Bloggers responded this afternoon to Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane's "outing" of one of the show's main characters. Stewie, the cartoon baby of improbable verbosity who talks like a Roald Dahl creation, tinkers like an MIT hacker, and plots like a pint-sized Hitler, is, apparently, gay. Here are the early responses:

• Join the Club  The folks at Gawker one-upped MacFarlane, presenting a list of other plausibly homosexual cartoon characters: Rudolph, Fred of Scooby-Doo, the Pink Panther, and Chip and Dale. "Since MacFarlane is outing toons," they wrote, "these other targets had better close their Manhunt accounts." The rationale for Rudolph: "there's a reason none of the other reindeer want to play his games." As for Chip and Dale? "Two guys who live together and love nuts."
• Stewie's Next Move  Michael Lehet of Chicago Now wondered whether Stewie should "officially" come out. "Or is just knowing good enough?"
  
• Should You Be Offended?  Gabe of Videogum called Stewie "annoying" and MacFarlane a "moron," and wasn't alone in finding MacFarlane's off-beat explanation offensive. But he was one of the first:
  

The worst part about this whole thing is that since they canceled the episode in which Stewie 'comes out,' the only thing that actually makes him gay is Seth MacFarlane alone in the recording booth thinking 'this is a gay person’s voice.' Hmmm, that might not actually be the worst part. The worst part might still be the sentence "it also explains why he’s so hellbent on killing his mother and taking over the world."

• Delightful!  Those at the activist blog Good As You seemed unperturbed: "We've always said that we won't really achieve true visibility until we get a foul-mouthed animated baby on our team."
• Bracing for Conservatives  "I have only one thing to say," wrote Wendie Tobin of Evil Beet Gossip, "to all the right-wing Bible thumpers that will  most assuredly arrive in droves after learning of this immoral, animated character: What are you doing reading Playboy interviews?"

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Heather Horn