‘Category one insurrection’: US embassies hoist rainbow flags for Pride Month, defying Washington
- US State Department has been rejecting requests from embassies wanting to fly the flags outside mission buildings
- Some diplomats are either ignoring the ban or finding creative ways to get around the policy
The US State Department began rejecting all embassy requests to hoist rainbow flags outside the mission buildings during Gay Pride Month this year, but some US diplomats have been finding ways to defy, or at least get around, the new policy.
The facades of the US missions in Seoul, South Korea, and Chennai, India, are partially hidden behind large rainbow flags, while the embassy in New Delhi is aglow in rainbow coloured lights.
The website for the embassy in Santiago, Chile, shows a video of the chief diplomat raising a rainbow flag last month for the International Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia and Biphobia.
The Vienna Embassy’s website features a photo of a rainbow flag flying below Old Glory on a mast jutting from the building, a statement by Diplomats for Equality and a story about a professor lecturing on the visibility and growth of LGBT rights.
US diplomats in Jerusalem joined a March for Pride and Tolerance, and several ambassadors have tweeted photos of themselves in local Pride parades or standing outside the embassies surrounded by employees holding up letters spelling PRIDE.