2022 YIR: Swastika Mars Atlanta’s Rainbow Intersection
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2022 YIR: Swastika Mars Atlanta’s Rainbow Intersection

Dave revisits an upsetting story from earlier this year about a swastika having been spray painted on the iconic Rainbow Crosswalk.

By Dave Schechter December 22, 2022, 3:32 pm Edit

Dave Schechter is a veteran journalist whose career includes writing and producing reports from Israel and elsewhere in the Middle East.

A swastika spray-painted on the “rainbow” crosswalks at the intersection at Piedmont and 10th Street in Atlanta was power-washed away by a city crew within hours of its discovery. // Photo courtesy of Adam Van Wickel
A swastika spray-painted on the “rainbow” crosswalks at the intersection at Piedmont and 10th Street in Atlanta was power-washed away by a city crew within hours of its discovery. // Photo courtesy of Adam Van Wickel

One of Atlanta’s most recognizable intersections was vandalized on Aug. 17 with a spray-painted swastika.

Within hours of the swastika being discovered on the rainbow-colored crosswalk at Piedmont Avenue and 10th Street, a City of Atlanta crew worked through a rainstorm to power-wash away the symbol.

A photograph provided to the AJT showed the swastika before its removal. The crosswalk’s color scheme reflects the LGBTQ+ flag: stripes of red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet.

Two days later, the intersection was vandalized again. Atlanta police took into custody a 30-year-old man suspected of previously defacing the intersection, as well as a nearby church. He was charged with three counts of second-degree criminal damage to property, criminal trespass, and interference with government property.

A statement by the Southeast regional office of the Anti-Defamation League read: “We have been seeing the normalization of hatred and antisemitism seeping into everyday life over the past several years. We are disturbed by this horrible incident which is an unfortunate reminder that we all need to work together to fight hate. Incidents like this serve only to intimidate and harass marginalized communities. We are pleased to see the City of Atlanta take quick action to remove this symbol of hate on the Pride crosswalk at 10th and Piedmont. There is no place for hateful symbols like this in our community.”

The multi-colored crosswalks were installed for the Atlanta Gay Pride Festival in October 2015.

Then-Mayor Kasim Reed announced in 2017 — one year after the mass killing of patrons at a gay nightclub in Orlando — that the rainbow crosswalks would remain, in recognition of Atlanta’s LGBTQ+ community.

Earlier in 2022, metal plates were installed at the intersection after street racers spun their vehicles there, leaving “donuts” of rubber tread.

The swastika — a symbol used independently, and benignly, by many cultures, according to the ADL — was adopted as an emblem by the German Nazi Party in 1920. “Gay men, in particular, were subject to harassment, arrest, incarceration and even castration. In Nazi eyes, gay men were weak and unfit to be soldiers, as well as unlikely to have children and thereby contribute to the racial struggle for Aryan dominance,” according to the website of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.

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