Nearly a decade after the Chinese emperor character knelt down in front of Mulan, the Chinese warrior character has reappeared as a national hero who saved China, but this time as a transgender one, which angered many Chinese netizens.

Mulan recently became a hot topic on Twitter because of U.S. President Donald Trump’s controversial transgender military ban. Images featuring Mulan read: “If transgender soldiers were not allowed to serve, Mulan could never have saved China” and “If having transgender troops is so bad plz explain how Mulan was trans in the army yet managed to save all China.”

Many Chinese netizens were disturbed by the transgender reference of Mulan, who is widely recognized as a legendary heroin in China. They argue that Mulan was not a transgender person and she never gave up her female identity.

“As much as I understand and support them, this is just a very bad reference and disrespectful,” commented a netizen on Sina Weibo.

While there is no official historical record on Hua Mulan, her story has been passed down for generations, especially after it was written in the form of a poem in the Northern Wei Dynasty (368-534). The poem praised Mulan for her sacrifice to join the army in place of her father and fight against the invaders.

The Mulan images were reportedly a response to Trump’s July 26 announcement on Twitter about his decision to ban transgender individuals from serving in the U.S. military, citing “tremendous medical costs and disruption.”

In 2016, a RAND Corporation study found that treatments would cost between $2.4 and $8.4 million annually, representing a 0.04 to 0.13 percent increase in the military’s healthcare budget.

No official data on the number of transgender soldiers in the U.S. military has ever been provided so far. The RAND study estimated the number to be between 1,320 and 6,630, but the Williams Institute and the National Centre for Transgender Equality estimates as many as 15,000 transgender people currently serving, with 134,000 retired, ABC reported.