SpongeBob SquarePants hasn’t been safe from controversy, and the biggest one is that about SpongeBob being gay and “trying to turn children gay”. SpongeBob SquarePants was created by Stephen Hillenburg and premiered on Nickelodeon in 1999, becoming one of the longest-running American animated series, and one that has successfully expanded to other media as well. SpongeBob and friends have their own comic books, films (with the third one, The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run, releasing in 2020), video games, and more.
SpongeBob SquarePants follows the daily adventures of the title character (a sea sponge that looks like a kitchen sponge) alongside his best friends Patrick Star, Sandy Cheeks, his neighbor Squidward Tentacles, his boss Mr. Krabs, and his “enemy” Plankton. SpongeBob has been involved in all types of adventures and predicaments, but he always manages to come out on top thanks to his always cheerful and optimistic nature, which in turn has earned him some serious criticism.
The character has been accused of promoting homosexuality, with various groups expressing their discomfort and even demanding that Nickelodeon stops airing the show. Of course, this hasn’t stopped SpongeBob from continuing his underwater adventures, but it is an unnecessary file in the show’s history.
The SpongeBob SquarePants Is Gay Controversy Explained
The “SpongeBob is gay” controversy can be tracked all the way back to 2002, when the episode “Rock-a-Bye Bivalve” first aired. In it, SpongeBob and Patrick adopt an abandoned baby scallop, with SpongeBob taking the role of mom and Patrick of dad. The show was accused of promoting gay marriage, but as sea sponges aren’t either female or male, SpongeBob being the mother is actually normal for him – even more when remembering that Hillenburg was a marine science educator, and he added as many real life characteristics to the characters as possible. Hillenburg even clarified that he considered the character to be “somewhat asexual”, and all claims that SpongeBob is gay are false. A few years later, in 2005, a video with clips of children’s shows, including SpongeBob SquarePants, promoting diversity and tolerance was criticized by an evangelical group, stating the show was “advocating homosexuality”. Hillenburg reasserted his position, adding that sexual preference didn’t play a part in what they were aiming for with the series.
Others have pointed out SpongeBob’s relationship with his best friend, Patrick, saying they are a couple and thus, once again, promoting homosexuality. Meanwhile, some others have simply decided that SpongeBob is gay because of how he acts. Like with many other cartoons from the 1990s, the characters were not created with a sexual preference in mind as that’s not the show’s goal, and even if that was the case, there’s nothing wrong with diversity in children’s shows (as seen in modern cartoons like Star vs the Forces of Evil). If there has to be a label over SpongeBob, let it be that of an asexual character, as his creator said, simply because SpongeBob’s species is like that. In the end, Nickelodeon knows what the show is truly about and continues working on new SpongeBob SquarePants episodes, despite the controversies over its main character.