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Comment by nostromo | Hacker News Reader

Children can draw rainbows free of symbolism right now and forever.

Flags are different. Flags always have symbolism, that's their point.

Similarly, children can draw a hammer and sickle for fun if they want. However, should you put it on a flag and fly it in front of your house, don't be surprised if people draw conclusions.

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> Similarly, children can draw a hammer and sickle for fun if they want. However, should you put it on a flag and fly it in front of your house, don't be surprised if people draw conclusions.

Even more extreme: Swastikas in the decorative masonry in a government building? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Greca_a_svastica_-_palazzo...) Don't expect much controversy. Swastikas on a flag in the same building? Expect an issue. Something being in a flag or not is an incredibly important context that must be considered.

Swastikas are a little different though. It's been decoratively used for apolitical reasons for thousands of years on all sorts of things, but was only really flown as a flag starting with the NAZIs in the 1920s. There's a lot of architecture, even in Europe involving pre-NAZI swastikas. And before and even shortly after the NAZI party adopted it, it was used a a good luck symbol in the west (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_use_of_the_swastika_in_...).

I think that is quite similar to rainbows though. Use lots of places in a variety of ways for a very long time, but only really use on flags by the LGBT movement.

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