A former Sesame Street writer has shared the truth about Bert and Ernie.

Decades of speculation are over and we can finally sleep soundly.

Former Sesame Street writer Mark Saltzman has confirmed what we’d all assumed to be true – two of the show’s most recognised characters, Bert and Ernie, were written as a gay couple.

Saltzman told Queerty he wrote the pair based on his own relationship with film editor Arnold Glassman, who died in 2003.

“I always felt that without a huge agenda, when I was writing Bert & Ernie, they were [gay]. I didn’t have any other way to contextualise them. The other thing was, more than one person referred to Arnie & I as ‘Bert & Ernie.'”

He said he was the Ernie in their relationship, and his partner Arnold was Bert, so it was only naturally that the on-screen pair mirrored his real-life relationship.

"It was the Bert & Ernie relationship, and I was already with Arnie when I came to Sesame Street. So I don’t think I’d know how else to write them, but as a loving couple. I wrote sketches… Arnie’s OCD would create friction with how chaotic I was. And that’s the Bert & Ernie dynamic," he said.

"That’s what I had in my life, a Bert & Ernie relationship. How could it not permeate? The things that would tick off Arnie would be the things that would tick off Bert. How could it not?"

But... Sigh. The Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit organisation behind Sesame Street, has refuted Saltzman's claims in a statement on Twitter.

Please see our statement below regarding Bert and Ernie. pic.twitter.com/6r2j0XrKYu

— Sesame Workshop (@SesameWorkshop) September 18, 2018

According to its statement Sesame puppets can be best friends, but they don't have sexual orientations.

Except... Uh...

As expected, Twitter was very invested in the news.

I DON'T CARE IF BERT AND ERNIE ARE GAY I JUST WANT THEM TO BE HAPPY!!!!

— billy eichner (@billyeichner) September 18, 2018

|￣￣￣￣￣￣￣￣￣￣￣|
| LET BERT AND |
| ERNIE BE THE |
| GAY ICONS WE |
| DESERVE! |
|＿＿＿＿＿＿＿＿＿＿＿|
(\_____/) ||
(????ㅅ????) ||
/ 　 づ

— Blair Imani (@BlairImani) September 18, 2018

Bert and Ernie aren't a couple. They're exes who still live together and whose excessive emotional involvement with each other prevents them from forming new, healthy romantic relationships.

— Josh Barro (@jbarro) September 18, 2018

Bert and Ernie being gay is the good news we needed after Stormy Daniels described Donald Trump’s penis.

— Chelsea Handler (@chelseahandler) September 18, 2018

And they were not here for the double standard.

So according to Sesame Street, Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy have been in an on-again/off-again relationship for 40 years, but Bert and Ernie can't be gay because "they are puppets, and do not have a sexual orientation"

— Ian Alda (@IanAlda) September 18, 2018

In response to Bert and Ernie being outed, Sesame Street said that Muppets have no sexual orientation. So how do Kermit and Miss Piggy have a relationship if they're just pieces of asexual felt? How?!

— Daniel Aegan (@Daniel_Aegan) September 18, 2018

You can't say Bert and Ernie are "just Muppets and therefore have no sexual orientation," when the entire dynamic of Miss Piggy and Kermit since day one is she's trying to get that amphibian D. pic.twitter.com/weoAx0GbQp

— Eric Diaz (@GeekBoyEric) September 18, 2018

But no matter what is said (or whether puppets can have sexual orientations or not), no one can take away Saltzman's own experience of writing Bert and Ernie.

mark saltzman put such love and care into writing bert and ernie, into reflecting the love he and his partner felt for each other and for decades we saw that! we read into it! that’s beautiful.

— keri russell warrior (@faretheeweIl) September 18, 2018

i’m really disappointed in sesame workshop...a gay man talked about his own experiences with writing the show and how he and his partner identified with bert and ernie...and they have to stomp on all of that

— ????lynn???? (@huckleberryduck) September 18, 2018