Are Same Street’s Bert & Ernie gay? A ntroversial history, explaed. - Vox

Contents:

• ‘SAME STREET’ TRODUC S FIRST MARRIED GAY UPLE, MAKG A BOLD STATEMENT FOR LGBTQ VISIBILY
• BERT AND ERNIE ARE ED A GAY UPLE, 'SAME STREET' WRER CLAIMS
• ‘SAME STREET’ CLUS GAY MARRIED UPLE FOR FIRST TIME SHOW’S 51 YEARS
• SAME STREET TRODUC FAY WH TWO GAY DADS DURG PRI MONTH
• SAME STREET WEL THE SHOW'S FIRST GAY COUPLE
• SAME STREET SAYS BERT AND ERNIE 'DON'T HAVE A SEXUAL ORIENTATN' AFTER LONGTIME WRER CLAIMS THEY'RE GAY
• FIRST GAY MARRIED COUPLE INTRODUCED ON ‘SAME STREET’
• 'SAME STREET' FEATUR 2 GAY FATHERS FOR 1ST TIME 51-YEAR HISTORY
• ‘SAME STREET’ INTRODUC FIRST GAY COUPLE SPECIAL PRI MONTH EPISO
• ‘SAME STREET’ TRODUC FAY WH TWO GAY DADS
• SAME STREET GO GAY: ‘ON OUR STREET, WE ACCEPT ALL…HAPPY PRI MONTH’
• ‘SAME STREET’ INTRODUC GAY COUPLE IN HONOR OF PRI MONTH
• Y, BERT AND ERNIE WERE A GAY COUPLE — A SAME STREET WRER JT CONFIRMED IT
• THE FIGHT OVER SAME STREET’S BERT AND ERNIE AS A GAY UPLE, EXPLAED
• ARE BERT AND ERNIE GAY?

‘SAME STREET’ TRODUC S FIRST MARRIED GAY UPLE, MAKG A BOLD STATEMENT FOR LGBTQ VISIBILY

This week, the inic children’s show dropped a very special episo lled “Fay Day, ” troducg two gay dads, Frank and Dave (the brother of Na, who works as a bike store owner on the street), and their dghter, Transcript[MUSIC PLAYING]. “Same Street” celebrated Pri Month by troducg s first gay married uple to the show.

BERT AND ERNIE ARE ED A GAY UPLE, 'SAME STREET' WRER CLAIMS

This was the first time the 51-year history of “Same Street” that a gay married uple was clud a storyle. “Same Street” celebrated Pri Month by troducg s first gay married uple to the famo children’s show. Durg Pri month, Same Street troduced a new gay uple and their dghter as recurrg characters on the show.

'Same Street' troduc fay wh two gay dads. The episo featured a fay wh two gay dads. Same Street celebrat Pri Month by troducg s first married gay uple, Dave and Frank, durg the show's Fay Day episo.

‘SAME STREET’ CLUS GAY MARRIED UPLE FOR FIRST TIME SHOW’S 51 YEARS

Same Street celebrated Pri Month by troducg s first married gay uple, Dave and Frank, durg the show's Fay Day episo. A former wrer for Same Street said a recent terview that he nsired Bert and Ernie to be gay — but the show rebutted this claim, sayg the puppets “do not have a sexual orientatn.

SAME STREET TRODUC FAY WH TWO GAY DADS DURG PRI MONTH

“I always felt that whout a huge agenda, when I was wrg Bert & Ernie, they were [gay], ” Saltzman said. ’ But those two… you had characters that appealed to a gay dience. In a first for the show and the genre, a married gay uple, wh their dghter are movg to Same Street.

As a gay man wh a hband and two betiful children, I’m so proud of this! Alan Muraoka, who directed the episo exprsed how exced he was for people to see the episo and the pictn of a morn fay who jt happens to be gay. ) *** Same Street troduc married gay uple wh a dghter — Happy to Be Bin’s Ameri!

For years, dienc have bated whether Bert and Ernie are Same Street's rint gay uple. But their iendship has been the subject of much bate over the years and many speculated that the two are fact a gay uple.

SAME STREET WEL THE SHOW'S FIRST GAY COUPLE

Why People Thk Bert and Ernie Are a Gay Couple. The mors led to a number of public sentments om Same Workshop statg that they are not a gay uple, but are simply bt iends. Mark Saltzman, ex-wrer for Same Street, alleged that Bert and Ernie were based on his timate gay relatnship wh a worker — but should be noted that Saltzman is not the creator of Bert and Ernie.

SAME STREET SAYS BERT AND ERNIE 'DON'T HAVE A SEXUAL ORIENTATN' AFTER LONGTIME WRER CLAIMS THEY'RE GAY

Another reason the bate has gone on so long is om the unrlyg homophobia that l our society and, up until recently, domated the media.

People fear what they don't unrstand, and many the LGBTQ+ muny believe that those who ny that Bert and Ernie may be a uple are beg homophobic, takg issue wh the implied queerns. "Same Street" is markg Pri Month by showg a type of fay that has never been seen the 51-year history of the inic children's televisn show shared an episo last week lled "Fay Day" that featur a married gay uple of two dads wh their dghter. The show also answered a qutn about long-time characters and roommat Bert and Ernie, sayg 2018 that they are not gay, they are "bt iends.

Stream It Or Skip It: ‘Red, Whe and Royal Blue’ on Amazon Prime Vio, a Charmgly Star-Crossed Gay Rom-Com. The long-nng children’s program troduced a fay wh two gay dads for the first time ever on s June 18 episo, Yahoo Entertament reports. But long before 2017, Same Street was featurg a famo gay uple.

FIRST GAY MARRIED COUPLE INTRODUCED ON ‘SAME STREET’

Same Street was not the only kids’ show that voiced a msage of support for the LGBT activist–backed “Pri Month, ” which promot the homosexual liftyle and genr-fluidy. For a long time, LGBTQ activists and punds have sisted tha the two puppet characters are a “gay uple. Bert and Ernie “gay” mors were addrsed 2018 when Same Street Workshop, as well as Muppet creator Frank Oz, nied that Bert and Ernie are “gay.

She was asked if Bert and Ernie are a “mted gay uple. “You want to thk they’re gay? DROP Disney+: New teen film 'Out' featur openly homosexual ma character!

The Twter hashtag #Spongebobisgay began to trend on Twter after many on social media speculated that SpongeBob SquarePants is ed “gay” for beg clud the June 13 Nickeloon tweet. However, the creator of SpongeBob, Stephen Hillenberg, who died 2018, said 2005 that he “never tend” the Spongebob character and his sikick iend Patrick Starfish to be “gay. “We never tend them to be gay.

'SAME STREET' FEATUR 2 GAY FATHERS FOR 1ST TIME 51-YEAR HISTORY

In honor of Pri Month, the episo featured two gay fathers.

In an terview wh Queerty, Same Street wrer Mark Saltzman nfirmed that he nceived of and wrote the longtime fictnal roommat as a gay uple. And while the show was no doubt aware that two of s most famo characters had bee gay ins, still released a statement 2011 nyg that they were gay, llg them "bt iends" who were "created to teach prchoolers that people n be good iends wh those who are very different om themselv. A new episo of “Same Street” troduced a married gay uple, a segment a -director scribed as a “tone” for the inic children’s the episo, which buted durg Pri Month and jt ahead of Father’s Day, the “Same Street” characters are preparg for a celebratn.

Are Bert and Ernie gay? Same Street has always had one nsistent official answer (no, they’re not), but that hasn’t stopped the two famo felt roommat om beg gay ins and occupyg a unique role the queer rights movement. Controversy over their perceived homosexualy has raged termtently for s, spearhead by both alli and adversari — and a new flare-up shows that ’s not gog away anytime soon.

‘SAME STREET’ INTRODUC FIRST GAY COUPLE SPECIAL PRI MONTH EPISO

The official negatn was echoed by puppetmaster Frank Oz, who origally performed Bert oppose Jim Henson as Ernie, and who stated on Twter that “They’re not [gay], of urse. For those queer fans lookg for narrative subtext, there’s plenty to be found the personas of Bert and Ernie; after all, there’s a reason we as a culture have been discsg their relatnship for s, a reason that they ntue to be held up as gay ins across generatns — and a reason people have spent s beg hoppg mad about . It’s all pretty gay!

Among homosexuals, Bert and Ernie of Same Street are the real thg. Bert and Ernie nduct themselv the same lovg, discreet way that lns of gay men, women and hand puppets do. “I don’t believe there was much public discsn, ser or otherwise, about the crypto-gayns of The Odd Couple the 1960s and ’70s, ” he wrote an email.

‘SAME STREET’ TRODUC FAY WH TWO GAY DADS

“That kd of disurse only appeared ncerng work about straight characters by gay wrers — most famoly, whether Who’s Aaid of Virgia Woolf was somehow ‘really’ about a gay uple, ” he add.

“In 1980, when I published my Bert & Ernie thg, there were still no out gay characters mass media. The piece of the zegeist I was rpondg to was, jt a after Stonewall (which BTW occurred a few months before Same Street premiered) and the first pri march, the hly ‘normalized’ nature of out gayns plac like New York. The nversatn between Saltzman and terviewer Reddish is illumatg and poignant, equently returng to Saltzman’s experience as a young gay man the early ’80s, one fdg his way out of the closet jt as the AIDS epimic was begng to be wily unrstood.

SAME STREET GO GAY: ‘ON OUR STREET, WE ACCEPT ALL…HAPPY PRI MONTH’

“I n remember pchg to the tn partment, the gatekeepers of the curriculum, gay ntent, jt to get off my nscience.

But there was one place Saltzman was able to sert his own lived experience as a gay man to his wrg, and that was through the personas of Bert and Ernie. “There is a difference, ” he told the Tim, between “brg[g] what you know to your work” and “Bert and Ernie beg gay. But ’s also important to note that if Saltzman’s origal ment to Queerty that “when I was wrg Bert & Ernie, they were” lovers was te, seems to have been an impulse born out of the ep existential crisis of beg gay durg the AIDS epimic.

‘SAME STREET’ INTRODUC GAY COUPLE IN HONOR OF PRI MONTH

It was an era when an entire culture was unr attack — if not om the disease directly, then om the many homophobic parameters that arguably worsened the spe of the tragedy. In that era, primarily due to homophobic agators, Bert and Ernie beme perpetually discsed parts of the so-lled “gay agenda.

Y, BERT AND ERNIE WERE A GAY COUPLE — A SAME STREET WRER JT CONFIRMED IT

In the ’90s, Bert and Ernie were drafted to the “homosexual agenda. In the ’90s, Bert and Ernie beme viewed by some as threateng elements of a homosexual liftyle that was perceived as encroachg upon a mastream heteronormative culture. In 1993, the New Voice, a regnal gay newspaper, reported that Tupelo, Mississippi, gay panic had spng up over the appearance of Bert and Ernie as part of a Same Street tour stop at a lol arena.

“Tupelo lism officials say they’ve been bombard wh ncerned parents wantg to know if two of the fictnal characters are gay, ” the newspaper noted. “Officials say mors that Same Street’s Bert and Ernie characters are supposedly portrayg a homosexual uple have circulated across the untry. If this isn’t meant to reprent a homosexual unn, I n’t image what ’s supposed to reprent.

“Bert and Ernie, who’ve been on Same Street for 25 years, do not portray a gay uple, and there are no plans for them to do so the future, ” reads a statement om 1993 llected by Snop. In 2000, one wrer displayed Bert and Ernie dolls at his same-sex weddg as a repudiatn of the homophobic enzy around the characters; 2002, the Same Street Workshop stopped circulatn of a cult die film lled Ernt and Bertram that rest the characters as gay. In 2010, discsn of the queerg of the Same Street characters was fully mastream, prompted part by a tweet om the official Same Street acunt that read to some as nfirmatn of Bert’s homosexualy.

THE FIGHT OVER SAME STREET’S BERT AND ERNIE AS A GAY UPLE, EXPLAED

The ke had been orred, ironilly, as a way to memorate the Internatnal Day Agast Homophobia. Given that Bert and Ernie have been repeatedly drafted to the gay agenda by homophob, ’s a matter of, well, pri, for queer fans to subversively view them as a joyo reprentatn of a posive queer relatnship — which is why Same Street’s nial on Tuday stck many people as homophobic.

As long as Bert and Ernie uld be queer, they will ntue to enrage homophob who seek to e them to imply a gay nspiracy to filtrate mastream pop culture. It has long been whispered that Same Street's Bert and Ernie are gay.

They're not even homosexual (if ed 's possible for mere puppets to be sexual). The shift the standard mor of gayns to clu s subjects actually gettg married is, I thk, a reflectn of the tim.

ARE BERT AND ERNIE GAY?

Joseph Chambers attempted to get the puppets banned unr a ltle-ed anti-gay law the ep South.

Bert and Ernie, who've been on Same Street for 25 years, do not portray a gay uple, and there are no plans for them to do so the future. Though 's impossible to p down where the "Bert and Ernie are gay" mor began, one potential source is The Real Thg, a 1980 Doubleday book by Kurt Anrsen.

In this book (which purports to be "A gui to separatg the genue om the ersatz, the men om the boys, and the wheat om the chaff"), Anrsen mak the whimsil claim that among homosexuals, Bert and Ernie are "the Real Thg":.