At the start of Pride Month, downtown Chapel Hill is decorated with all the colors of the rainbow. Pride flags hang throughout town representing different factions of the LGBTQIA+ community. But, community members noticed the pink, orange, red and white of the lesbian flag is missing.
Pride flags throughout downtown Chapel Hill are put up by the Downtown Chapel Hill Partnership. Originally, just rainbow flags flew through town. Now, flags in Chapel Hill also depict the transgender, bisexual, gender-queer, non-binary and asexual communities.
Jessie Gleason, a UNC senior who has lived in Chapel Hill since December 2016, said she has never seen a lesbian flag in downtown Chapel Hill during Pride.
“As someone who identifies as a lesbian now, it feels like these flags are going up in a very performative way,” said Gleason, “to show that we see you and we support you but we don’t actually care all that much about you as evident by the fact that the first letter of LGBTQ, lesbian for L, is just not represented.”
Gleason said the lack of a lesbian flag points to a larger issue during Pride: the lack of acknowledgment for the lesbian community.
“At the end of the day its just a flag it doesn’t really mean anything,” Gleason said. “The Town of Chapel Hill is not backing these flags up with any sort of support. I think it is really indicative of how they want to be seen as this progressive place and as people who do progressive things but are not actually following that up with real progressive action. It’s never come as a surprise to me that the lesbian flag hasn’t been on Franklin Street.
“I feel like in general,” she continued, “in queer spaces you see lesbian representation the least often. When you do it tends to be a direct effort of lesbians or queer women in general or it’s sometimes the result of fetishization of two women. I’m not particularly surprised that the Town of Chapel Hill doesn’t have a lesbian flag up. It’s just in general feeling the exclusion from the town as a whole and that they don’t really care about us.”
Samantha Slayer is an administrative coordinator in the department of parks and recreation as well as a member of the LGBTQ+ Employee Resource Group (ERG). Slayer shared she identifies as asexual and seeing the asexual flag in downtown felt amazing to be acknowledged.
“Ace is one of the more overlooked identities,” Slayer said. “It’s less common so fewer people know about it. It really shocked me and surprised me the first time I walked down Franklin Street and saw an ace flag. It’s a really overwhelming feeling to be acknowledged and welcomed in that way. That’s something me and all of the rest of the employee resource group really want for every member of the queer community.”
Slayer said the ERG agreed with Gleason and others for the need to include a lesbian flag in the downtown.
“This is a process that the ERG is not fully in control over but we do work closely with the Downtown Partnership,” Slayer said. “They have assured us they will put up a lesbian flag. It’s just important for us to regularly get this kind of feedback so we know when its time to make changes.”
She said the Town of Chapel Hill takes a three pronged approach to addressing the needs of the LGBTQIA+ community through celebration, education and action.
“The flags are part of the celebration, the acknowledgment, the welcome mat if you will,” Slayer said. “I think it’s clear that we need to have strong communication lines. In other communities like in Durham they have the LGBTQ Center of Durham that does this kind of advocacy work for the community, but we don’t have anything like that in Chapel Hill.”
Slayer pointed QTIPOC Aid Fund as one resource which does advocacy work but is focused on material needs of the queer community.
“The town is currently working on educating our staff so that we can serve all members of the community in an inclusive way and meet the unique needs of our community,” Slayer said. “We are working on policies that will protect our staff and be a model for other employers in the area.”
Matt Gladdek, executive director of the Downtown Partnership, acknowledged the lack of flags representing all of the LGBTQIA+ community in Chapel Hill.
“It’s very possible that in the chaos and resource stretch of the last two years that some things went unnoticed, like the lack of a lesbian flag and even the gay men’s flag, but we hope it gets corrected ASAP,” Gladdek said in a message to Chapelboro.
Chapel Hill has 56 flag hangers in downtown and there are more than 30 different Pride flags with Gladdek telling Chapelboro that the Downtown Partnership is assessing flags to add to its fleet.
“We want to ensure we are as inclusive as we can be and have the biggest visual impact we can,” Gladdek said. “We will discuss a process with the town and the outcome of that will determine what additional flags we purchase.”
Gladdek said the goal is to have an updated fleet of Pride flags for Pride 2023.
Featured Photo via Mark Losey / Town of Chapel Hill
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Oh my gosh guys leave the f***ing flags alone why do you feel the need to do this stupid s***? Like sure you can be “queer” whatever the f*** that means but nobody wants to see you littering on the streets, okay?
Unbelievable