The Bovigender Moo-nifesto

Flag designed by yours truly, with input from Bragd and final vectorwork by Arina-Artemis.

What does the flag mean?

It's very much a mashup of the nonbinary and nonhuman flags, using them as a foundation to paint its own picture, something new and moo.

The colors can mean the same things they do in their parent flags, but they also don't have to mean exclusively those same things. There is room for interpretation, double meanings, etc. As such, rather than focus on the colors themselves, I'll focus on what shapes they take, as that's where this flag stands out

• Green is taken from the nonhuman flag and shaped into a rolling pasture for us cows to graze in.
• Purple takes from both the nonbinary and nonhuman flags, shaped into clouds that dance above said pasture.
• White is again present in both flags, forming the background here, almost like the sky separating the hills and clouds.
• Black was only given meaning in the nonbinary flag, but present in both (the nonhuman symbol was black). Here it takes the form of cowprint on that white background, for what I'd imagine are fairly obvious bovine reasons.
• Yellow comes from the nonbinary flag, adorning a golden cowskull/cowbell symbol. This was intended to be an inclusive symbol of bovinity, like the cowprint. Udders were too gendered, for example, there are plenty of moos out there without 'em, bulls or otherwise.

Who is this flag (and gender) for?

There already exist flags and related kingenders for cowgender and bullgender, but they treat "cow" and "bull" as standins for femme and masc, and that leaves some of us moos out. this is a cow gender, but not one explicitly for gendered cows.

I would imagine both of them, as kingenders, can fit alongside, or even beneath this flag, I tried to design it as inclusively as possible because the last thing i want is to exclude a moo from our broad herd of genderfucked hoofers. I'm sure used to bein' the odd one out that doesn't fit a mold, after all, so I wanted this to be a nice open field for our diverse herds to graze on.

This is for Gender:Cow, really, which includes the Cow Genders, if i had to say it in one phrase. It's for when you're none gender with left beef, or it's for any amount of bovine pride you have in yourself. It's as open as the pasture it abstractly represents is broad.

Why did I make this flag?

When I found cowgender and bullgender, I found yet another place I didn't fit into, as a they/them/moo genderfucked Cow Online (and beyond), and I wanted to remedy that not just for mooself, but for the others I'm certain are out there. I know a handful of other they/them/moos like the aforementioned Bragd who helped inspire moo to make this, and brought the idea to use green for a meadow, which then inspired me to draw from the nonhuman flag.

I've been sorta, ruminating on whether I'd fully describe mooself as such, i think "gender: cow" sorta sits with me more fully, but I wanted to leave room for other cows whose identities drift into ΘΔ.

I posted a lil finger-painted sketch to cohost that I'd made in Chrome Canvas on my chromebook's touchscreen, after working on it in a conversation with Bragd, and then both infinityio and arina-artemis brought their own takes on it to life in vector art programs. Ultimately, Arina's take won my heart but I would be remiss not to thank and credit everyone that has been involved with the design at any point.

How can you use this flag?

The SVG and a large jpg/png are available for download on Dropbox since that's just the one I opened first, I might add a Google Drive mirror later.

Use it as you see fit! But like, if you get it printed as a sticker or somethin, help a bull out and share the link with moo!!! I'd want a couple! I'm sure i could go grab a formal license agreement but like. At least give credit with what you're doing, if it's the kind of thing you'd do that for. That kinda thing. Use it in good faith, or whatever.

arina-artemis is already trying to remix it as the basis for other farm animal pride flags, and further remixing is obviously welcome. This was a collaborative effort from the start, and it's once it's out of my hooves y'all're welcome to find ways to remix it, same "probably nice to give credit in your remix" rules apply.

I'm trying to think of the funniest and most cow-punniest closing line, but I'm failing. "Happy trails" is a bit too inspecific, even joking about cattle drives. So instead, we'll do the sincere conclusion. Thanks for reading, and if this resonates with you, I hope you find yourself comfy under this cowprinted banner!!

Posted originally to cohost on June 29th, 2023. Available on tumblr, as well.