YMCA has never been gay, says the song’s lyricist and singer

Village people singer Victor Willis, who wrote the lyrics to YMCA, says the song is about ‘Black guys hanging out together … there’s nothing gay about that’ Photograph: PA

If you thought that YMCA by Village People was a gay anthem, think again. According to Victor Willis, who wrote the lyrics, the famous song is entirely heterosexual – and anyone suggesting something to the contrary should “get their minds out of the gutter”.

“Come January 2025,” Willis added on Facebook, “my wife will start suing each and every news organisation that falsely refers to YMCA, either in their headlines or alluded to in the base of the story, that YMCA is somehow a gay anthem because such notion is based solely on the song’s lyrics alluding to elicit [sic] activity for which it does not.”