It sure looks like Wonder Woman supports Pride

Patty Jenkins, director of Wonder Woman and its follow up WW1984 (which for some bizarre reason they are not calling a sequel), released a colorful poster for the movie on Wednesday.

 

The sheer amount of color almost hurts my eyes. It’s just so over-the-top. It’s almost as if someone tried to steal the pot of gold at the end of a rainbow, only for a leprechaun to stop them.

By beating their ass with the rainbow.

I was reminded by friends that the garishness of the colors is appropriate given the 80s setting of the movie. There’s something striking about the colors that some folks have noticed though.

 

 

Image Description: the bisexual pride flag on a pole, swaying in the wind against the sky as a backdrop
The Bisexual Pride Flag
Image of the Gay&Lesbian Pride Flag
The Rainbow Flag widely associated with the Queer community. Notably missing the addition of Black and Brown, which totally isn’t a metaphor for white people being viewed as the face of USAgayz.
3-D rendering of the Pansexual Pride Flag against a blue sky backdrop
The Pansexual Pride Flag

I haven’t seen Jenkins elaborate on any meaning (hidden or otherwise) in the image, so its possible the colors are not meant to help convey a message. However, given that they aren’t going to start campaigning for the movie until December, and this was released in June, during the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall Uprising, I’m going with “they chose the colors with deliberation”.

In viewing the color palette as a deliberate allusion to the various Pride flags, I realized that Wonder Woman is a great fictional character to show support for Pride. Whether she is queer herself as many suspect (I was reminded that the movie established her as bisexual), or she is not, the essence of her character is that of a person who would argue fiercely in support of queer rights. The following is a statement I can imagine her giving during Pride month:


“When I first arrived in Man’s World, it was as if I were seeing the world as a child again. The people, places, and things I encountered differed so much from the world I knew that I felt a rush of excitement as I considered how much Man’s World might have to offer.  The people were so different. The places looked like nothing I had seen nor dreamed of before. Oh, and the things I encountered. We did not have ice cream on Themiscyra, which reminds me, I need to bring another batch of Ben & Jerry’s when I return home.

Unfortunately, not everything I saw in this new world inspired awe. Your first World War was a time of profound suffering, pain, and torment.  Even as the horrors of a global war spurred me on to aid others and assist in quelling the conflict, they also acted to temper the excitement I felt in my new surroundings. But planetary war was not the only form of darkness I discovered in your world.

With men occupying virtually all political and military positions, and women relegated to different spheres, I quickly became aware of a gender-based hierarchy in this world. Over time, I learned this hierarchy was known as sexism, one of many structural ills that contributes to the darkness in the world.

I stand here today, against a backdrop of dazzling colors–colors that will resonate with a great many, even as others remain will feel no connection–to lend my support, compassion, and love against another form of structural inequality: systemic injustice and discrimination against the LGBTQIA+ community.

To my fellow LGBTQIA+ people, I see you.

I see Marsha P Johnson and Sylvia Rivera, two transgender women who were front and center in the events of June 28, 1969, which saw the NYPD raid the Stonewall Inn. The actions of the officers that night proved to be a tipping point for members of the community, who had grown tired of police harassment and social discrimination. The long simmering frustration and resentment boiled over and led to a social uprising. Though quelled the first night, members of the community returned for the next five nights, sometimes in the thousands, to protest police brutality and state discrimination.

I see that night and the following five as pivotal events in the course of your country’s history.

I see the righteous frustration and outrage of the Stonewall protesters as well as their courage, defiance, and determination.

I see those same qualities reflected in all of you today.

I salute each of you for your courage in living your true, authentic selves.

I see the social, political, economic, and religious forces arrayed against you.

I see how these forces, with their boots on your necks, tell you to deny your truths, to go back in the closet, to neither celebrate nor take pride in your queerness.
I see them trying to deny, erase, downplay, and eradicate your existence.

I see this and I am in awe of the courage on display in the queer community.

The courage to live openly as your true selves, in spite of the forces against you.

I see this and more.

I see the suffering imposed upon the transgender community.

I am angered.

I see the continued resistance to improving the quality of life for all under the queer umbrella, not just in the United States, but across the world, in places like Brunei, Chechnya, and the Philippines.

I am angered.

I see the attempts by self-professed gatekeepers in your community to bar entry by those deemed “not or insufficiently queer”.

I am angered and saddened.

I see the preachers.
I see the pastors.
I see the priests.
I see those claiming a connection to the spiritual world using that connection to justify their morally repellent beliefs.

I see the achievements made by the movement for queer rights, as well as the setbacks. I know the fight is far from over.
I know many have died along the way, from those hundreds of thousands taken by AIDS to those youth who saw suicide as their only way to be free from the pain externally imposed upon them to the ongoing epidemic of transgender women of color being brutalized and murdered.

I see you.
I see your lives.
I see your hope.
I see your perseverance.
I see your courage.
I see your love. 

Most of all, I see you.

You are here.
You are queer.
You are perfect just as you are.
You. Matter.”

–Princess Diana, Ambassador of Themiscyra

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It sure looks like Wonder Woman supports Pride
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