Bemz graduated with a Master of Sociology from the Ateneo de Manila University, and was a researcher working in the same university when she experienced sexual harassment from a consultant.  Being a transgender, she was denied any sort of legal protection and retribution.

This traumatic experience taught her the importance of having legal protection for any gay or transsexual person in the Philippines.

In May 2010, she was the first transgender person to run for a congressional seat in the country, and the main platform of Ang Ladlad was to have the anti-discrimination bill, which has been lingering in Congress for decades, be finally passed into law.