Does a censored or removed cover constitute a reason to keep two releases separate?

MusicBrainz
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I recently added this Bandcamp album, the cover of which depicts a woman giving birth. The album is also available on various streaming platforms and there is a corresponding release on the database. Now, the Bandcamp album and the streaming release seems to be identical, except for the cover. On the streaming platforms, the picture of the woman has been replaced by some text on red background stating the reason of removal. Consequently, the two releases have different covers, which normally is a reason to keep two releases separate, however in this case the different covers seem to not be intentional. I initially went ahead and made a merge edit for them but now I’ve realized it may not necessarily be justified, so I thought I could cancel it and ask here for your opinion. Do you think the two releases should be merged or kept separate?

EDIT: Another difference is the Bandcamp version credits two artists as the release artists, whereas the streaming version only credit one.

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Sounds like two releases to me.

Do you know if the uncensored version was released on those streaming platforms before being taken down and replaced? If so, the dates on the censored version may be incorrect.

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Oh, it doesn’t seem like the censored version has been taken down. I think it’s still available, it’s just that the cover has been replaced.

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My guess is that the censoring is done by the distributor, Believe Digital, automatically.
They likely do not handle the Bandcamp site.

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I thought so too to be honest.

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It has the same font and icon as the BC cover, which surely can’t be an accident - I think it’s a statement and was done by the same graphic designer (well worth storing separately imo)

P.S. tbh even if it wasn’t intentional, I think two releases would be warranted, just like we would do with non-artist-intent censored physical versions

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Ok, thank you everyone! I will not proceed merging them!

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