#I think the worst possible pitfalls for queer representation are pretty difficult to fall into with warrior cats

[rookflower]

We can't even really credit the Erins themselves for RavenBarley, it's the artists who made the novel who rewrote the arc and added that in. Props to the publisher for not censoring that, but they didn't make the decision to add this.

If this graphic novel gets translated I think it's very likely they'll remove it too, so Harper Collins/ the Hunter team really aren't praiseworthy for this.

(As a side note, this has happened in side content, a graphic novel adaptation of a 20+ year old book series, not in the main books and I'd like it to stay this way. I do not trust the actual Erin Hunter team to handle queer themes properly and thus I don't even want them to think about doing so)

oh yeah that's why I said "allowing this" and not "doing this", 100% believe it's down to the GN artists rather than the Erins or coolabi. from what we've seen I doubt the erins are actively (or at least consciously) homophobic but they've always been very passive and """safe""" about this and left to their own devices I doubt gay cats would be a thing for years if at all. would not be surprised in the slightest if it doesn't survive translation, but it's still something

as for not trusting the team to handle queer themes, I do get that, but I think some cases of minor implementation are pretty impossible to fuck up. Even if they did do an involved and messy job of it I can't say I wouldn't be cautiously intrigued.