Thread by @femoit13

How Genspect’s Narrative Collapses Under its Own Evidence

In 2010, the World Professional Association for Transgender Health (WPATH) issued a short, measured statement:

“The expression of gender characteristics… that are not stereotypically associated with one’s assigned sex

https://twitter.com/stellaomalley3/status/1978522983359496548

at birth is a common and culturally-diverse human phenomenon which should not be judged as inherently pathological.”
— WPATH, May 26, 2010

It was a call to end stigma, not a recruitment drive. Yet, groups like Genspect have retroactively cast this statement as the trigger for a

“social contagion”. Claiming that once the psychiatric establishment stopped calling trans people disordered, trans identity “spread” through schools, media, & culture.

That’s not history. It’s conspiracy logic.

WPATH wasn’t promoting a trend; it was correcting a wrong

De-pathologization means acknowledging that variance isn’t illness. When homosexuality was removed from the DSM in 1973, that didn’t “cause” more gay people, it allowed people to exist without criminalization or shame.

WPATH’s 2010 statement did the same for gender variance.

It didn’t invent new identities; it stopped punishing existing ones.

Yes, some social contagion did occur, but not in the way they claim

It’s fair to admit that in the 2010s, a subset of youth explored gender identity

in ways amplified by online culture & peer influence. The internet made identity experimentation public, accelerated, & sometimes performative.

But that’s not unique to trans issues. From emo subcultures to eating-disorder forums to self-diagnosed neurodivergence, adolescence has always mirrored & magnified the social languages of belonging. A subcultural adoption wave is not the same thing as a psychiatric epidemic.

Genspect’s error is treating every rise in self-identification as proof of pathology & every act of self-expression as evidence of delusion.

Their own “decline” argument dismantles their theory

https://x.com/genspect/status/1978093208857927781?s=46&t=uwTc-pQJvEazlyxMuAvhKw

Recently, Genspect shared CHSS Report No. 5: “The Decline of Trans and Queer Identity among Young Americans” as proof that trans identification is “falling out of fashion.”

But this undercuts their own contagion model.

If WPATH’s statement supposedly “triggered” an unstoppable

social epidemic, how do they explain its sudden reversal? A contagion doesn’t fade on its own a fad does. By highlighting a decline, Genspect quietly concedes that what they observed was a temporary social wave, not a permanent ideological infection.

Moreover, “decline” in self-reports could reflect anything: increased stigma, backlash, survey shifts, or sample changes. Numbers fluctuate when safety & acceptance fluctuate. They don’t prove a single psychological cause.

The real driver was the Zeitgeist

Trans visibility

rose in tandem with broader movements: racial justice, queer rights, neurodiversity, feminism, not because of one press release from WPATH. It’s the product of a generation raised with digital connection & social vocabulary for difference.

To reduce all that to “WPATH made it happen” is like claiming the invention of the thermometer caused global warming.

De-pathologization is social progress regardless of numbers.

Whether the number of people identifying as trans increases or decreases, removing “gender identity

disorder” from the list of mental illnesses remains a milestone of human rights.

The measure of progress is not how many identify, it’s how few must hide.

WPATH’s 2010 statement didn’t cause a contagion; it cured a form of institutional blindness.

Genspect’s own evidence now proves as much. Relaxed policies exposed areas for improvement in assessment & support, but the solution is better care, not a return to stigma or psychiatric labeling.