I think it just happens, because things catch on when the internet is involved. Remember, the Babadook was a gay icon a few years back.

but I don’t understand how link is a trans icon.

Trans and trans icon are not the same thing. Trans icons are people or characters trans people might identify or admire despite not being trans. Lady Gaga for example might be considered a trans icon even though she is she/her. In Links case, they identity with the androgyny of his character design.

“He is a trans icon to trans people but he isn’t trans at all.”

“I’m a firm believer in author’s intent”

People can interpret media any way they like, regardless of the author’s intent. 

Faux has never reported news. It was literally created by Rupert Murdoch and (now thankfully dead) Robert Ailes to be a far right propaganda and disinformation tool, from day one. Because Rupert Murdoch doesn’t believe in either truth or democracy.

Faux is literally several decades behind the curve with their hateful outrage. Female Link is a phenomenon so old I don’t even know when it started (I mean, just take a look at a cosplay convention sometime), and trans Link is ancient too.

Unless a game’s protagonist gender is explicitly defined in the game’s lore and story... its whatever the hell you want it to be. A projection of yourself an escapist version what you might want to be or simply role-playing a complete opposite of yourself.

Theyre not saying Link is officially and canonically trans. They’re saying Link isn’t a super masculine character the way mmostmale heroes are portrayed, and Link’s androgynous look lends itself to folks playing Link as a trans or differently gendered character.

I believe Miyamoto has stated that Link will never talk so the player can imagine themselves as the character. It’s no surprise trans kids are seeing themselves in him, it was kind of the goal from the start. Certainly worked on me when I was a kid.

Yeah that was my experience. I’m non-binary assigned male, but I’ve always been attracted to women, and my childhood was a deeply confusing, alienating experience of feeling left out of any kind of romantic partnership in life even though the world kept telling me I was a boy.

I didn’t really know until I was about 11, but I had some early same sex attraction as early as 2nd grade... but even then it took about 6 more years to process it since media at the time was acting as if being gay was a really shameful thing.

I mean they 100% the only reason the US has a mass shooting so often. Just video games. Nothing else. No other reason.  :)

Oh no, somebody identifies with something I love in a way I don’t relate to and that makes me uncomfortable which I can only express in outrage because I’m too immature to deal with nuanced emotions.

I learned that I was gay just about the second puberty hit. I learned that it was not acceptable when the other kids introduced me to “queer” as a derogatory term, which would have been around oh, early 2000s or so. Thankfully that’s not as much of a problem these days, but yeah, there was no media involvement here.…

Fox News and being angry at video games, a long-standing tradition.

Keeping people divided, benefits the powerful.

This is exactly what they want. Those kids to feel sad and ashamed. And they will. 

Interestingly, I knew I was trans/ nonbinary since I was a kid, and before I even knew those such words existed.
Hiding these terms from kids isn’t gonna not make them trans/ gay/ etc, it’s just gonna make the kids that are these things feel incomplete. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯