For years it has been widely rumored that the Sesame Street puppets, Ernie and Bert, are gay. Apparently, that controversy has been put to rest by the producers of Sesame Street. Kudos to them for standing their ground and announcing their intent to continue the friendship of Ernie and Bert as it is—just friends.
The producers of the popular children’s program were compelled to issue a statement in response to an on-line petition by gay rights activists who want Ernie and Bert to marry in order to teach acceptance of people whose sexual orientation or preference may be different. Certainly, there are other ways to get children to realize that people have alternative lifestyles without altering a traditional children’s program.
Sesame Street producers maintain that although the puppets portray friends, and they happen to have male characteristics they are obviously puppets; PUPPETS with no sexual orientation. Furthermore, even if the program’s producers acknowledged that the puppets were actually males, for all intent and purposes they still would not necessarily be gay. Numerous men and women — we are talking real people now — have a best friend of the same gender and that does not mean that both or either of them is gay.
It is a sad state of affairs when even inanimate objects – in this case puppets on a children’s TV program—cannot simulate close friendship without some people trying to make the objects symbolic to promote a cause or lifestyle.