For the better part of a decade, with the rapid rise of LGBTQ++, non-binary, and other forms of identity – especially among youth – this narrative was rammed down everyone's throat that history spoke to: gender fluidity was a moral revelation that represents the right side of history. Homosexuality was on the rise as society finally abandoned repression and came to the conclusion that people who are gay were “born that way.”
Unfortunately, reality has a way of monkeying around.
Recent empirical work by Jean Twenge and Eric Kaufman (“Increases in self-identification as transgender among US adults, 2014-2022”) [2024] Sexuality Research and Social Policy: A Journal of the NSRC, 22(2), 755-773. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13178-024-01001-7; “Growth in LGB identity among US adults, 2014-2021” [2024] Sexuality Research and Social Policy: A Journal of the NSRC, 21(3), 863-878. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13178-023-00874-4; and “The decline of trans and gay identities among young Americans” [2025] CHSS Report No. 5 Declines in Trans and Queer Identity Among Young Americans – Heterodox Social Science CenterAnalyzing large-scale survey data in the US and UK, respectively) shows that the dramatic increase in non-heterosexual identification during the 2010s has slowed significantly. It became stable in some areas. Refused in others.
But even more pronounced than the plateau was the pattern of uplift. Twenge's generational research found that Gen Z reported far higher rates of LGBTQ++ identity than Millennials or Gen But the increase was not distributed equally across categories. A large portion of the increase came especially among young women. Kaufman observed clustering in progressive ideological and social environments.
What both Twenge and Kaufman found is that the LGBTQ++ shift was group-driven, culturally focused, and quite sudden. But biology doesn't behave that way.
If sexual orientation and gender identity were entirely innate and fixed at birth in stable proportions, as has been the case for millennia, no one would expect such sharp, particularly generational, spikes. There are no sudden changes in human genetics between 2012 and 2022. In other words, what changed were not the chromosomes but the culture. This phenomenon has a name in the social sciences: contagion.
Infection is essentially a well-documented way that behavior, attitudes, and identities spread through peer networks. Especially teenagers are very sensitive to this. When incentives are abundant in favor of a certain identity, such as when institutions (i.e., corporate and academia), the media, and even one's coworkers celebrate a particular identity such as LGBTQ++, it is no surprise that the number of people identifying or even pretending to be such increases. There are many examples from a similar past: self-harm, eating disorders and even some political identities.
Twenge and Kaufman suggest that the 2010s represent a peak in LGBTQ++ identification. Which should logically trend downwards. And this is not because of oppression but because of simple exhaustion and reason asserting itself.
One finding also looked at a 23% decline in young adults identifying as LGBTQ++ from 2022-2023, which coincidentally was when Elon Musk began taking control of Twitter.
This plateau or even declining trend is significant because pro-LGBTQ++ public policy, educational programming, and even medical protocols were justified by the perceived increase in LGBTQ++ numbers. The perception was that LGBTQ++ were a huge but suppressed demographic. But if that increase was merely an illusionary peer-induced contagion, which 1-5% of the generally recognized LGBTQ++ population still holds true, then a reassessment of the policy becomes necessary.
Fortunately, Philippine law has been fairly stable so far. The Supreme Court has consistently considered sex to be a biological reality and immutable, not a self-proclaimed variable (see Silverio v. Republic and even Republic v. Cagandahan). The underlying principle is that law should conform to reality and biological stability rather than cultural fluctuations.
Obviously, these decisions are not religious declarations. They are legal decisions rooted in statutory interpretation and scientific reality. They reflect a judicial understanding (despite the strange decision in Joseph v. Ursua) that sex is not a matter of subjective identity but an objective characteristic.
Yet, with the rebuttal of the “born this way” narrative, the only other argument for the LGBTQ++ movement is to separate sexual identity from biology, in which the former can be shaped by environment and peer influence. But if that were the case, then there remains a legitimate interest in the norms that society promotes.
If Twenge and Kaufman are correct in their claims that gender identity is not rooted in biology (as progressives claim) but rather a cultural phenomenon, then society has the right to protect itself and encourage only those cultures and behaviors that are truly for the good of society.
It thus highlights the importance of free speech rights, accurate information and, for example, democratic governance over judicial law.
Conservatives have long argued that humans – apart from immutable characteristics like biology and gender – are socially constructed. Families, churches, schools, the media and academies, and especially the law, all have a responsibility to ensure that civic formation serves the common good.
And yet the common good must be naturally rooted in reality. And reality, unlike fashion or contagion, is not based on the ups and downs of algorithms.
Jamie Gatdula is the Dean of the UA&P Law School and a lecturer at the Philippine Judicial Academy for Constitutional Philosophy and Jurisprudence. The views expressed here are his own and not necessarily those of the institutions to which he belongs.
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