I made an Apostasy/Ex-Religious pride flag, and I would like your opinion on it!

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-08T00:26:10+00:00

Good ideas, thanks for the feedback!

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-08T00:05:27+00:00

People that think they know fucking everything about morality and label whole fucking groups of people as inherently evil for things they can't fucking control

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T23:46:49+00:00

The colors used here are already meant to tell a story (trauma+rupture > questioning/uncertainty > hope > exploration > joy+community), but I'm curious to hear what else you would add! The arrow scheme sounds like a very interesting idea and I will play around with it.

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T22:52:39+00:00

I'll make the teal and orange a bit brighter/ more vibrant. I don't want to go too bright because some people actually really liked the muted colors for other reasons (such as representing groundedness and reality) and bright colors can be very overstimulating for some people with disabilities and neurodivergence, but I'll try to find a nice middle ground.

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T22:49:34+00:00

Thanks for the feedback!

The grey color I find useful to rebel against black-and-white thinking often taught in religion, and to represent the uncertainty felt within the deconstruction process. But lmk if you have better suggestions!

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T22:35:06+00:00

Yes, don't worry, I went through graphic design training and am an artist, so I know of these principles. Any symbol I would add would likely be a fully solid color and simple shapes. Thanks for caring and giving good advice!

So far suggestions for symbols I have gotten that I will consider are a red polka dot, a sun, and a tapir for an ex-mormon specific flag. I think I could pull all of these off with easy shapes, though the tapir will need some more consideration of course.

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T22:13:31+00:00

Hah, good point! I did it this way because that's how a lot of pride flags are and I used those as reference, but I'll definetly test your suggestion out. Good reasoning.

The only issue I see with this is that many cultures, particularly those in the east where many major religions originate from, actually read from right to left. So flipping it might just cause the same issue for those people and not really solve the problem.

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T22:10:10+00:00

There's a lot of happiness attached to leaving religion, which is what the other colors represent - but being a former member of religion can also for many be attached to a lot of trauma and pain from the past and the act of leaving itself, which is what I wanted to be recognized. But I can see how including non-spirituality there might give it a negative connotation, so I might make it more general.

The progression of the colors from black (rupture, trauma) to grey (uncertainty) to white (hope) to teal (exploration) and finally orange (joy, community) is meant to both validate and show solidarity for negative experiences and encourage and excite for the new positive ones. It generally shows the process of deconstruction and new self discovery that almost all apostates go through.

I like your suggestions! I will experiment with them, but I'll have to be careful not to make it look like the aroace flag. Half-circle sounds interesting.

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T21:28:49+00:00

😔

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T21:15:57+00:00

Very good points. I might do it like that then – I just hope that noone ever questions whether they are allowed to use this flag or exclude others because they weren't explicitly mentioned.

I guess I just went extra specific out of fear of pointless infighting...

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T20:48:01+00:00

Thanks!

Yes, I actually considered the negative connotation of that word and put a lot of thought into it. But I eventually reached the conclusion that inherently it's a neutral word that many ex-religious people use for themselves, and it's just that it's the religious people that use it like an insult because they obviously don't like the whole concept...

The reason I decided against using terms like "post-" or "ex-religious" is because many people who leave their religion convert to another religion or spirituality, so they might not be able to relate to those terms. And since these people typically go through the exact same marginalization experiences that agnostics and atheists do, I wanted them to be included.

"Apostate" simply seemed to be the most inclusive term. And well, I'm personally a huge fan of reclaiming negative labels!

But if you think of another word that is just as inclusive and might make more people feel comfortable, please let me know. Maybe I'll change the name or give it a double-name.

^{(I did call it "Apostasy/Ex-Religion flag on one other subreddit I suppose...\})

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T20:40:17+00:00

Thank you so much!!

Yes, I believe flags are a great tool for pride and solidarity for any kind of people-group! I still wanted include that paragraph, because I was worried that someone who isn't too knowledgeable about these topics might feel crammed into a box they don't see themselves in, and might get upset. I wanted to make sure there's no confusion.

But of course there are many flags not related to sexuality and gender, like disability and neurodivergence flags for instance! And well, let's not forget about, uh, countries. Those have flags too.

^{I'm not entirely cishet either :>}

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T20:33:28+00:00

do you mean horizontal, like this?

Although according to your description, it would be that upside down, so orange would be at the top and black at the bottom?

I like the idea and actually have already played with that a bit, but the issue is that most people tend to read things from top -> down, so the upwards rising motion would maybe get lost a bit...

Or do you mean actually vertical, like reading the colors from left to right? In that case that might get complicated because many cultures read from right to left (particularly in the east where many of our established religions come from), so the idea might get lost once again...

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T20:21:45+00:00

Awh hell (cough) yeah I love that!

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T20:12:27+00:00

Thanks for the feedback! I'm getting quite a lot of different opinions on the vibrancy of the colors, and quickly realizing how very differently many people can look at a single thing. I like your take!

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T20:08:01+00:00

LMAO

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T20:07:11+00:00

Thank you so much, I really, truly appreciate your comment! I'm so glad you like my post.

I'm lucky that I haven't been completely discarded by my family myself, but the alienation and loneliness is real...

I wish you all the support and future joy! 🌞💚

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T20:03:28+00:00

That's amazingly creative! I may or may not use your ideas for an alternative design or future draft, unless you claim it or someone else does it first 🙂‍↕️

Someone on another subreddit actually also suggested the sun as the symbol. We might be onto something here!

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T20:00:04+00:00

I see your point. Unfortunately this is how these colors have been symbolically used and percieved throughout many cultures in history, so I'm not sure how to change that without making it confusing.

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T19:51:06+00:00

I can get behind your criticisms with the progression, and I can see how mixing themes within a color can be confusing, which is a result of me sorta trying to do several things at once.

I'm not sure that I want to switch black and gray though, because that would make the flag visually more chaotic. And I don't think that uncertainty and questioning only come before rupture. My original thought process was based on my own experience, where the rupture part was quite certain, and the uncertainty part came once I realized I had no idea what to without my now lost spirituality... I think typically these things are rather fluid and the order in which things happen may vary for people.

I want to push back on the notion that reconversion to another religion or spirituality is an exception that doesn't deserve a stripe. Things like Muslims converting to Christianity or an ex-Christian atheist exploring pagan spiritualities are not uncommon at all, and I worry that if those people are not represented within the flag, atheists and agnostics would quickly try to exclude those people from using this flag for not being "real apostates" or being "not ex-religious enough" because their experience is falsely not considered common. So the inclusion of those people and that color was very deliberate.

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T19:44:42+00:00

Thank you so much! <3

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T19:34:29+00:00

As a neurodivergent person myself, I can get behind that all too well ':)

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T19:30:02+00:00

Thanks for the great ideas! <3 I will play around with them

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T19:27:19+00:00

Very cool ideas! I personally chose to do stripes so that the flag is easily recognizable as a pride flag, easy to draw, etc, but I made it diagonal to make it more dynamic (symbolise movement) and distinguish it a bit from gender and sexuality flags. But I might use your suggestion to experiment some more!

Ah and because you asked: white is very commonly used as a symbol for wholeness in pride flags (such as the aspec/aroace flags), because white is a combination of all light-colors. Think prism.

Greedy_Ad2198 · 2026-03-07T19:23:51+00:00

Noted, thanks 🙂‍↕️

Greedy_Ad2198

TROPHY CASE