After winning an Emmy Sunday night for playing a gay dad on ABC’s Modern Family, Eric Stonestreet talked at a press conference about the impact of the show:
“We get amazing compliments from kids of same-sex marriage families. For example, the most recent one just was the other day. A gentleman approached me and said he was raised by two moms and they adopted another daughter. When he was in school, there was no reference to two moms or two dads raising a child. And he just wanted to thank me and tell the producers thanks for giving his sister something to point the bullies and the people who make fun of her at school to and say, ‘Look at Mitch and Cam. That’s what my family is and you like them.”
Stonestreet is in fact, a straight ally. (Actor Jesse Tyler Ferguson, who plays his partner on the show, is gay.) I think Stonestreet deserves an “ally of the week” award for that comment, since mainstream media seems to be picking up on it. (The New York Times, however, botched their excerpt, stating, “He [Stonestreet] said, ‘We get amazing compliments from kids of same-sex-marriage families’ and recounted a recent conversation with a man who thanked him for giving his sister ‘ammunition for the bullies.’” More accurate would be: “for use against the bullies.”)
Video of Stonestreet’s remarks after the jump.