Jessica Max Stein

Why do we speculate on the love lives of puppets? Because it tells us so much about ourselves.
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I have written about my discomfort with gay marriage, but the plan to light up Niagara Falls “with the colors of the rainbow flag” (why not just “the rainbow”?) to accompany New York’s first legal same-sex marriages is almost enough to make me join the wedding party.

And what better place to make this grand gesture than Niagara Falls, an iconic “natural wonder” in a ruined rust belt city “whose history has been deliberately obscured” to preserve illusion, greed and over-the-top “camp spectacle“?

Or, as a friend said, “This is possibly the gayest thing I have ever seen.”

As Muppeteer Richard Hunt’s biographer, last Thursday evening I had the pleasure of attending the opening reception for the new Jim Henson’s Fantastic World exhibit at the Museum of the Moving Image in Queens. And I’ll be commemorating what would have been Hunt’s 60th birthday with a public event later this month!

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Please enjoy my eyewitness account from the Stonewall Inn on the night gay marriage came to New York state, “Does Gay Marriage Endanger Queer Community?” While gay marriage is a great step forward for many families, let us never forget that we are family.

And a bonus article! Has Dan Savage’s fatphobia finally gone too far?

The Bilerico Project has a new look, and I have some new articles out!

“Reluctance About Chaz Bono,” explores Bono’s recent media bubble, and received a lot of attention, with over 2,000 hits and over 50 comments!

And in honor of the rapture that wasn’t, “Let’s Celebrate Non-Judgment Day“! Or at the very least, let’s watch the Blondie video for “Rapture.” “Don’t stop, do punk rock!”

Many of Richard Hunt’s Muppet characters are household names: Beaker, Scooter, Janice. Statler and Waldorf. Hunt even played Miss Piggy for a season of The Muppet Show, Elmo for a year on Sesame Street. So why is his name not more well-known?

Though many people may not know Richard Hunt’s name, they already know his spirit – for so much of his spirit is present in the work.

I recently wrote a thumbnail biography of Hunt for LGBT website The Bilerico Project. Take a look at it here!

This weekend, I am going to the house where I grew up for the last time before our family sells it. I have been surprised at the depth of my feelings of loss. I wonder how much my experience of growing up queer there intensifies the transition.

The house is a brick colonial in Rust Belt suburbia, on a street canopied by maple trees. A great place to be a kid, wearing whirligig maple keys on the end of your nose. Not such a great place to be, shall we say, a righteous babe.

Read the rest of this post on the bilerico project!