#he's basically the only one who hasnt turned to the camera and said 'i'm trans' on this poll but i think its enough .

[badasstransswag]

Just asking out of curiosity, but where does the idea that swk is trans come from?

Macaques are matriarchal, and 王 (typically translated as the "king" in Monkey King) was historically a gender neutral title. This is widely known enough that some scholarly readings of JTTW interpret the other macaque in his sworn brotherhood to be a female monkey king. (On a similar but less impactful note, though often translated as "Handsome Monkey King," Sun Wukong's title of 美猴王 more accurately translates to "Beautiful Monkey King," with 美/beautiful having feminine connotations.)

It is widely known that Sun Wukong was appointed the position of 弼马温 (translated directly as “to soothe the horses”) as a pun on the identically pronounced 避马瘟 ( “to ward off sickness for horses”). This title references a traditional Chinese belief (often cited to 马经 by 赵南星 of the Ming dynasty) that female monkeys and their menstruation would ward off plague for horses if kept in the same stable

The disciples in Journey to the West hold elemental names in addition to their given and Buddhist names. Zhu Bajie and Sha Wujing both have feminine elemental names (木母 "Wood Mother" and 黄婆 "Yellow Matron" respectively), but in contrast, Sun Wukong holds a masculine elemental name, 金公 Metal/Gold Male

Sun Wukong is a 妖 yao, and yao in general have a history of being associated with the Chinese trans community. (Supplemental: see Bai Suzhen being read as an allegory for trans panic)

Thematically-wise, Sun Wukong's story is one of transgressing boundaries. JTTW as a whole is a story that places a lot of weight on the topic of transformation and change. Buddhas becoming humans, humans becoming gods, gods becoming yaoguai, yaoguai becoming buddha, buddhas taking the face of yaoguai. Yin within yang, light within dark, nothing is inherent, nothing is black and white. 变化者乃天地之自然 "Change is the nature of heaven and earth" (Daoist text 抱朴子 by 葛洪), 诸行无常 "all forms are ever-changing/no self is permanent" (Buddhist three marks of existence), etc etc. Sun Wukong is at the center of it all, a yao who not only asserts his identity as a god, but also a yao who will not change his being in lieu of that (SWK is very invested in showing off his grand power, and achieving/living in human form is an end goal show of power by many yao, yet SWK markedly remains steadfast in keeping his monkey form). SWK is a yaoguai, a god, and a buddha all at once, transcending boundary over boundary and master of the 72 transformations, transforming himself into what he wants to be and what he feels is true for himself.

This naming scene: 祖师笑道：“你身躯虽是鄙陋，却像个食松果的猢狲。我与你就身上取个姓氏，意思教你姓‘猢’。猢字去了个兽傍，乃是个古月。古者，老也；月者，阴也。老阴不能化育，教你姓‘狲’倒好。狲字去了兽傍，乃是个子系。子者，儿男也；系者，婴细也，正合婴儿之本论。 "The Patriarch laughed and said, “Though your features are not the most attractive, you do resemble a pignolia-eating monkey (husun). This gives me the idea of taking a surname for you from your appearance. I intended to call you by the name Hu. If I drop the animal radical from this word, what’s left is a compound made up of the two characters, gu and yue. Gu means aged and yue means female, but an aged female cannot reproduce. Therefore, it is better to give you the surname of Sun. If I drop the animal radical from this word, what we have left is the compound of zi and xi. Zi means a boy and xi means a baby, and that name exactly accords with the fundamental Doctrine of the Baby Boy." -JTTW Chapter 1

Also 1961 Sun Wukong speaks in a very characteristically Chinese opera 生 voice while no other character in the movie really does so outside of exclamations and such. And well... (The sheng is a role type in Chinese opera for dignified and respectable male characters such as Confucian scholars, nobles, or heads of households. They may be portrayed by either male actors or actresses. In Yue opera, sheng roles have been mainly portrayed by actresses. Actresses playing men (sheng) is also common in some southern genres like Teochew opera and Taiwanese opera. It also appears in Ping opera. (Wikipedia))