Planet Earth [Oskar Pernefeldt's proposal]

One of biggest flag-releated news to pop on world's internet this month was the proposal of "The International Flag of Planet Earth", by a Swedish designer named Oskar Pernefeldt. According to the official site, it was designed as a graduation project.

Have you seen this design?

I sincerely like the design, even though it's a bit complicated.

According to the site, the objective of the flag is being used to raise awareness and represent the Planet Earth as a whole — one given example is an international earthling colony in Mars!

The blue color is iconic of Earth since, at least, the famous Yuri Gagarin's speech. Its bright blue shade was chosen to stand out against both space's darkness and white shiny space suits and ships. The seven rings represent the seven continents, and are arranged as Borromean rings i.e. one ring can't be removed without collapsing the whole structure.

One special note: when I learned about the "seven continents" thing, I, being South American, immediately associated it to Africa, Asia, Europe, Oceania and... North America, Central America and South America! Being the designer Swedish, they more probably were North America, South America and Antarctica.

By the way, design and rationale are a bit reminiscent of Olympic rings, aren't they?

Comments are welcome!

World Heritage Convention

You may have seen the today's flag yet. No matter in what continent you live. There's a flag granted to all the UNESCO's World Heritage sites, occasionally also used by the entities that protect te sites.

There are many variants of the flag, but you'll find more commonly these two:



The first, red on white, the second like UNESCO flag (white on UN blue). The inscriptions in English ("WORLD HERITAGE") and French ("PATRIMOINE MONDIAL") are always present, but the writing in Spanish ("PATRIMONIO MUNDIAL") can be replaced by the national language of the country where the site is located.

The square stands for the result of human skills (the cultural heritages), while the circle represents the Earth (the natural heritages). The circle also remembers a bell jar, representing protection (the World Heritage Convention itself). The fact the circle and the square are intrinsically united represents the link between cultural and natural heritages.

The logo of the design has a strong simplicity that combines with a flag. The text, however, could be dropped without extra thought (as in some variants of the flag), because the wind would be too strong or too weak to the text be read on the biggest part of time.

Hope you knew more about this flag. Comments are welcome.

Anonymous (group)

I've been seeing this flag very much on the last times. You could have saw it and never noticed. I'm talking about this flag, specifically:

This is a flag of an activist group called Anonymous. You probably have yet found its motto in a vandalized webpage:

"Knowledge is free. We are Anonymous. We are legion.We do not forgive. We do not forget. Expect us."

They are present in initiatives off-line, like the Occupy Wall Street, and on-line, when released a list of names and personal data from people related with virtual pedophilia and cyber-bullying. For its legion of computer hackers, its activities are known as "hacktivism".

This flag has some very curious aspects, in vexillological point of view. The logo of the group recalls the word "Anonymous" and, more surprisingly, has an incredible resemblance with United Nations logo: notice the globe and exact same arrangement of the olive branches.

I couldn't find the symbolism of colors black and green. It can be related to "green anarchism" (anarchism + enviromentalism), an ideology that Anonymous usually defends, although the flag of anarcho-syndicalism defaced with Anonymous logo is also used (see). I have a theory, although I can't prove it: the colors are inspired, conscious or unconsciously, on the old green phosphor monochrome monitors.

Other very curious flag associated with Anonymous group is this:

The anarchist ideas of Anonymous and group's relation with piracy (in contemporary meaning of term) make the Jolly Roger an obvious symbolism (see post about pirate flags). However, they changed the traditional skull by the mask of Guy Fawkes, made famous by V for Vendetta and used by members of the group where anonymity is necessary.

If you know additional information about Anonymous flags or want to make any other kind of commentary, feel free to comment.

Olympic flag

The Olympic flag is a cultural icon, seen in almost everything related to sports and competitiveness. The flag is shrouded in myths, and I probably couldn't remember all of them, but I'll try to clarify the most famous. It's used since the seventh modern Olympic Games (Antwerp, 1920), although it is some years early (remembering that 1916 Olympics didn't occur). Its creator is Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of modern Olympics. It's the flag:

The five rings represent more probably the five continents. The position and color of each meaning is defined.

OK, coming to the myth #1: each color represents one continent. The answer is: depends... Although  it isn't the original meaning, it appears in the Olympic official handbook. There's even an official explanation to the colors: blue for Europe, yellow for Asia, black for Africa, green for Oceania and red for Americas.

Myth #2: the rings are based in ancient symbols found in Delphi. Absolute myth, but there's a funny explanation to it! Before the 1936 Olympic games, the torch passed in Delphi. To commemorate the occasion, a milestone was constructed and put on the Delphi ruins. It was never removed, until two British historians found it in 1950, creating a great confusion.

So let me tell what's almost certain about the origin of Olympic symbols. The rings are inspired by the logo of USFSA (the French Olympic representative), where Pierre de Coubertin took part and could easily borrow the symbol. About the colors (including white background), they came from the national flags of each country that competed on that time. See a quote by Baron de Coubertin, in 1912:

...the six colours [including the flag’s white background] thus combined reproduce the colours of all the nations, with no exception. The blue and yellow of Sweden, the blue and white of Greece, the tri- colours of France, England and America, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Hungary, the yellow and red of Spain next to the novelties of Brazil or Australia, with old Japan and new China. Here is truly an international symbol.

Would he joke? The "color-for-continents" theory isn't truth, so you can't absolutely say "yes" or "no".

This is it. I hope you liked the text. Please, leave your comment (positive, neutral or negative).

Jolly Roger flag

Pirates flags were an powerful pop icon at 20^th century, and still are. A common denomination to pirate flags is "Jolly Roger", usually represented by a black field with white skull and crossbones. But it differs a bit from their historic origins.

A common pirate flag from Golden Age of Piracy (16^th century) is a plain red flag (Qatar and Bahrain put white on their flags to prevent retaliation to their ships). Some histories, possibly untrue, relate that the term "Jolly Roger" comes from "jolie rouge" ("pretty red" in French). The reason is curious: in naval code, a black flag means there're prisoners at ship; a red flag means there aren't (in pirates' case, all the enemies are dead). Click here to see an authentic red Jolly Roger.

Along the time, the black flag increased of use. The color was chose because it doesn't resembles any national flag, suggesting pirates are people without homeland (similar symbolism explains the use of black by Anarchists).

Now a final explanation: skull and crossbones are commonly used by pirates, OK, but not a lot more than full skeletons, hourglasses, cutlasses and "pierced" hearts. They're all used as symbols of danger and experience.

So, if you constructed a pirate flag in your childhood, I sorrily advert you were mistaken. But children like fantasy, however.

And, in the end, a very curious Jolly Roger, from Bartholomew Roberts, showing a supposed encounter between him and the Death: