Safety and Belonging/Gender-Neutral Language
Exploring potential changes to NA literature from gender-specific to gender-inclusive language when referring to our members and potential members, beginning with a draft of IP #1, Who, What, How, and Why
Every World Service Conference typically approves a project plan to revise existing recovery literature, with the focus to be decided by the conference. In addition, WSC 2026 approved a project plan to address Safety and Belonging/Gender-Neutral Language, an issue that has been a topic of discussion in NA for several conference cycles. The essay in the 2026 Conference Agenda Report has more background information. As that essay explains: “When we talk about gender-neutral language, we are really discussing three separate things: the words we use to describe our members and potential members, the words we use to describe God, and the words of our Steps and Traditions.” We are focused, at present, just on the language used to describe our members and potential members.
We as a Fellowship want to ensure that all addicts feel welcome in the rooms of Narcotics Anonymous, and gender-neutral language “smooths the path for identification in ways that most members may not even notice” (2026 CAR). It is worth noting that NA literature written since 2012, including Living Clean and SPAD, has almost always utilized gender-neutral language in an effort to embrace more addicts into our midst so we can grow and help as many addicts as possible.
Understanding that there are concerns about potentially altering such foundational pieces of our literature and many members are confused about what changes are being proposed, the conference decided that seeing a complete revised draft of IP #1, Who What, How, and Why, would provide an initial focus for both project plans and allow the Fellowship to see a concrete example of what gender-neutral language could look like.
In our standard translations process, IP #1 is always the first piece of literature that gets translated, so it was the natural place to start. We invite you to read and review the revised draft, as well as the accompanying introduction, which contains a more detailed history of how this project came to be. The four suggested revisions are shown in the table below in bold.
Who is an addict? | “an addict is a man or a woman” | “an addict is a person” |
What is the Narcotics Anonymous program? | “fellowship or society of men and women” | “fellowship or society of people” |
What… | “regardless of age, race, sexual identity, creed, religion, or lack of religion” | “regardless of age, race, gender, sexual identity, creed, religion, or lack of religion” |
Why are we here? | “ahead of our families, our wives, husbands and our children.” | “ahead of our families and loved ones.” |
Next Steps: Depending on the Fellowship’s response to the IP #1 revisions, more pieces of literature could potentially be released in draft form, with gender-inclusive language substituting for gender-specific language. As is always the case for recovery literature, the final approval drafts would be included in the CAR, with the decision to follow at the 2029 conference.
Draft revisions to IP #1: Who, What, How, and Why
Please use the online form posted at na.org/surveys to provide input: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/revisingIP1
This draft is posted for review until the end of October 2026.
See a collection of alternative, gender-neutral NA literature excerpts for groups to read at na.org/gender.