The text has nothing to do with homosexuality, says the Village People’s “police officer”.
Village People founding member and songwriter Victor Willis has made it clear that he approved of Donald Trump’s use of “YMCA” at his campaign rallies. He also rejected any interpretation of the song as a celebration of queerness and made it clear that he does not consider the song to be a “gay anthem.” He announced legal action in 2025 against any media that continued to claim this.
Trump was allowed to dance
In a Facebook post on Monday (December 2), Willis wrote that he initially asked Donald Trump to stop using the song at his rallies. He discovered it as a kind of signature tune and even came up with his own dance choreography for it. But because of a usage agreement between the record company BMI and the campaign, Trump had every right to continue playing the song, said Victor Willis.
“Trump seems to really like ‘YMCA’ and he’s having a lot of fun with it,” the musician wrote. “I just didn’t have the heart to ban further use of my song when so many artists have withdrawn the use of their material. So I told my wife to inform BMI not to revoke the license for political use by the Trump campaign.” In addition to obvious pity, money was also a decision factor. Because at the same time he acknowledged his financial advantage. Through Trump he will earn “several million dollars” from the 1978 hit.
“You can hang out with all the boys”
As for the idea that “‘YMCA’ is somehow a gay anthem,” Willis continued, “is a false assumption based on the fact that my writing partner was gay and some (not all) of the Village People were gay and that the first Village People album was entirely about gay life.” This misunderstanding was further reinforced by the fact that the youth clubs of the “Young Men’s Christian Association” were also “apparently used as a kind of gay meeting place.” All of this led to the view that the piece was a “message to gays.” But despite all the evidence, Victor Willis is certain: “That’s not him.”
At the time it was made, he simply didn’t know that homosexuals would like to spend time in the “YMCA” – his gay bandmate Jacques Morali never told him. So he simply wrote a text about the “Y” in the urban areas of San Francisco, about “swimming, basketball, track and field” and “cheap food and cheap rooms.” The line is “You can hang out with all the boys.” “Just 1970s black slang for black boys hanging out together,” said the singer, who in the Village People usually dressed as a police officer in tight pants and knee-high boots.
“You can do whatever you feel”
“Since I wrote the text and should know what the text I wrote was really about, starting in January 2025, my wife will be suing any news organization that falsely refers to ‘YMCA,’ either in its headlines or in allusions to it.” “The narrative that ‘YMCA’ is somehow a gay anthem because that idea is based solely on the song’s lyrics, which allude to depraved activities, which is not the case,” Victor Willis eventually wrote. It remains to be seen whether freedom of expression will win out in the end.