What Victor Willis got wrong, and right, about “YMCA”

Victor Willis, a lead singer for the Village People who died Tuesday, insisted that the 1978 hit “YMCA,” the group’s most famous song, was not a gay anthem. Never mind its innuendo — its description of the YMCA as a place that has “everything for young men to enjoy/You can hang out with all the boys” and “do whatever you feel.”

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Jacques Morali, the openly gay French music producer who helped create the group, said he did so after thinking to himself that “gay people have no group,” but Willis, who was the straight frontman dressed as a police officer surrounded by gay costumed bandmates, said “YMCA” was merely about young men having a place to clear their minds at the gym in the comfpany of other men. He said the songs “Macho Man” and “In the Navy” weren’t about gay life, either.

Maybe that’s what Willis needed to tell himself to justify becoming a closing act at MAGA rallies. Willis performed “YMCA” the night before President Donald Trump’s second inauguration alongside a new group of band members, as Trump twisted at the waist and pumped his fists instead of doing the simple hand motions fans created to spell out the letters. To many people, Willis aligning himself with MAGA, including his performance at the inauguration, felt like a betrayal, but Willis maintained the month before that performance that “YMCA” was for everyone and that after he decided to entertain MAGA “the financial benefits have been great.”

Willis was right about one thing. Like the cultural institution that gives the song its title, “YMCA” is for everyone. It’s a fun, upbeat song with a catchy hook and a ridiculous dance that everyone responds to and in which everyone finds their own meanings. The song resonates on multiple levels because the YMCA itself does, too.

Founded in 19th century London to provide a haven and moral guidance to men who had relocated there during the Industrial Revolution, the Young Men’s Christian Association’s religious conversion mission gave way to the need to attract a large clientele, and it became a becoming a pioneer in gym memberships, fitness training and even body-building. The YMCA is now recognized as a messy social experiment that has provided everything from emergency assistance, afterschool programming, summer day camps, transitional housing, the aforementioned gym memberships and swim lessons, a unique community center in the heart of the blasé metropolis. There are many things people associate with the YMCA, and cruising remains one of them.