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Dumbledore, Meet Tinky WinkyOn the outing of fictional characters.

By Jacob WeisbergPosted Monday, Oct. 22, 2007, at 3:43 PM ET

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In a curious way, gays, their friends, and their enemies have all collaborated in destroying the sexual innocence of cartoon characters by making an issue out of it. When trying to elude Elmer Fudd or Yosemite Sam, Bugs Bunny is liable to dress up as a woman, vamp around, or imitate Katharine Hepburn. Is this meant to indicate that he likes other boy bunnies? Many of these antics were borrowed from vaudeville comedy, where a man dressing up as a woman didn't necessarily imply homosexuality (although the same questions arise in retrospect). The Warner Bros. studio, where these cartoons were created in the 1940s and '50s, was an aggressively heterosexual milieu. Chuck Jones and other illustrators were mocking stereotyped homosexual behavior, not winking at homosexuals in a friendly way. But while a man dressing up as a woman may not have "meant" anything in the 1940s, it does mean something in the late 1990s. What has sexualized these cartoon characters is the change in the culture, which in the last few decades has become not just aware of homosexuality but increasingly open about and tolerant of it.

Ernie and Bert are another good example of this process. When Sesame Street was created in the early 1970s, no one meant for them to be taken as lovers. But consider two men living together, sleeping in the same room, and taking great interest in each other's baths. Predictably, the "urban legend" that Ernie and Bert were gay began to spread. In 1994, a Southern preacher named Joseph Chambers tried to get them banned under an old North Carolina anti-sodomy law. (He said they had "blatantly effeminate characteristics.") The Children's Television Workshop eventually had to deny the rumors, which have included an impending same-sex union. But the gay read on Ernie and Bert isn't wrong because the creators don't endorse it. The same goes for the Peanuts characters Peppermint Patty and her tomboy friend Marcie, who always refers to her as "Sir." When Charles M. Schulz created the strip, he never imagined that Patty and Marcie would be claimed as protolesbians.

In recent years, children's entertainment has contained an increasing number of apparently intentional or even obviously intentional gay references. In The Lion King, Simba leaves home and is more or less adopted by Timon and Pumbaa, a male meerkat and a male warthog who live together as a couple in the jungle. In the 1994 Disney film, the actor Nathan Lane supplied the voice of Timon in much the same style as his flamboyantly gay character in The Birdcage. When I saw the Broadway version of the musical, the audience roared at Timon's even more exaggerated gay mannerisms.

Or consider Pee-wee's Playhouse. Pee-wee Herman minces about and becomes obviously infatuated with other male characters who conform to gay archetypes. While parents may pick up this gay semaphore, kids aren't likely to. To them, Timon, Pumbaa, and Pee-wee are just goofy characters.

Elsewhere, the implicit has become explicit. On The Simpsons, Smithers, the bow tie wearing toady who trails around after Mr. Burns, has become increasingly gay. According to Larry Doyle, who writes for the show, Smithers was originally just a sycophant in love with the boss. But lately he has taken to cruising college campuses in his Miata, looking for "recruits." In last week's episode, Apu, the Indian convenience store owner, goes down to the docks to donate porno magazines to sailors. The sea captain calls out to thank him: "Thank you for the Jugs magazines. They'll keep my men from resorting to homosexuality ... for about 10 minutes!" The sailors all laugh, and one calls out, "Look who's talking!"

It isn't absurd for anyone, including Falwell, to notice these hints, inferences, and references. But it is ridiculous to object to them. There's no scientific or psychological basis for believing that children are affected in their sexual development or eventual sexual orientation by exposure to homosexuality—on television or in real life. If the creators of cartoons are intentionally or unintentionally giving children the idea that gay people are part of the big, happy human family, that's a good thing, not a bad one. (If it weren't for gay people, there would be no Lion King—or much else on the all-American cultural front.) The conservative paranoia about recruiting, which leads them to think that gay school teachers and Boy Scout leaders present a hazard to the young is pure prejudice.

Anyway, for the religious right, this battle is pointless because the war is already lost. Gay themes are everywhere. Pee-wee's Playhouse runs every day on the Fox Family Channel, the cable network Pat Robertson recently sold to Rupert Murdoch. It's just a couple of hours ahead of The 700 Club.