For the past five years, its been impossible to discuss LGBTQ+ issues on social media platforms like X and Facebook without seeing comments calling LGBTQ+ people and their supporters groomers or worse. Politicians and advocates who built their brands around hating LGBTQ+ people like Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Nancy Mace (R-SC), anti-trans Republican Valentina Gomez, and activist Matt Walsh all fashion themselves as opponents of sexual abuse. And the ties between the anti-LGBTQ+ right and the biggest child sex trafficking conspiracy theory of the past decade QAnon are glaring.But its all projection, and its important for LGBTQ+ peoples self-worth and for the fight against child sex abuse to keep that in mind. Related Founder of Protect Our Kids First arrested for allegedly downloading child sex abuse material Meanwhile, right-wingers continually accuse LGBTQ+ people, drag performers, and their allies of being pedophiles and groomers. Dive deeper every day Join our newsletter for thought-provoking commentary that goes beyond the surface of LGBTQ+ issues Subscribe to our Newsletter today This has become harder to ignore in the past month as evidence continues to pile up that Donald Trump knew that he was years-long best friends with one of the most notorious child sex traffickers, Jeffrey Epstein. Trump keeps on making very suspicious statements about how much he was involved in Epsteins harmful activities, even complaining about Epstein stealing underage girls from him.John Oliver summed up some of the evidence that the U.S. currently has a pedophile for a president, and in the week since this clip, even more damning evidence has come out. Its no coincidence that someone like Congresswoman Greene, who constantly rails against trans people for supposedly grooming kids into becoming trans (which is just stupid, becaause thats not how being transgender works, and we need to be calling this idea that teachers are transing kids stupid more often), is also one of Trumps biggest supporters despite the fact that he even openly admits to sexually abusing women.Its called pedocon theory pedo from pedophile, con from conservative the idea that pedophilia is inherently tied up with movement conservatism. Samantha Hancox-Li has a great article at Liberal Currents explaining it in more detail, and she sums it up thus: If conservatism is thetheory, pedophilia is the practice. Hancox-Li points out that child sex abusers in high-power positions in the GOP greatly outnumber those in the Democratic party and that conservative institutions like the Catholic Church, the LDS Church, and the Southern Baptist Convention have all had massive child sex abuse scandals. Pedocon theory suggests that this is not an aberration, she writes. Pedocon theory suggests that this was the inevitable result of the conservative project, because the conservative project is inherently pedophilic.For conservatives like Greene, child sex abuse is an aberration and a sin, just like homosexuality and trans identity. People do it because theyre weirdos, and people who are weird in one aspect of their lives and who refuse to follow the rules laid out for them (either by unspoken norms or in texts like the Bible) are simply chaotic, perverted, and libertine and are therefore likely to do anything else thats chaotic, perverted, and libertine like abuse children. This is why QAnon believers often describe their theorized international cabal of child sex abusers looking to take the adrenochrome out of kids as satanic. Its not enough to just have such a cabal; it has to beanti-Christian because Christianity, to them, provides rules and morality. And whats more anti-Christian than Satanism?But this isnt how it actually works. The liberal view on the matter is that its about power; child sex abuse happens when an adult has a lot of authority over young people and little accountability or oversight. This is why large Christian institutions often have issues with child sex abuse. Its not uncommon for churches to tell victims of sexual abuse that they must forgive their abuser instead of calling the police protecting their own hierarchy is a more important goal to many Christians than the safety of their parishioners.This view that child sex abuse is connected with power dynamics not sin or abnormal sexuality is consistent with the fact that the victims of child sex trafficking tend to be people from historically disempowered groups. According to the Human Trafficking Collaborative at the University of Michigan, almost all the victims of sex trafficking are women and girls, and most of them are people of color, with just over half being Black. LGBTQ+ youth are at greater risk of being trafficked because of family rejection, youth homelessness, and substance use (consistent with minority stress). Conservatism is fundamentally about maintaining and strengthening these sorts of power structures. While Republicans like Greene might see consistency between her vocal opposition to child sex trafficking and her even more vocal opposition to accepting trans kids for who they are, the reality is that her stances are completely contradictory. Parents who drive away their trans kids, through direct rejection or shame, put them in situations where they are vulnerable to trafficking. Parents who try to keep all discussions of sex and sexuality out of schools to protect their childrens innocence are leaving them vulnerable to sexual abuse. Parents who refuse to entertain the notion that church leadership is wrong when it comes to demonizing LGBTQ+ people are sending a message that these people are infallible authorities and no one will believe you if you say they victimized you.And the kind of conservative parent who becomes outraged that a doctor or another mandatory reporter would want to privately talk to their kid about whether theyre experiencing abuse well, that ones pretty self-explanatory. Liberals often say that every conservative accusation is a confession, and thats true here too. Trump spent 2024 describing transgender people as threats to women and children, despite there being no evidence that they are, even after he had been found liable for sexually abusing a woman by a jury, and he had been accused by dozens of women and even some children of mistreating or violating them. (Trump denies all these allegations.)And what better way to deflect attention away from ones history of abuse than to paint oneself as a great defender of women and children? The idea that LGBTQ+ people are a threat to children is one of the oldest and nastiest stereotypes used to deny us our rights and our humanity. And one of the reasons that conservatives spread it is to keep from actually having to take real steps to fight child sex abuse.Subscribe to theLGBTQ Nation newsletterand be the first to know about the latest headlines shaping LGBTQ+ communities worldwide.