At Freedom Plaza in Washington, DC, the Rainbow History Project has an outdoor exhibition on display through July 6 called “Pickets, Protests, and Parades: The History of Gay Pride in Washington.” On about ten giant cubes are infographics and photos of local Queer history spanning from 1965 to the present day. My husband and I were just passing through on our way between tourist stops in DC and happened to notice it, so there wasn’t time to digest it in full — but one wall of one of the cubes quickly caught my eye: “The Millennium Marches Onward,” about the 2000 Millennium March on Washington for Equality and its “mixed legacy” after being mired in controversy due to a “top-down, undemocratic structure” led by the Human Rights Campaign rather than grassroots organizers.
I was at that march, which serendipitously occurred on my 24th birthday: April 30, 2000. To me, that was largely a sign that I had to be there. This was also during the year I worked at the Seattle Gay News, which meant I was aware of many of these controversies I never would have known about otherwise. In activist and Queer journalist circles, the Millennium March’s controversies, the calls for boycotts, and particularly its lack of clarity of purpose, were widely known. All of that mattered little to me in my twenties: planning the trip and just being there meant a great deal to me.
That was 25 years ago, and this year, after another two and a half decades of both amazing national progress and recent, dispiriting setbacks, Washington, DC hosted WorldPride. The Capital Pride Alliance officially submitted its bid to host in 2021, and it was selected in 2022 — both during the Biden administration, a time when there was still a lot of naïve conviction that Trump would never return to the White House.
Trump’s reelection in 2024 had wide-ranging, immediate ripples of consequence, and WorldPride 2025 was no exception: some corporate sponsors backed out; the Kennedy Center, now packed with Trump appointees, canceled all WorldPride events it planned to host; and many travelers, both international and domestic, canceled plans to attend due to safety concerns amid a coordinated attack on Queer rights by this administration.
Don't let them win
Which brings me to my personal perspective and experience on all this. I had more than one person express shock when I told them I was going to WorldPride in Washington. DC. One actually said to me, “I wouldn’t be caught dead there!” They acted like I was putting safety or maybe even my life in danger, that I should expect to get spit on or have eggs thrown at me or maybe even shot, like God knows what could happen.
Days before we flew out there, I saw a video posted to Threads of a man angrily tearing a rainbow wrap from a streetlamp, the replies packed with people expressing anger at seeing such flagrant homophobia and dismay that WorldPride hadn’t been canceled outright due to safety concerns.
I resisted all this from the start. Times like these are when courage is needed most, and in response to the backsliding of Queer rights, that’s all the more reason to be there! When they silence us, when they frighten us, they win. I’m not about to let them win.
And, more notably, people far too easily forget that whipping each other into a frenzy on social media is rarely reflective of real life; one anecdotal incident is not evidence of horrendous abuse on every corner. Most importantly, people around the country seem to have no idea that the city of Washington is a largely autonomous entity, and while it is beholden to the US Congress in ways no other American city is (one of a great many compelling cases for DC statehood), it operates far more independently of Congress, and certainly the president, than people think. Washington, DC is actually one of the most progressive cities in the country, with one of the highest per capita Queer populations of any major American city, and I found it to be a strikingly welcoming place to visit.
I happened also to be at WorldPride in Sydney, Australia, in 2023. I was struck and moved by the numbers of rainbow flags and amount of Pride paraphernalia on the streets and in storefronts all over town, something I said at the time you don’t tend to see in US cities. Walking around Washington, DC, I found the citywide welcoming atmosphere, with rainbows and Progress Pride flags all over the place, to be surprisingly comparable.
Community over fear
Which is to say: in spite of all of these concerns — some of them founded, many of them not — I truly had a blast, in Washington DC overall and at WorldPride 2025 in particular. There were too many related events to count, and my husband and I could only attend a fraction of them, albeit mostly the major ones: two nights of “Pride on the Pier” at the Wharf, with a low-key but delightful “WorldPride Boat Parade” on Friday, a fireworks show on Saturday, and dancing with a DJ on the pier both nights; the 17th Street Block Party in DuPont Circle on both Friday and Saturday; the WorldPride Parade on Saturday (as is Capital Pride tradition, earlier in June); the WorldPride Street Festivals on Saturday and Sunday; and — getting back to the history of these marches on the National Mall — the WorldPride International Rally & March on Washington for Freedom on Sunday.
As a side note, in the wake of especially targeted attacks on the Trans community, which have been steadily increasing for years but kicked into high gear under the current administration, I was disappointed to find little that was Trans-specific on the WorldPride 2025 website. Later a “Diversity Pride” menu was added to the Events list, which included Trans Pride Washington DC — the main event for which occurred early, May 17, weeks before my visit. I later learned, too late, that there was a National Trans Visibility March just before the International Rally & March, which itself was scheduled for 9:30 a.m. on June 8. Not only is there oddly no mention of this event on the WorldPride website but even at the largest national Queer festivals, it feels like Trans events get short shrift — this one was scheduled at 7:30 a.m. How many people didn’t make it to that just because it had to happen so early?
On a more positive note, there was definitely Trans visibility at the other major events: the parade, the street parties, and perhaps most importantly, among the speakers at the International Rally. Marchers held many Trans-specific signs, along with others addressing a range of issues across the Queer community.
And this what I felt most at WorldPride 2025: community, a force far greater than fear.
Which brings us back to an eternal debate, one that has gone on at all the other Queer marches and parades, at the Millennium March that I attended in 2000 and all the others: Should we be focusing on the fight, or on celebrating? And I say: Why not both? Aren’t we fighting for the right to celebrate ourselves?
I saw a delightful T-shirt recently that read “Every time we fuck, we win.” To me, this is more than just a joke (a great joke though it is). It’s a provocation, a defiance, a celebration — a point of view that applies to both sexuality and gender.
At WorldPride 2025, I was in public spaces infused with political passion — and with raw sexuality — and it’s good to remember that these things are inextricably linked. Dancing on the pier, to Gay classics by Donna Summer, Cher, Madonna, and others was a transcendent experience. It was a space held for communal joy, the thing we should always refuse to let them take from us — Trans joy, Queer joy, the joy of self, the joy of sex, the joy of expression in all its forms. WorldPride provided all of this for me and more, a deeply fulfilling experience and a vital reminder of what we won’t stop fighting for.
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