted in the colours of the lesbian flag in a pride month post, and "Doggy Da Vinci" frequently shows her amidst orange, pink, and white scenery during the first half of the episode.
- In The Amazing World of Gumball, there's an episode called "The Night" that shows what various characters are dreaming of. In Mr. Small's bedroom, he has a sticker of the rainbow flag on the headboard of his bed. He's also hinted to have an unreciprocated crush on Larry.
- Amphibia:
- The I.T. girls are a same-sex couple. Ally's color palette was taken from the pansexual pride flag, and Jess's color palette was taken from the bisexual pride flag.
- In the finale, the mirror in Sasha's car has a bisexual pride flag sticker.
- In Baymax!, one of the people who gives Baymax advice on menstrual pads is a trans man who wears a shirt patterned after the transgender flag.
- BoJack Horseman:
- The cab company Todd starts in season three, Cabracadabra, has a sign colored in purple, white, and black. At the end of the season, Todd realizes he's asexual, likely making this subtle Foreshadowing.
- The sign at the asexual meet-up Todd attends in "Hooray, Todd Episode!" is white with a purple and black border.
- The cab company Todd starts in season three, Cabracadabra, has a sign colored in purple, white, and black.
- DC Super Hero Girls (2019): The superheroine Zatanna (aka Zee Zatara) wears, in most of her outfits, the colors pink, blue and purple, which are the colors of the bi pride flag; which they are even personified in her and her magical auras: light magic is represented by pink, dark magic by blue, while in both her civilian and heroic identities, the predominant color is purple. Although it has not been officially confirmed whether Zee is bisexual due to the series' cancellation, there are indications that she may be: she falls in love with Aquaman when she met him, and before that she had feelings for Barry Allen (The Flash), but when she met Wonder Woman for the first time, she was struck by her beaut, even goes so far as to exclaim about her "Gorgeous!", as their first interaction.
- In Eureka! (2022) , Eureka's friend Pepper wears an outfit that's primarily orange and pink, which are two of the major colors of the lesbian flag. She's later confirmed to have 2 moms.
- Hazbin Hotel:
- "Radio Killed the Video Star": When Vox's face starts glitching in "Stayed Gone", it flashes◊ the colors of the bisexual flag for a couple frames. It also flashes TV color bars◊ following a rainbow pattern rather than any of the standard ones.
- "Dad Beat Dad": A subtle example. During Alastor's "They say when you're looking for assistance / It's smart to the pick the path with least resistance!" line in "Hell's Greatest Dad", the three giant books that drop onto Charlie only for Alastor to lift them up with tentacles match the colors of the bisexual pride flag (albeit in a different order from the flag's stripes), referencing Charlie's bisexuality.
- "Scream Rain":
- The blanket fort that Charlie sets up to reconcile with Vaggie is full of◊ orange, pink and white◊, similar to the orange-pink / "sunset" lesbian flag.
- During Charlie and Vaggie's sexy fantasy dance sequence in the song "Easy", they're shown dancing in front of a pink-and-white gradient background that's colored similarly to the sapphic flag.
- The blanket fort that Charlie sets up to reconcile with Vaggie is full of
- The Pride 2025 merch has the characters in outfits in the colors of their respective pride flags.
- One piece of 2026 Pride merch has the characters with hearts in their pride colors (and Charlie also holding a camera with a rainbow pattern on it), while another shows them holding ice cream in their pride colors.
- "Radio Killed the Video Star": When Vox's face starts glitching in "Stayed Gone", it flashes
- In the series finale of The Legend of Korra, there's a shot of the sky in blue, purple, and pink as Korra and Asami become an Official Couple. Both characters are also confirmed to be bisexual.
- Miraculous Ladybug:
- Marc Anciel (a Punny Name on the French word for rainbow, arc en ciel), is a shy, quiet boy who has a rainbow-colored shirt and blushes around Nathaniel. In Season 6, he adds a blue and green lightning shape behind his jacket, colors of the gay male flag.
- Juleka Couffaine has a black-purple-white color scheme. Purple, white, and black happen to be the classic lesbian pride colors, and her relationship with her best friend Rose is confirmed after tons of Ship Tease throughout the show in "El Toro de Piedra", in which they share a kiss on-screen.
- In "Mr. Pigeon 72", Kagami Tsurugi's bathing suit just happens to be yellow, pink, and blue, the pansexual pride colors. Her official bio says that she has "powerful feelings" for both Adrien Agreste and Marinette Dupain-Cheng, and in "Protection", she declares that it's hard for her to see them together because she loves both of them.
- Sabrina Raincomprix has implied that her feelings for her former "BFF" Chloé were more than friendly, and in Season 6, she has become very close to Chloé's sapphic half-sister Zoé. On the other hand, she has shown an attraction to boys on a few occasions. Consequently, she wears a violet (the traditional color for sapphics) vest with patches of blue (the traditional color for boys).
- Following his redesign in Season 6, Nathaniel Kurtzberg now sports blue, purple and pink splashes of paint over his clothing, literally coloring him as bisexual.
- In Season 6, Zoé's hair now has pink and blue highlights, which combine with her blonde hair to make the colors of the pansexual pride flag. Her Miraculous also has a blue-pink-gold color scheme when it's disguised.
- Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur (2023)
- Casey's dads have a few rainbow decorations in their house.
- Brooklyn, the captain of the volleyball team, has a trans pride flag sticker and a rainbow sticker on her water bottle. She was confirmed to be a transgender girl in the un-aired episode "The Gatekeeper".
- Jurnee is a member of the STEM club. In the Heist Episode, she has a bi flag sticker on her phone.
- Matsuye and Merle, Mimi's old colleagues, are strongly implied to be a lesbian couple in their first appearance. When they visit the Lafayettes in "Lava Actually", their luggage has a lesbian pride flag on it.
- Enid from OK K.O.! Let's Be Heroes, has a peace sign-shaped bi pride flag sticker on her bike helmet. When Mr. Gar gives her a new bike, she immediately adds some stickers to it, including an identical sticker. In-series, Enid's primary love interest and figure of admiration has been the female hero Red Action.
- The Owl House:
- Luz Noceda is canonically bisexual, and this neon promo poster for the "Enchanting Grom Fright" episode (where she receives Ship Tease with her female Love Interest Amity) depicts her with pink, purple, and blue colors, the colors of the bisexual flag. Later, in the episode "Eclipse Lake", she spends the entire episode in purple pajamas with pink and blue socks.
- Amity Blight is a lesbian with a motif for the color purple, a color usually associated with sapphic women. This is especially notable when she dyes her hair purple, representing her own decision to take control of her self-identity.
- In general, the backgrounds for big romantic moments between Luz and Amity tend to have a pink, purple, and blue color scheme.
- Lilith Clawthorne is implied to be an aromantic asexual during the March 2022 charity livestream (and later confirmed as one per her voice actress), and after absorbing half of Eda's curse, her right eye turns grey, which, alongside her remaining green eye, makes up two of the colors of the aromantic flag.
- Masha (a Gravesfield teenager) is nonbinary and has their nails painted yellow/black/white/purple (the nonbinary colors).
- Luz Noceda is canonically bisexual, and this neon promo poster
- The episode "Horn Sweet Horn" from The Powerpuff Girls (2016) ends with the heart colored in pink, white, and blue rather than different shades of pink as normal, very reminiscent of the transgender flag. The episode (about a horse who wants to become a unicorn) was originally promoted as a transgender allegory; though Word of God would later claim this wasn't the case, there's no other reason for the flag to be colored that way.
- In the Ready Jet Go! special "Back to Bortron 7", Jet sings a soft duet with his male friend Sean, who he's had Ship Tease with throughout the special, and the colors in the song are all of the bisexual pride flag — pink, purple, and blue. After the show ended, Jet was confirmed to be bisexual by Craig Bartlett.
- She-Ra and the Princesses of Power:
- She-Ra's power is often associated with rainbows — she and all the other Princesses are each associated with a certain color, and when they join forces and use their abilities in tandem, they glow in their designated color and together make a huge rainbow. The current She-Ra, Adora, is revealed to be in love with Catra, and finding out it's mutual is what ultimately saves her life in the series finale.
- Married couple Netossa and Spinnerella are seen holding a bouquet in varying colors of red, pink, and white during "Mer-Mysteries", in what behind the scenes confirms is a reference to the lipstick lesbian pride flag.
- Total Drama: Bowie, who is gay, predominantly wears purple and green as his signature colors which are commonly associated with homosexuality.
- Young Justice (2010): In season 3, Kaldur first kisses his boyfriend in front of a pink, green, and blue background. Those are the colors of the polysexualnote pride flag. When asked how the character would label his sexuality, the creator specifically referred to him as polysexual.
- Z-O-M-B-I-E-S: The Re-Animated Series: In "Alien vs. Shredator", A-Spen, who has previously expressed attraction to both Zed (male) and Willa (female), wears blue, purple, and pink eyeshadow during their performance with Wynter.
