Santa's Little Helper event; however, their plan fails and a drunk shark that's discovered at the event becomes the new mascot instead. Santa's Little Helper gladly returns to the Simpson family. Santa's Little Helper's initial appearance on "The Simpsons" was in the first episode of the series, "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire", which aired on Dec. 17, 1989. Since then, he has become a recurring character. "The Simpsons" creator Matt Groening told "TV Guide" in 2000 that "we [the staff] painted ourselves into a corner with our Christmas episode. Once we wrote the dog into the show, we were stuck with him."
Politics in The Simpsons adjective "gay", criticized Nelson Muntz's line "the Grand Pumpkin is super gay" in "Treehouse of Horror XIX" (season 20, 2008). A spokesperson for the GLSEN said "many people say gay without even realizing what they're saying is bad, we're trying to educate people that this is a term that is hurtful to young people when used in a negative way." Several similar jokes have been made throughout the series without controversy. Politics in The Simpsons Politics is a common theme in the animated television series "The Simpsons", and this phenomenon has had some crossover with real American politics. U.S. conservatives