It is quite funny to me that we live in the world full with people that contradict themselves whenever possible. Politically Conservative people tend to always bring up "Free Speech" whenever Liberal-minded people disagree with their opinions. Yet they are also very much in the business of censorship themselves. We saw that with
Florida's Book Bans and we now see it again with
Pepper & Carrot. A comics from
David Revoy that was attacked recently by those unable to see people expressing love to one another.
David Revoy
posted about the situation on his Mastodon account, which had an attachment to it, with a screenshot of an email that he received. The email in question, reads thus:
Dear Mr. David Revoy,
I hope this message finds you well. I'm an avid reader of your wonderful work Pepper & Carrot and would love to share it with children in my family. However, I noticed something in Episode 36 (Page 10) that might concern some parents: the scene where Torreya and Shichimi kiss, followed by Pepper explicitly stating they're a couple.
While I deeply respect your creative choices, many conservative parents worldwide prefer to avoid exposing children to romantic relationships between same-sex characters. To make your masterpiece more accessible to families across different cultures, could I kindly suggest modifying this scene? Perhaps replacing the kiss with a friendly cheek kiss, and describing Torreya and Shichimi as "close friends" rather than romantic partners? This subtle approach would allow readers to interpret their relationship naturally while maintaining the story's charm.
Your consideration of this small adjustment would help families like mine introduce your beautiful artwork to younger audiences without hesitation. Thank you for your understanding and for continuing to inspire us with Pepper's magical world.
Warm regards,
... the name was redacted by Revoy. Revoy himself added:
An email I received left me speechless. Obviously, they don't respect my creative choices. I will not 'fix' this panel under any circumstances.
Episode 36 The Surprise Attack really does contain a kiss between two girls. So what? This is a story written and drawn with those characters being girlfriends. This is a part of the vision. Technically yes, somebody could make a fork of this comics and change it, to remove the kiss or whatever. The comics is under CC-BY. So it is possible. But asking the artist to do so, in his original version is kind of in a bad taste.
More than that, having an issue with the stuff depicted is weird anyway. They are not murdering children there. There is nothing uncomfortable in the image. Even if you don't think pornography is art, which it is, but that's besides the point, the image is so mild in it's depiction, the kiss is literally just a very light touch of lips. Not dissimilar to say a kiss in
My Girl or something.
Look, Revoy could be making a horrible Satan worshiping horror comics about psychopaths murdering babies and eating them. It doesn't matter. It is his art. He chooses what to put into his art. If another person wants to make something else. Something, say, for conservative, families. Please go ahead and do it. The art can exist simultaneously and there is no problem with it.
But then there is another thing: Maybe the person is not happy with this art existing in the first place. Maybe just making a version of it, where somebody paints out the stuff the person doesn't like is not enough. Maybe the person doesn't want a chance of the children he is talking about finding the original. And finding the message in the original.
Well to this I can say that the children are not your fucking property. If they want to see and engage with ideas you personally don't like, you have no right to stop them. They are separate human beings. And forcing another human being into anything is abuse. So if they want to see a comics about lesbians and you are not letting them, you are committing child-abuse. I'm sorry, but that is true.
In this whole situation I'm firmly on the side of David Revoy. I'm firmly on the side of art. And I'm firmly against any Conservative ( or otherwise ) Ageist Censors that try to distort art, to abuse their own kids.
Happy Hacking!!!