‘Grooming’ rhetoric is harmful
Group says term in child sex abuse debate dims trauma
“Grooming,” a term associated with adults who sexually abuse children, has become an attack word in today’s battle over anti-LGBTQ legislation and is spilling out into the broader culture wars.
The term, coined in the 1980s, describes a process used to gain access to a potential victim, coerce them to agree to the abuse and reduce the risk of being caught, according to RAINN, a national anti-sexual violence organization.
Now, however, some conservatives are using such terms as “grooming,” “groomer” and “pro-pedophile” against opponents in battles over everything from laws restricting discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity in schools to Supreme Court confirmations. Critics say the references are dangerous, diminishing the experience of sexual assault survivors and smearing the LGBTQ community, which has long faced a false stigma regarding inappropriate behavior with children.
“I think it does enormous harm,” said Michael Bronski, a professor of women, gender and sexuality studies at Harvard University and author of “A Queer History of the United States for Young People.” “This really speaks to the deep-seatedness of this notion of abusing children as a political tactic.”
Here are some recent examples where child sex abuse terminology has been used:
• In March, Christina Pushaw, press secretary for Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, tweeted that “Parental Rights in Education” legislation restricting classroom discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity, is an “Anti-Grooming Bill” and that anyone opposing it is “probably a groomer or at least you don’t denounce the grooming of 4-8 year old children.”
• Fox News host Laura Ingraham went further, labeling a program segment: “Liberals are sexually grooming elementary students.”
• After Disney criticized that legislation, Lt. Gov. Jeanette M. Nuñez told Newsmax that Disney has a “not-so-secret agenda to indoctrinate our youth with topics that are very inappropriate. Sexualizing children at a young age is never OK.”
• Last month, first-term U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, RGa., tweeted “Democrats are the party of killing babies, grooming and transitioning children, and pro-pedophile politics” two days after calling three Republican senators “pro-pedophile” for voting to confirm Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court. Greene has a history of supporting the fringe group QAnon, whose conspiracy theories include the false claim that Democratic elites are immersed in child sex trafficking.
• And, in Michigan, Republican state Sen. Lana Theis accused Democratic colleague Mallory McMorrow in a fundraising email of wanting to “groom and sexualize kindergarteners,” leading to an impassioned condemnation last week by McMorrow, who supports LGBTQ rights.
Use of terms such as grooming and pro-pedophile play into a persistent stereotype linking LGBTQ people to inappropriate behavior with children, “which is completely, patently false,” said R.G. Cravens, assistant professor of political science at California Polytechnic State University, who focuses on LGBTQ politics and policy.
“The rhetoric has a long history with anti-LGBTQ politics,” Cravens said.
He added that the use of weaponized language often arises in reaction to LGBTQ political, legal and social gains. As such, Cravens explained, rightwing groups have historically used loaded terms to discredit and delegitimize political opponents and LGBTQ people in particular and few topics draw as strong an emotional response as harm being done to children.
“There’s no coincidence that the first conservative antiLGBTQ organizations that formed in the 1970s,” Cravens said, “went by names like Save Our Children.”
Political language loaded with references related to child sex abuse, especially with the history of blame wrongfully attached to LGBTQ people, goes hand in hand with a flood of state legislative bills, many targeting transgender people, seen as restricting LGBTQ rights in classrooms, medical treatment, sports participation and restroom usage, said Sarah Kate Ellis, president of national LGBTQ rights group GLAAD.
Tiffany Justice, co-founder of parental rights nonprofit Moms for Liberty, is a supporter of the new Florida law prohibiting classroom discussion of sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third grade. She defended using the term grooming because she feels kids are being indoctrinated in school.
Justice acknowledged that some people could link terms such as grooming to child sex abuse, but added, “Stop teaching kids things there are laws against teaching and parents don’t want taught. No one will call you a groomer then.”
Justice rejected criticism that the law targets the LGBTQ community, calling it “a lie. … Nothing about the bill says anything about gay or straight.”
Log Cabin Republicans, the nation’s largest organization of LGBTQ conservatives and their straight allies, also supports the Florida law and doesn’t see it as an attack on LGBTQ rights, president Charles Moran said.
However, he acknowledged that some people have loosely used terms such as grooming, especially in social media.
“I’m very sensitive to the importance around child trafficking, of actual grooming, and we don’t use that officially within our organization,” Moran said.
Opponents of the grooming language say it doesn’t have to mention LGBTQ people directly to discriminate, that a restriction against discussing sexual orientation and gender identity defaults in favor of the status quo, cisgender heterosexuals.
Child sex abuse is a serious societal problem, with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reporting that about 1 in 4 girls and one in 13 boys experience it, with the majority of abusers being known to the child or family.
Efforts to prevent child sex abuse and help survivors become more difficult when terms such as grooming and pedophile become cultural cannon fodder, advocates say.
Media discussion of sexual abuse, even as part of necessary efforts to find solutions, can be difficult for survivors of assault and abuse.
It’s much worse when that discussion is “misused” for other purposes, said Laura Palumbo, communications director for the National Sexual Violence Resource Center, based in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
“Many survivors may not even have disclosed (their experience) to their own friends, family and loved ones because of the shame and stigma that they face,” Palumbo said. “And then to see that their stories are being tossed around by others to make a point about an unrelated issue does have a harmful impact.”