Catalogue Number
NMLH.2024.39
Object Name
flag
People
Anis Akhtar
Description
A purple flag with a white circle in the centre.
This flag was designed by Anis Akhtar, a visually impaired intersex activist.
Intersex people have variations of both primary and secondary sex characteristics such as chromosomes, hormone levels and genital types. Some intersex people are identifiable at birth, and others don't discover they are intersex until later in life, if at all. Some intersex people also identify as transgender and/or part of the LGBTQIA+ community (the I stands for intersex) but others do not, usually if they identify as straight and with the binary gender they were assigned at birth. Intersex activist campaigns at present typically focus around bodily autonomy and reducing the use of 'corrective' cosmetic (not medically necessary) genital surgeries on intersex infants to assign the child a binary gender without their consent. Intersex activists say that where it is medically safe to do so, doctors should wait until the intersex person is old enough to choose if they want to have these surgeries at all.
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