Boy Culture Links: Victor Willis of Village People Fame (and Infamy) Dies at 74, GOP Rep Brags About Lobster in Affordability Crisis, Peppermint on the SCOTUS Trans Ruling + MORE
JULY 1, 2026
GR8ERDAYS: Rest in piss, Victor Willis, 74. The lead singer of the Village People — who happily accepted Donald Trump’s embrace of “Y.M.C.A.” — died suddenly of a “short, but aggressive” illness … on the last day of Pride.
HUFFINGTON POST: Trump has made $1B+ on crypto while in office. But hey, he doesn’t even take a salary.
PEOPLE: Mitch McConnell is seriously on his last legs.
YOUTUBE: If you’re into gay male romantic novels, check out my chat with Edward Schmit, author of The Open Era. It’s an oversimplification, but the book is kind of a tennis version of Heated Rivalry.
EXTRATV: Danny Glover announces Alzheimer’s disease.
YOUTUBE: Rep. Troy Nehls (R-Texas) brags about eating lobster and ribeye in response to an affordability question.
QUEER 101: Peppermint responds to the Supreme Court’s vile decision against trans kids in sports. It’s so fucking ridiculous. The number of kids and youth who are trans and in sports is minuscule. It’s just a made-up issue in order to create a wedge with voters, period.
INTERVIEW: Please enjoy this walking tour of Madonna’s NYC — by me!
CNN: More importantly, CNN featured me as one of the world’s biggest Madonna fans — and that was without even relying on a scale, pure guesswork. It was a fun interview. As I head toward pensioner status, I still find it’s important to have frivolous and fun things to obsess over in life, or life isn’t life.
P.S. Madonna is going to pop up at London Pride.
54 BELOW: Isaac Mizrahi doesn’t just design, he also sings — and he’s returning to 54 Below with his jazz band for the show Hooray. Tickets for the show, which runs August 12-15, are on sale now.
WBOC: A review of Blue Film that includes a generous Boy Culture reference.
It's unfortunate that after making millions on the gay community, that this guy turned his back on us and started supporting haters. I've stated many times on the internet how I was at YMCA in San Francisco when the song was released and anyone saying it wasn't a gay anthem at the time was not paying attention.
Then trump had to ruin the whole thing.
If it matters, I was negotiating with Mitchell Weiss (their manager) in 1991/1992 to buy the rights to The Village People. I'm a little fuzzy on who initiated it and why, but Jacques Morali died (of AIDS) in November of 1991 and the group was a little lost. In retrospect, I probably should have made the deal but I was VERY busy in the early 90's and (likely) would have had to spend too much time running the VP deal; I still had shows opening on tour and several MAJOR new shows to open in 1992, 1993 and 1994. Had the deal been offered in 1994, I probably would have done it. Anyway, I tell the story for this reason - I know everyone is hating on Victor and I completely understand it but when I met with everyone - ALL they cared about was the money. Victor himself has said that he's made MILLIONS because of 45/47. So, was he truly a 47 supporter - or just loving the money...? Who knows.