Is The Simpsons The Most Important Cartoon In Gay History?

The Simpsons has covered LGBT topics numerous times in its long history. Now a German academic Erwin In het Panhuis has been analysing the series and its record on gay rights, looking at 490 Simpsons scenes and finding over 70 gay characters and 500 gay-themes scenes.

He’s come up with a book, Behind the Gay Jokes – Homosexuality in The Simpsons, which points out things such as the fact that in 2005 the show was the first cartoon to dedicate an entire episode to same sex marriage. He believes the show has helped many gay people to come out, due to the fact that the programme ”treats homosexuality as something normal in a media environment which can usually be very hostile to the point of view.”

Panhuis told the Süddeutsche Zeitung, as reported by The Local, “Homer has kissed other men on the lips more than 50 times throughout the series but despite that he’ s happily married to his wife. Homer is sometimes heterosexual, sometimes gay and sometimes homophobic.”

He adds, “It [The Simpsons] set the standard for cartoon series … and I believe it’ll always be a trailblazer.”

While in the early days, the show was sometimes rather ambivalent about all things LGBT (believed to be partly because it aired on conservative station Fox), but over the years become more open about its support for all things gay. For example, the likes of Waylon Smithers and Marge’s sister Patty moved from closeted innuendo to being openly.

It’s first mostly gay-themed episode came in 1997 with Homer’s Phobia, where Homer is worries Bart is going to turn out gay, and so decides to butch him up. However Homer’s new gay friend John (played by John Waters) helps him see things differently. Fox initially didn’t want to air the episode, but eventually relented.

Other episodes have seen Marge coming round the the idea of Patty getting married, Moe turning his tavern into a gay bar and pretending to like men himself (an episode that played with TV’s reticence to actually use the word gay), and Homer moving in with two gay men, one of whom makes a move on him.