Stephen Miller Really Hates Gay Pop-Tarts

It was recently announced that J.M. Smuckers agreed to buy Hostess for $5.6 billion, which joins together two treat makers. However, Hostess might be warned that a there is a tasty treat villain ready to steal away all the fun. Let me explain.

When I was young, I did not eat sugary foods. My mom kept all the goodies — Cap’n Crunch, Cocoa Pebbles, Pop Tarts, Twinkies and most especially Super Sugar Crisps — away from me and my brother and sister.

Looking back, that was a sure sign of negligence. And Fruit Loops? Don’t get me started. I was afraid if I’d eat those, I’d turn into them – “Fruit Loop” was a derogatory term for gays when I was growing up. And Skittles wasn't introduced to America until the late 1970s, so as we all know with recent headlines about the candy's Pride colors, they would have likely turned me into a Fruit Loop too.

However, when I went to college, I binged on sugar cereal, and other delectable treats that I had been denied all my life. I remember trying Pop-Tarts for the first time — blueberry — and that frosting! I ate them excessively, and ironically, it was around this time in my life that I started questioning my sexuality.

I never put two and two together, so to speak, about the impact Pop-Tarts had until I read recently that bigoted, homophobic, white nationalist Trump loyalist Stephen Miller filled a complaint with Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) charging Kellogg’s with targeting children through marketing campaigns that “politicize and sexualize its products.”

The childish Miller cited the cereal giant’s partnership last year with GLAAD for Pride Month, with a limited edition of NEON pink lemonade Pop-Tarts with pink filling. “Of course,” I blurted out. “It was the Pop Tarts, and not the Fruit Loops, that made me gay.” How can I ever repay Miller for figuring it all out?

Because of Miller’s complaint, conservative mothers across America are trashing their Pop Tarts, while liberal mothers are racing to the grocery store to snap them up before they're discontinued for causing gayness. And Miller’s complaint leaves open a burning question: If little girls eat pink Pop-Tarts will that make them more girlish or butch?

Obviously, I’m joking, but Miller’s complaint is no joke. It’s unsettling, really, to think that there are people like Miller who genuinely believe a company like Kellogg’s is out to “corrupt” children. And Miller is likely to take his crusade further, no doubt going after chocolate. Could another iconic confectionery be next?

Miller is president of the far, far, far-right America First Legal, which, according to their warped view, fights for “Our security, our liberty, our sovereignty, and our most fundamental rights and values are being systematically dismantled by an unholy alliance of corrupt special interests, big tech titans, the fake news media, and liberal Washington politicians.”

Miller is an unabashed racist, and like my sugary fix in college, his racist fix started while he was a freshman at Duke University. He railed against the iconic Maya Angelou as a speaker for freshman orientation. “I can imagine you must have been very excited to hear her speak, especially since the orientation pamphlet lauds her ‘legendary wisdom’ (known outside of academic circles as tired, multicultural clichés),” he sarcastically wrote.

You don’t need me to tell you anything more about Miller. If you’re reading this, you know who he is, what he’s said, and how warped he is. Further, I’m not going to dignify his cruelty by repeating comments he’s made and things he’s written.

The Southern Poverty Law Center includes Miller in its extremists file. They sum him up this way, “Stephen Miller is credited with shaping the racist and draconian immigration policies of President Trump, which include the zero-tolerance policy, also known as family separation, the Muslim ban and ending the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. Miller has also “purged” government agencies of civil servants who are not entirely loyal to his extremist agenda, according to a report in Vanity Fair.” The SPLC does a great job of talking about the danger he poses to any marginalized community. You can read it for yourself here.

The irony of Miller filing a silly complaint with a government agency he deems silly is rich. If there ever was a “liberal” agency in his eyes, it would surely be the EEOC. It's all about equality, something that he is firmly against.

So, you may be asking yourself, why with all the other “woke” products, merchandise, food, etc., Miller decided to pick on Pop-Tarts and file a complaint with a federal entity he loathes?

It’s all about — and always about — the money. Miller started his “woke watch” a little over two years ago, and at the time Politico pointed out, “Miller’s organization will join a fairly crowded ecosystem of conservative-leaning legal entities, including Judicial Watch, Alliance Defending Freedom and the Immigration Reform Law Institute.” In order to compete against these heavy weights for donor dollars, you need to create attention for yourself — and relevancy.

What better way to create a media frenzy than to pick on an American classic like Pop-Tarts? The big guns, aka his competitors, target the behemoths, e.g., Target, Anheuser-Busch and Kohl’s. That leaves Miller to pick up the crumbs of a classic like Pop-Tarts. While he might think he’s scaring the bejesus out of ignorant Christian conservative parents, who will rip Pop-Tarts out of their kids’ hands, what he ended up doing was looking like a fool.

First, he comes after the low hanging fruit — us. We are the cause du jour, or the hate du jour of the moment. We are in the crosshairs of Republicans' efforts to demonize us up to the November 2024 elections. Miller just simply hopped on board.

His little ineffectual “woke watch” can’t help pass any anti-queer legislation related to drag queens, trans bathroom bans, book bans, LGBTQ+ teacher bans, and trans youth health bans, so he nonsensically tries to perpetuate a story that we’re poisoning Pop-Tarts. It’s all so gratuitous, and reeks of desperation.

Miller’s going to find that he’ll get about $10 of donations to his organization from all the people who don’t like Pop-Tarts — do they even exist? So, he’s likely going to go back to his roots of racial discrimination, since that’s in his wheelhouse.

His white nationalist organization took the Biden administration to court last year to try and overturn a provision in the COVID relief bill that provided funds for Black farmers who faced discrimination for decades. This money allowed Black farmers to invest in their businesses with new equipment and machinery. Miller successfully challenged this provision in court on the basis that it "discriminated against White farmers."

See, Miller doesn’t know what he’s doing trying to malign the queer community, but he sure has a lush history of lashing out against Black people.

My guess is that he goes after another American favorite, the timeless Hostess Chocolate Cupcake, with cream filling inside. Why? It must drive this bigot crazy that the black cake is smothering the white middle. He will sue Hostess, saying that the iconic cupcake "promotes anti-White bigotry." There might be reason for J.M. Smucker to get their legal team ready to defend the cupcake.

Meanwhile, the other 95 percent of us who have good taste will keep eating Pop-Tarts and Hostess Cupcakes.

The Pop-Tart stunt was child’s play that flopped for Miller, whose better at being a racist than homophobe. Next, he’ll go much darker, sinking his vampire teeth into all cupcakes in all their beautiful Blackness. I have a feeling something like that would leave a bad taste in J.M. Smucker's mouth.

John Casey is senior editor of The Advocate.

Views expressed in The Advocate’s opinion articles are those of the writers and do not necessarily represent the views of The Advocate or our parent company, equalpride.