The alliance's literature states that Doerr chose the symbol specifically for its denotative meaning in the context of chemistry and physics: 'a complete exchange of energy–that moment or span of time witness to absolute activity'.
In 1970, graphic designer Tom Doerr selected the lower-case Greek letter lambda (λ) to be the symbol of the New York chapter of the Gay Activists Alliance. The combined male-female symbol (⚦) is used to represent androgyne or transgender people and when additionally combined with the female (♀) and male (♂) symbols (⚧) it indicates gender inclusivity, though it is also used as a transgender symbol. These symbols first appeared in the 1970s. Two interlocking female symbols (⚢) represent a lesbian or the lesbian community, and two interlocking male symbols (⚣) a gay male or the gay male community. In modern science, the singular symbol for Venus is used to represent the female sex, and singular symbol for Mars is used to represent the male sex. The female and male gender symbols are derived from the astronomical symbols for the planets Venus and Mars respectively. Lesbian and gay interlocked gender sex symbols
