Bert and Ernie to marry?
Sesame Street’s famous ambiguously gay duo, Bert and Ernie, could be the latest same-sex couple to walk down the aisle – well, that’s if a new online petition has its way.
The petition at change.org calls on producers of the popular US children’s TV show to hold a wedding for the pair.
“We are not asking that Sesame Street do anything crude or disrespectful,” it reads. “It can be done in a tasteful way. Let us teach tolerance of those that are different.”
The petition also asks the show’s producers to consider introducing a transgender character to the program.
There has been plenty of debate about the puppet roommates’ sexuality since they were introduced.
For the time being, producers don’t seem convinced they need to ‘out’ the characters, saying that the pair were simply “best friends” who were created to “teach preschoolers that people can be good friends with those who are very different from themselves”.
You can sign the online petition here.
Growing up as a Ward of the State in a more then large household I found comfort in the energetic comical satire of Bert and Ernie. The message, two guys can get along who are very different, is an important symbol of hope for children who may be different. Bert and Ernie have always been about how love helps us overcome our differences.
If only there was a little of bit of Bert and Ernie in all of us, and we can learn to appreciate our differences, and realise that this is what makes us all special.
You know, I have a good friend who’s lived with his roommate for over twenty years. Both are gay, but there aren’t and never have been a couple; they date other people and share the same space. That’s all. Much like Bert and Ernie. So, I’m going to have to say ‘NO’ to the idea of marrying these two merely for the sake of it. Jokes and innuendo aside, there’s no history of a relationship.
How about we just introduce a same-sex couple instead? Preferably a human one. :)
It’s been well documented that Ernie and Bert are just friends and not gay :( . I highly doubt sesame street would ‘out’ them. Sesame street in Africa, from memory, do have a HIV positive character.
However that is not to say that the sesame street creators the Henson company are homophobic, as they have several gay characters in other projects they have.