Gay carabiner

So, it's just for myself."

It could be a sign that times have changed, especially in the LGBTQIA+ friendly area that is Sydney's inner west, where queerness is almost assumed. Besides Chappell Roan and Azealia Banks, one of the staple sounds I’ve heard over the past three years has been the jingle jangle of carabiners.

Although the term “carabiner” can be traced back to the 16th century, the modern carabiner we’re most familiar with today was first produced in 1911 by German climber Otto Herzog for hiking purposes.

Examining this history of queer culture and its impact is very much important. Straight-looking Gen-Z guys have started clipping them onto their Dickies jeans. During the 70s, there was widespread agreement that wearing the latch on the left side of the body indicated one was a top; while wearing it on the right indicated they were a bottom.

Even Carrie Bradshaw was spotted wearing one around her neck during a second-season episode of And Just Like That.”

Despite this, the lesbian latch has certainly stood the test of time as a part of queer iconography. Even though the handkerchief was mostly worn by gay men, lesbian women had a history of sporting handkerchiefs as well.

All of these methods of flagging have found their ways into casual queer attire.

Unlike other lesbian symbols, such as lavenders or the labrys, carabiners are versatile, easily wearable, and discreet. And is it something young people – especially those in queer communities – still participate in today?

Flagging explained

Flagging isn't just about what you wear, it's about what's expressed by what you wear.

In the new ABC iview series The Way We Wore, fashion historian from Adelaide University Madeleine Seys explains how clothes played a big role in the queer community, dating back to the 1800s.

She says fashion was an important tool for LGBTQIA+ people to find each other and build their communities in Australia, especially when homosexuality was criminalised.

"Flagging begins with queer men in the 19th century," she says.

"[They'd use] particular colours, objects or symbols to indicate their queerness to other men, other people in the community."

Watch The Way We Wore on ABC iview

The Way We Wore uncovers the cultural and historical significance of fashion, revealing how the clothes we wear can give intimate and surprising insights into how the country has evolved.

Adopters of "the hanky code" would wear a hanky in their back pocket, with different sides and colours communicating different kinks.

For example, a grey hanky hanging out of your back left pocket would indicate you're a bondage top, while a coral hanky in your back right pocket could flag to others that you're not against licking some toes.

Dr Seys says flagging let queer folk safely find like-minded individuals, and "deflect the threat from the outside world".

Is flagging still a thing today?

While the hanky code seems to have gone out of fashion among young gay people (after all, you can just add a line on Grindr), there is one key item that many queer people, especially women, still use: the carabiner.

When exploring the op shops in Sydney's Newtown, multiple people admitted to using the humble carabiner to flag their sexuality to potential love interests.

"I call it a carbonara" Seren says, momentarily unable to remember its real name.

"I need to get a new one, but I want it to be really big and chunky.

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'It's pretty obvious I'm queer': We asked young people how they use fashion to express themselves

From badges for your politics, jerseys for your sporting affiliations or eyeliner for your goth status, there's no shortage of ways that people use style to mark their identity.

This has been particularly important over history for LGBTQIA+ people to subtly signal who they are and what they like.

There's even a word to describe this phenomenon: flagging

So, how did flagging actually work?

With that in mind, flagging (signaling your queerness using some form of code) has become a vital part of both queer fashion and queer communication.

There have been many different ways in which people have flagged their queerness over the decades, but one notable trend was the association of different types of flowers for queerness.

I'm still part of the queer community."

The argument against flagging

For many of the young people we talked to, dressing a certain way to flag their queerness isn't something that's particularly important to them.

"I think I did [engage in flagging] maybe a couple years ago when I first came out, like: Oh, I'm queer and I want to use my clothing to express that," Sammy says.

"But now I'm very comfortable in myself and I don't think I personally need to show off that I am any certain way.

This could be a patch, pin, decal, or design, but there are still more subtle ways in which queers flag. Sappho was a female Greek poet who was famous for her love of women, and the word "lesbian” comes from her home island of Lesbos. In this sense, the carabiner was the lesbian version of the hanky code, a system where gay men would communicate their sexual preferences by wearing a coloured bandana in the left or right back pocket.

In recent years, the carabiner has become a more mainstream fashion accessory.

I'm just okay with who I am."

Sammy loves being fluid with her clothing, going for ultra girly one day, and then an oversized unisex look the next.

"I very much have come into: I'm going to dress how I want to dress and it's not going to be for any certain person."

"If it's to attract a masc chick, like, who knows what that even means?

Androgyny has also been an important part of this history — gay men frequently wear outfits seen as more effeminate and lesbians may dress in more traditionally masculine clothes. Some of Sappho’s surviving poetry discusses the adornment of a lover (of which she had many at one time) in wreaths of violets, as well as hyacinths.

Many queer people today still have used methods like these to flag in places where it’s still not very safe to do so.

This trend is undeniable, with there now being multiple queer climbing clubs in the UK such as Not So Trad, Climbing QTs UK, and GOC Adventure Out.

DIVA magazine celebrates 30 years in print in 2024. From then on, many gay men would wear green carnations on their lapels in order to show their sexuality.

So-called ‘sapphic’ violets served a similar purpose, though predominantly for women who loved other women.

If you like what we do, then get behind LGBTQIA media and keep us going for another generation. Over the next few decades, these became an easy and practical way for working-class people, as well as climbers, to carry around equipment or keys.

It’s difficult to trace the history of the carabiner as a queer accessory, but many draw it back to World War Two.

With hundreds of thousands of men away fighting during the Second World War, labour shortages became acute leading women to fill these roles on the production line.

Carabiners served women in the blue-collar workforce as a multifunctional tool. However, one important thing members of the community have in common is the need to subtly flag their queerness to each other.

I was speaking with some of my friends the other week and a lot of them suggested that the continual popularity of carabiners has to do with rock-climbing becoming a genuinely popular sport in the lesbian community.