Nazi prisoner identification In
Nazi concentration camps, each prisoner was required to wear a downward-pointing, equilateral
triangular cloth badge on their chest, the color of which identified the stated reason for their imprisonment. Early on, prisoners perceived as gay men were variously identified with a green triangle (indicating criminals) or red triangle (political prisoners), the number
175 (referring to
Paragraph 175, the section of the German penal code criminalizing homosexual activity), or the letter
A (which stood for , literally "arse fucker"). Later, the use of a pink triangle was established for prisoners identified as homosexual men and transgender women. (
Lesbian and bisexual women and
trans men were not systematically imprisoned; some were classified as "asocial", wearing a
black triangle.) The pink triangle was also assigned to others considered sexual deviants, including
zoophiles and pedophiles The Nazi amendments to Paragraph 175, which turned homosexuality, previously labeled as a minor offense, into a
felony, remained intact in East Germany until 1968. In 2002 the
German government issued official
pardons to
gay men who were convicted by the Nazis.
Rudolf Brazda, one of the last known homosexual concentration camp survivors, died on August 3, 2011, at the age of 98.
Symbols of LGBTQ+ liberation In the 1970s, newly active Australian, European and North American queer liberation advocates began to use the pink triangle to raise awareness of its use in Nazi Germany. In 1972, gay concentration camp survivor
Heinz Heger's memoir (
The Men with the Pink Triangle) brought it to greater public attention. In response, the German gay liberation group issued a call in 1973 for gay men to wear it as a memorial to past victims and to protest continuing discrimination. In the 1975 movie
The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Dr. Frank N. Furter—a
bisexual transvestite—wears a pink triangle badge on one of his outfits. In 1976, Peter Recht, Detlef Stoffel, and Christiane Schmerl made the German documentary (
Pink Triangle? That was such a long time ago...). The design of the
biangles symbol of
bisexuality began with the pink triangle. The biangles symbol was designed by artist Liz Nania as she co-organized a bisexual contingent for the
Second National March on Washington for Lesbian and Gay Rights in 1987. The addition of a blue triangle to the pink triangle in the biangles symbol
contrasts the pink and represents
heterosexuality. The two triangles overlap and form lavender, which represents the "queerness of bisexuality", referencing the
Lavender Menace and 1980s and 1990s
associations of lavender with queerness. Taking a more militant tone, the
AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP) was formed by six gay activists in New York City in 1987, and to draw attention to the disease's disproportionate impact on gay and bisexual men, and the apparent role of "genocidal" queer-antagonism in slowing progress on medical research, adopted an upward-pointing pink triangle on a black field along with the slogan "
SILENCE = DEATH" as its logo. Some use the triangle in this orientation as a specific "reversal" of its usage by the Nazis. The
Pink Panthers Movement in Denver, Colorado, adopted a pink triangle with clawed panther print logo, adapted from the original Pink Panthers Patrol in New York City. In the 1990s, a pink triangle enclosed in a green circle came to be commonly used as a symbol identifying "
safe spaces" for LGBTQ+ people at work or in school. A pink Union Jack, with the blue triangles of the Union Jack changed to pink in reference to the pink triangle symbol, was created by a gay man, David Gwinnutt, to express his "pride in being gay and British." Use of the pink triangle symbol is not without criticism. In 1993, historian Klaus Müller argued that "the pink triangles of the concentration camps became an international symbol of gay and lesbian pride because so few of us are haunted by concrete memories of those who were forced to wear them." In March 2025,
US president Donald Trump shared a link to
The Washington Times, which showed the downward pointed pink triangle overlaid with a
no symbol, in reference to Trump's
anti-DEI policies. File:Bi triangles.svg|The
biangles symbol of bisexuality, designed by artist Liz Nania, features a pink triangle. File:19.Assembly.ActUp.NYC.30March2017 (33609021152).jpg|An
ACT UP member in 2017, displaying the organization's trademark protest sign with an inverted, upward-pointing pink triangle. File:Straightally.svg|An inverted pink triangle surrounded by a green circle, as used as a "
safe space" symbol. File:Gay Pride flag of the United Kingdom.svg|A pink
Union Jack, a pride symbol with the blue triangles of the Union Jack changed to pink in reference to the pink triangle symbol. == Memorials ==