District of Columbia

Recovery at the Triangle Club

Coming together as a group to fight a common addiction

Published

2 years ago

October 26, 2023

If you need help with an addiction, the Triangle Club offers an array of meetings and resources. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)

On Sunday, between the Dupont Italian Kitchen, where the tables are filled with the boozy brunches of the kickball gays, and Mikko, where a young couple is celebrating their anniversary with some Champagne, the door to a row-house opens, and all at once, a crowd pours forth onto the stairs. Only the stairs keep on filling. These folks aren’t leaving. They’ve only left the building to come to the stairs, just to chat. It’s as though 100 people all decided to go for a smoke out front, all at the same time. But if you ask them why they’re there, you’ll get only the vaguest of answers. “We’re just coming from a meeting,” one will say. “It’s a clubhouse,” says another.

There are good reasons for this vagueness. The Triangle Club is a center for queer folk to attend recovery meetings: Overeaters Anonymous, Alcoholics Anonymous, Crystal Meth Anonymous, Sexual Compulsives Anonymous. It’s part of the very mission of these groups to protect the privacy of their members. But these groups also want those in the queer community who need the support to know that they’re there. And so the folks at the Triangle Club were kind enough to welcome the Blade into their space for a few meetings, to see how things worked and shed some light on what they’re all about.

The Club had its kickoff meeting in 1988, during the AIDS crisis. Churches weren’t particularly enthusiastic about hosting gay recovery meetings in their back rooms. And so the Club sought to provide a safe place for those meetings to take place. At the time of the club’s founding, it was estimated that gays and lesbians were twice as likely to report problems with alcohol abuse than heterosexuals. One would hope that things might have changed in the intervening years. But according to a government report released this summer, that figure has barely improved. (The government report did not collect any statistics on transgender people.)

Of course there is no single reason queer people develop problems with drugs and alcohol. But one in particular struck me, especially as a reason I heard coming from a lot of the younger folk at the Triangle Club. “I thought meth was a prerequisite for going out,” said one. “I thought that’s what you did.” Another said, “I drank to find community. And then I drank to numb myself when I didn’t find it in the gay community.” Again and again, I heard stories about turning to drugs and alcohol as a way of finding connection, and as a way of coping with the failure to find connection.

*(Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)*

And so while I heard a lot of gratitude for the role the meetings at the Triangle Club played in people’s recovery, I also heard a lot of gratitude for the community of the Triangle Club itself. It wasn’t just that the Club helped people turn away from an unhealthy way of solving their problems. It’s that it gave them what they were really looking for in the first place: a community they could call their own.

Improbably, as I left a meeting of Crystal Meth Anonymous, I found myself wishing to be an addict in recovery. To have a place to share things that would go unsaid among friends and family, let alone therapists. To take part, week after week, in one another’s mission for a more fulfilling life. To be present for the absolute raucousness, as when one gentleman described living on meth as “wearing a fur coat into a swimming pool,” and then “turning the wave-machine on.” To hear the applause that only someone four days sober could receive. But what kind of destructive, life-threatening wish was I making? I couldn’t possibly be serious.

Many of us in the queer community are exhausted by drinking, if not drugging, our way into it. That exhaustion might not rise to the level of addiction, but this has the perverse consequence of not driving us to seek alternative forms of belonging. One of the men I interviewed kept talking of the “sober community,” and my ears perked up. Perhaps there was a broader community of folks, of which those in recovery were only a part, that wasn’t centered around substance use.

“The sober community absolutely extends beyond the Triangle Club,” he told me. “There are a bunch of other gay meetings that go on.” This wasn’t exactly what I hoped to hear. What a sorry state we’re in, I couldn’t help but feel that to be part of the sober community was to be in recovery. As though the community of substance use were so mandatory that it had to drive you to your own personal edge in order for you to find community in sobriety.

The Triangle Club should not be overly romanticized, and they’d be the first to tell you. People talked of trying to find fellowship at the club in the past, and not necessarily succeeding. Being one of two Black people in the room, only for the other to drop out of the program. Or of the demands of service, dragging yourself out late Friday night to chair a meeting, or sponsoring someone for the first time and being scared that you aren’t the right one to advise them. But I think it’s a testament to the space that these things could be said in the space. The meetings aren’t a place of mandatory optimism, but honest experience. And what good is a meeting for sharing honest experience if you can’t share your negative experiences too?

I had hoped, as part of this feature, to attend a meeting of Sexual Compulsives Anonymous. The two meetings I appealed to were kind enough to hold a vote on whether they would open their doors—but in the end they opted to remain private. One gentleman from the meetings volunteered to share a little of what these meetings were all about. Recovery meetings in general depend on coming together as a group to fight a common addiction. But “S” meetings, as the gentleman described them, can’t take “coming together” lightly, nor a “common addiction” lightly.

To begin with, sexual addiction is not as straightforwardly defined as addiction to drugs or alcohol. What sobriety is for one person is not what sobriety is for another. One person might be trying to curtail a masturbation habit. But for others? “That simply isn’t an option,” the gentleman said. And unlike recovery meetings for substances, which can ban substances from the room, the same can’t as easily be said for “S” meetings. We’re sexual beings, and so inevitably, to bring yourself into a room is to bring sexuality along with it. The recovery meetings at the Triangle Club usually end with the group joining hands to say the serenity prayer. But this can’t be a given at “S” meetings, where joining hands might be violating someone’s boundary.

With the pandemic waning, most recovery meetings have slowly started to transition away from video format back to in-person. But “S” meetings have been more reluctant to do so, and most have stuck with a hybrid format. One veteran of Al-Anon voiced his relief at coming back to the rooms. “You can’t hug a square!” I suspect that’s the very reason “S” meetings have been slow to return.

Part of my disappointment in not attending the “S” meetings was how central they seemed to be to a queer recovery organization. Substance abuse might disproportionately affect the queer community, but it is the addicts who are queer, not the addictions. If the addiction is to love or sex, however, the addiction itself is inextricably queer. Aren’t the “S” meetings the heart, in a sense, of the Triangle Club? But a conversation with a gentleman from Alcoholics Anonymous had me rethinking this. “[Accepting you’re an alcoholic,] it’s similar to coming out as gay,” he said. “There are people out there who view it as a moral failing, but it’s just part of who I am.”

The experience of coming out is so central to being queer. How could coming out as an addict have nothing whatsoever to do with it? The same story of a newfound, authentic life was as common to the folks at the Triangle Club as it would be to anyone who comes out as queer.

(CJ Higgins is a postdoctoral fellow with the Alexander Grass Humanities Institute at Johns Hopkins University.)

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District of Columbia

Opening of Pride exhibition at Smithsonian’s African art museum postponed until 2026

Exhibition initially planned to open before WorldPride

Published

2 days ago

May 7, 2025

Lou Chibbaro Jr.

National Museum of African Art (Photo by Melissa Kopka/Bigstock)

An exhibition of the works of art from LGBTQ African artists at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African Art was abruptly postponed due to “our current budgetary situation,” a museum spokesperson told the Washington Post.

The exhibition is entitled, “Here: Pride and Belonging in African Art.”

The Post, which broke the story about LGBTQ exhibition’s postponement on May 6, reports that the museum denied that the postponement was brought about by the Trump-Vance administration’s executive order restricting certain content at Smithsonian museums or the current political climate.

“This exhibition was on a very ambitious schedule to meet WorldPride, and we did not have enough time to secure all the private sector funds we had hoped to due to shifts in the fundraising environment,” the Post quoted Smithsonian spokesperson Jennifer Mitchell as saying.

Mitchell was referring to plans to open the exhibition in late May to coincide with the WorldPride events, which are scheduled to take place in D.C. from May 17-June 6.

The Post reports that the exhibition is now expected to open in February 2026 and to close at its originally scheduled closing time in August 2026.

The National Museum of African Art’s website describes the LGBTQ exhibition as consisting of “artists across Africa and the diaspora whose artworks connect to their identities and experiences as LGBTQ+ people.” It says those people are “featured as the first continental and diasporic survey of its scale and scope outside of Africa.”

The website statement adds, “The show assembles artists whose work has implicitly or explicitly challenged local and global legacies of homophobia and bigotry, offering images of alternative futures as well as celebrations of intimacy, faith, family, and joy.”

The Post reported that Mitchell “declined to say whether donors had withdrawn their support, explaining that she could not comment on private donors relations.”

Sources familiar with the Smithsonian have pointed out that private donors, including corporations, are the main source of funding for specific Smithsonian exhibitions. The federal government, with funds approved by Congress, traditionally has covered costs supporting the museum buildings, infrastructure, and upkeep.

District of Columbia

Bet Mishpachah to honor Fauci with lifetime achievement award

As part of its 50th anniversary celebration, Bet Mishpachah will present the Harvey Milk Chesed Award to Dr. Anthony S. Fauci in recognition of his groundbreaking leadership in infectious disease research and decades of service to global public health.

Published

2 days ago

May 7, 2025

Joe Reberkenny

Bet Mishpachah, Washington’s LGBTQ synagogue, on Wednesday will honor former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci with an award for his lifelong devotion to public health and service.

Dr. Fauci will receive the Harvey Milk Chesed Award on May 7 at 7 p.m. in Cafritz Hall at the Edlavitch Jewish Community Center of Washington, D.C., at 1529 16th Street, N.W.

The award is given annually to someone who has made “outstanding” contributions to the LGBTQ+ and Jewish communities that “exemplify the virtue of chesed, or ‘lovingkindness.’” Fauci’s commitment to combating infectious diseases-HIV/AIDS, respiratory infections, diarrheal diseases, tuberculosis, malaria, Ebola, Zika, and COVID-19-as well as his leadership in public health policy, embodies this value, according to Bet Mishpachah President Joseph Pomper.

“Bet Mishpachah is honored to have this opportunity to recognize Dr. Fauci for his lifelong commitment to the health and well-being of millions of people around the world,” said Pomper. “As members of the LGBTQ+ community, we are especially thankful for his courage and dedication in the fight against HIV/AIDS. He stood with us at a time when our community was often shunned and stigmatized. Today, as members of our community are again under attack, his leadership in that crisis and throughout his career serves as a shining example of the spirit of chesed (lovingkindness) that we honor with this award.”

Following the presentation, Fauci will join his longtime friend and colleague Jeff Levi — emeritus professor at the Milken Institute School of Public Health at George Washington University and former deputy director of the White House Office of National AIDS Policy — for a conversation.

Fauci advised seven presidents on key health issues, most prominently HIV/AIDS, and helped create the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), which has saved more than 20 million lives globally.

The event is part of Bet Mishpachah’s 50th anniversary celebration. Registration is closed, but waitlist requests can be sent to [email protected].

District of Columbia

WorldPride permits for National Mall have yet to be approved

Organizers say application process is going according to plans

Published

2 days ago

May 7, 2025

Lou Chibbaro Jr.

The Equality March for Unity & Pride was held in 2009. A June 8 International Rally and March for Freedom is planned during WorldPride but permits have not yet been approved. (Washington Blade file photo by Michael Key)

Less than two weeks before the first events of WorldPride 2025 in D.C. are scheduled to begin on May 17, the U.S. National Park Service has yet to officially approve the permits needed for what organizers say will be a small number of WorldPride events scheduled to take place on the National Mall and other federal park grounds.

In response to a request by the Washington Blade for information on the status of the permit applications, National Park Service Spokesperson Brian Hall said in a May 2 email only that at least one of the permits “is still being worked on and not final.”

Hall sent the Blade a chart showing what appeared to be five WorldPride events under consideration for a permit, with four of them set to take place on federal park grounds at or near the Lincoln Memorial.

Ashley Smith, president of Capital Pride Alliance, the nonprofit D.C. LGBTQ organization playing the lead role in organizing WorldPride 2025, said most of the several dozen WorldPride events expected to take place between May 17 and June 8 would be held at locations other than the National Mall and other federal spaces.

“There is really only a small number that we’re doing this with the National Park Service, because we’re not on a lot of federal land for everything,” he told the Blade. “But we have been in communication with them, and our team is consistently communicating with them,” Smith said.

Smith added, “We feel strongly that we will be able to move forward. I don’t believe there are major concerns with us not being able to move forward. We’re making sure we’re providing all the proper information we need to be successful.”

Some LGBTQ activists have expressed concern that the Trump administration, which has put in place policies hostile to the LGBTQ community, especially the trans community, might attempt to block the permits. But another National Park Service spokesperson said in a statement that the permit approval process does not take into consideration the political message of those applying for permits.

“Applications are approved provided no applications were previously submitted for the same dates and locations, and the organizers are able to ensure the preservation of park resources and the safety of all participants, park visitors, and community members,” according to NPS spokesperson Michael Litterst.

“It is a deliberate process that does not consider the content of the message presented,” Litterst added in a statement to the Blade last November after Trump’s election as president.

Sahand Miraminy, the Capital Pride Alliance director of operations, told the Blade in a statement that it is “customary” for the National Park Service to hold off on issuing a permit until about one week before an event is scheduled to begin.

“Oftentimes, this is also tied to the agency’s cost estimates for cleanup, turf restoration, and law enforcement reimbursements,” Miraminy said. “Typically, the National Park Service also has a policy of not sharing detailed event plans for applicants, and we certainly appreciate keeping our detailed event information secure, as it often pertains to the health and safety of our participants,” he said.

“We don’t believe it’s necessary to share with the broad public the exact permits we hold for our events as some reservations are tied to infrastructure and security measures,” Miraminy said, adding that the Capital Pride website is a “great resource” finding the numerous WorldPride events.

The website shows at least one leading event will take place on the National Mall: A June 8 International Rally and March for Freedom will begin on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial and travel from there to near the U.S. Capitol Building, the website states. It says participants in the march will then join the WorldPride Festival and Concert on Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W. near the Capitol scheduled to take place June 7-8.

Vincent Slatt, an official with D.C.’s Rainbow History Project, is among the lead organizers of that organization’s WorldPride exhibition called “Pickets, Protests and Parades: The History of Gay Pride in Washington, D.C.” The exhibition, scheduled for May 17 through July 7, will be held in Freedom Plaza, the federal parklands site on Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., between 13th and 14th streets.

Slatt points out that Rainbow History Project has applied for its own National Park Service permit for the exhibition and, like Capital Pride Alliance, is still waiting for the permit’s approval.

“I can share great news,” Slatt said in a May 4 message to the Blade, “Rainbow History Project had our latest meeting with NPS this morning and she stated that we are on track to receive our permit. There are no problems expected.”

Slatt added, “As of this morning, our permit is only pending the finalized copy of our insurance and safety plan. These are things my board will vote to approve at our May meeting. Everything looks GREAT for RHP and our activity.”