A weeklong internet debate about the gender of cartoon cat Garfield finally ended Tuesday when creator Jim Davis stepped in to proclaim a definitive answer.
The debate started when writer Virgil Texas referred to a 2014 quote by Davis that seemed to suggest Garfield was genderless. “Garfield is very universal,” Davis told Mental Floss. “By virtue of being a cat, really, he’s not really male or female or any particular race or nationality, young or old.”
That led Texas to edit the Wikipedia entry to change Garfield’s gender to “none,” which he posted on Twitter.
The Wikipedia community of Garfield fans began to argue with the assessment, and Garfield’s gender was changed about 20 times from male to none as the debate ensued, The Washington Post reported.
Those in the “male” camp referenced the fact that Garfield has a girlfriend, Arlene, and that the cat was referred to as a “boy” and as “he” several times by Jon, his owner. Texas stoked the fires by saying Davis had never explicitly referred to Garfield as male.
Finally, Davis himself stepped in and settled the debate by telling the Post and the Daily News on Tuesday that Garfield is male and that his earlier comments were taken out of context.
Texas backed off after Davis’ declaration. "He’s in charge of the canon. I’m just curious how it squares with his prior statement," he said, the Post reported. "If I had the opportunity I would interrogate him."
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