Nothing draws attention quite like gay marriage. After the legalization of same sex marriage in San Fransisco in 2004, the Simpsons staff wanted to capitalize on the hot topic by centering an episode around the subject. Much like Springfield legalizing same sex nuptials in order to boost tourism, Fox teased that one of the Simpsons' regular characters were finally coming out of the closet, in order to create buzz. Patty Bouvier would end up revealing her homosexuality and the episode would see Marge learning to accept her sisters lifestyle. Though the writers tried not to come down too heavily on either side, the episode received criticism for promoting gay marriage. Well they do say any publicity is good publicity. That said they also received praise for promoting gay marriage so we guess their plan to create buzz worked perfectly. Still a classic example of using a controversial topic as easy ratings bait.