link is trans!! no ifs ands or buts.

 here it is, the post you've all been waiting for. you read the twitter thread but are you ready for the multi-paragraph analysis blog post? fuck yes you are. this is why link breathofthewild is a trans man.

it's specifically breath of the wild link cause he's who i've thought about the most and he is my favorite link, but i'm sure an argument can be made for literally any other incarnation of the hero.

first piece of evidence is his hot bod. literally every time i look at a picture of botw link my dysphoria dissipates just a little bit. he is short with wide hips, big thighs and calves, kinda skinny arms, fat ass and a smaller waist compared to his hips. i would say he has kind of a baby face too, and plenty of characters call him some version of "little guy". i experience this as well but instead of it coming from a friendly goron it's from the senile elderly people that come through my line at work who ask me how old i am and tell me what a baby face i have. so i feel for him.

link's transmasc bod <3

there's also the matter of his voice, or lack thereof. breath of the wild is actually the first game where there's an in-game explanation of why link doesn't talk, written down by zelda in her diary. she says that link doesn't talk because "with so much at stake, and so many eyes on him, he feels it necessary to stay strong and silently bear any burden." that's a reasonable explanation for the guy that's expected to save hyrule from ganon, but you know what else is a reasonable explanation? VOICE DYSPHORIA. it is a BITCH. there are days where i literally wish i knew sign language so i didn't have to talk and hear the sound of my own voice.

we also know that link was a knight in the army before he became zelda's appointed knight. in such a hypermasculine environment as the army probably was, he probably was willing to do anything to pass safely. i experience this in how i'll suppress some parts of my personality that i think are more feminine when i'm in a space i've never been in before. it sucks, but i do it to feel safer. link doesn't talk because his voice is probably pretty high and he hates it. same man.

next is one of my favorite in game details brought up by one of my favorite characters:

robbie!!!

when link meets robbie in the akkala tech lab for the first time, robbie makes him take all his clothes off so he can look for the scars that prove he's the same link that "died" 100 years ago. now the average cis zelda player would assume robbie means battle scars and they're not necessarily wrong, link definitely has a lot of those. but the average trans zelda enjoyer knows that robbie means top surgery scars. in fact, robbie is looking for the top surgery scars that his skilled hand put on link's chest himself. that's right: robbie gave link top surgery at the akkala ancient tech lab.

i thought of this one day as a joke, but i think it's a joke with substance. robbie's obviously a smart guy, and the sheikah are insanely technologically advanced. if anyone would have invented surgery in hyrule, it would be him. he did accidentally remove link's nipples in the process, but link doesn't really care that much.

distinct lack of nipples

link can also still pass as a woman if he wants to, as seen when he sneaks into gerudo town. obviously the clothes are good and cover his face, but almost every gerudo (and plenty of non gerudo characters he talks to) are completely convinced he's a woman when he's in gerudo clothing. i have to give him props for dysphoria management tbh.

finally, i think that link's story in any zelda game is a very trans story in general. a kid finds out he has some incredible destiny and has all this stuff thrust upon him whether he likes it or not. he can either achieve that destiny or die trying; he can't escape it. it's kinda depressing when i put it that way in comparison to being trans, but it doesn't have to be. being a hero is cool and powerful and being trans is too. if this little guy can save all of hyrule then i can talk to my parents about top surgery i guess. what i'm saying is being trans is its own hero's journey and link embodies it for me. thank you and goodnight.