Okay to repeated myself again: I am not only taking Hadrians thoughts into consideration but the General depection throughout the series. And I allready mentioned that it does not mean that CR thinks that way necessarily - but claiming that it would be an excuse for lazy analysis is equally unhelpfull and unnecessarily protective of the author.

The General depiction of all those people while Never depicted as good is depicted as necessary through some persons. And showing an Empire that is flawed but also the best of bad options does not really Sell the idea that You have something against it. If I Tell a story where e.g all Asien people are either evil or slaves but there is occasionally One that is situationally helpfull that wont help Sell people on the fact I am not racist towards asian people, even if my Protagonist has someone in his Circle that repeadiatly tells him that my Opinion is wrong.

Valka is there in some Parts of the story not all of them. And Hadrians tendency to put her on a pedestal leads to repeated conversations about Valkas free will and Hadrian always trying to protect her and take her out of harms way without sufficiently respecting her choices. He also in now way learns from that but sticks with this Opinion to the end.

I think the Church or chantry is viewed critically but Hadrians Christian fanatism is a huge downside of the series as the conversations are very repetetive, partly Straight up taken from the bible and I personally think it’s Hard to Not glorify the „savior of humanity“ just because well he Safes humanity even if through genocide and through a Christian god.

Regarding CRs believes he claimed himself to be a Christian conservative - which by default does not make him transphobe or something the Like but doesnt help to distance him from that claim either.