Yes it is.
Entire episodes being cut down and a lot of good materials were removed to "not make kids bad", which is very silly and those were not what the audience could not adapt. The anime didn't force the manga to change or cut its own content.
And the dubbed anime didn’t force the Japanese anime to make changes so that argument right there makes no sense.
Yeah then why didn't Toei tone down the anime? I'm totally ok if DIC make a book based on it, but why hurt the original material in the anime so much to NOT let ppl see?
Here’s a dirty little secret for you both Japanese and the old dub of Sailor Moon have a target audience of elementary school girls. What’s considered acceptable in Japan to show young kids isn’t considered the same as it is in North America. Sailor Moon was edited down to be acceptable for the same target audience in North America as it was intended in Japan.
Now of course it’s ridiculous that western culture thinks the mere existence of gay people on television will corrupt children or that a show meant for young girls has to be censored to be deemed appropriate for the same target audience in western counties but that’s really not the fault of DiC or Cloverway or any of the various networks who agreed to broadcast the show as long as it met these arbitrary standards.
And standards of what’s considered acceptable change ALL THE TIME. Even in Japan we’ve seen this with Dragon Ball when they reedited Z as Kai they censored shots of children genitals, characters flipping the bird, and some of the gorier scenes. And then with Super it’s completely bloodless which is a little jarring to the blood bath the original Dragon Ball and Z could get at times.
They aren't and they didn't get enough screentime especially Zoisite. That change was made to build their characters and indeed gave them more life than their manga character.
Zoicite got the second most episodes of the Shitenou after Kunzite and Kunzite kind of had to take a backseat to Endymion .
Jadeite: 13 episodes (1-13)
Nephrite: 10 episodes (14-19, 21-24)
Zoicite: 18 episodes (14, 18,19, 21-35)
Kunzite: 19 episodes (22-25, 27, 29, 32-44)
Also Memento supplied evidence that Kunzite and Zoicite were made gay either in reference to some older Shojo anime from the 70s or to appeal to fanartist who had already been drawing them as a gay couple before Toei got to them