Re: Favourite and Least Favourite Doctors, Companions, Anything!

On 2025-07-17 21:26:14 +0000, Melissa Hollingsworth said:

Verily, in article <105bnsr$1ibvj$1@dont-email.me>, did
YourName@YourISP.com deliver unto us this message:

 Morons have also complained and forced changes to "Noddy", Sesame
Street's Bert and Ernie, "The Famous Five", Roald Dahl's books, etc.
among many many others.   :-(

 Bert and Ernie are a particularly disgusting case because they are
*children*.

Bert and Ernie are not children. They don't have an official age (like Elmo does), so their ages are unknown, but they are friends and they are roommates who share an apartment, apparently by themselves, so they must be adults to some degree.

They are two boys who live together in the same room, with twin beds.
The taller one goes to school and the shorter one does not.

I can't say I've seen Bert going to school, but then I definitely haven't seen anywhere near every episode. I do know Bert and Ernie did a parody of Harry Potter at one stage and went to Wizard School in the claymation animated series "Bert and Ernie's Great Adventures".
Ernie also decided to go to Clown School in one episode.

The taller one is sometimes frustrated with the shorter one's dumbness, but they clearly love each other. Also, the shorter one's iconic song is
literally about a bath toy.
 They're very obviously children and *brothers*, not lovers.
Unfortunately, gross people made jokes, and dumb people took the jokes
seriously, and activists pushed and shoved, and eventually they caved.

The Sesame Street writer Mark Saltzman claims Bert and Ernie's relationship is somewhat based on his own relationship with his 'life partner' Arnold Glassman. The Sesame Street makers say that isn't true.
Another Sesame Street writer, Jon Stone, claims Bert and Ernie's relationship is reflection of the friendship between Jim Henson and Frank Oz.