by Laurel Duggan
Twitter began censoring the word “groomer” after left-wing media watchdog group Media Matters for America pressured the site to crack down on the term, which they claim is anti-LGBT.
Commentator James Lindsay was locked out of his Twitter account Thursday for calling a Media Matters employee a groomer, according to screenshots Lindsay shared with the Daily Caller News Foundation. He had to delete his tweet and wait an additional 12 hours to regain full access to his account.
The term groomer describes adults who form inappropriate friendships with children in order to prime them for sexual abuse, and it has been used by some commentators to refer to those who expose young children to sexual content through drag shows and lessons on gender identity and sexuality.
Lindsay told the DCNF he uses the term to refer to both sexually predatory grooming and ideological grooming into what he called “queer Marxist ideology.”
“I call people who engage in either of these grooming behaviors ‘groomers’ because it’s wrong to do and because that’s what they’re doing: grooming,” he said.
“Ok, groomer,” Lindsay said in the offending tweet. He was responding Ari Drennen, LGBTQ program director at Media Matters, who had criticized a DCNF article about the campaign to get “groomer” censored on Twitter. Twitter told Lindsay his tweet violated its rules against hateful conduct, according to a screenshot he shared with the DCNF.
Lmao L https://t.co/hIK0KKZU1C pic.twitter.com/0aKt0e8ZYI
— James Lindsay, equipping my war moms (@ConceptualJames) July 21, 2022
Misusing “groomer” to attack lgbtq people erases survivors of sexual abuse and is being used to incite violence against the LGBTQ community. Good to see Twitter finally starting to take this seriously. https://t.co/0H24t7glDz
— Ari Drennen
(@AriDrennen) July 22, 2022
“Accusing people of harming children with no basis is extremely dangerous,” Drennen wrote Thursday. “Three weeks again, Lindsay directed his little groomer bit at a library holding a drag queen story hour. Proud boys showed up three days later with signs about groomers and a rifle.”
Twitter and Media Matters did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.
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Laurel Duggan is a reporter at Daily Caller News Foundation.
