Even if we were starting from scratch, ignoring the historical connotations of this flag, it would be regarded as racist and utterly unsuitable for use as a Chinese national symbol. The colours represented what were, at the time of its creation, the five recognised ethnic groups of China, those being, from top to bottom, Han, Manchu, Mongols, Muslims, and Tibetans.
The modern Chinese state recognises fifty-six ethnic groups. This is also not counting the aborignial peoples of Taiwan, all of whom the Chinese government consider to be collectively “Gaoshan people” but which the Taiwanese government considers 16 different ethnic groups, potentially more depending on who you ask.
Yes, the great Chinese empire is as diverse as any.
Even if you only include ethnic groups with more than five million people, that’s still ten different groups, and a ten-colour flag would be pretty jarring, to say the least, with one very famous exception of an 11-colour flag that is still rather aesthetically pleasing. And, of course, as the meme would imply, people pretty much automatically assume that any flag with lots of colours arranged in a horizontal bar represents an LGBTQ identity. LGBTQ acceptance is pretty low overall in Mainland China compared to Europe or North America so I don’t think the prospect of allowing the Americans to mock a future Chinese national symbol as a “gay flag” will go over too well.
On a barely-related note, this flag redesign idea is found pretty frequently on the Chinese Internet and seems to be popular with Mainlanders.
Can’t say whether it would go down well with Taiwanese people though.
Even if we were starting from scratch, ignoring the historical connotations of this flag, it would be regarded as racist and utterly unsuitable for use as a Chinese national symbol. The colours represented what were, at the time of its creation, the five recognised ethnic groups of China, those being, from top to bottom, Han, Manchu, Mongols, Muslims, and Tibetans.
The modern Chinese state recognises fifty-six ethnic groups. This is also not counting the aborignial peoples of Taiwan, all of whom the Chinese government consider to be collectively “Gaoshan people” but which the Taiwanese government considers 16 different ethnic groups, potentially more depending on who you ask.
Yes, the great Chinese empire is as diverse as any.
Even if you only include ethnic groups with more than five million people, that’s still ten different groups, and a ten-colour flag would be pretty jarring, to say the least, with one very famous exception of an 11-colour flag that is still rather aesthetically pleasing. And, of course, as the meme would imply, people pretty much automatically assume that any flag with lots of colours arranged in a horizontal bar represents an LGBTQ identity. LGBTQ acceptance is pretty low overall in Mainland China compared to Europe or North America so I don’t think the prospect of allowing the Americans to mock a future Chinese national symbol as a “gay flag” will go over too well.
On a barely-related note, this flag redesign idea is found pretty frequently on the Chinese Internet and seems to be popular with Mainlanders.
Can’t say whether it would go down well with Taiwanese people though.
I think that’s really progressive that they can enumerate all of their ethnic groups.