Christopher Rufo, the boy wonder of the right, is fomenting a panic about sexual abuse in public schools. jonathanchait writes
The Manhattan Institute’s Christopher Rufo is the boy wonder of the right, having burst onto the scene as a fervent critic of left-wing pedagogy’s encroachment on the workplace and schools. The strange logic of partisanship has transmuted his role into something far more bizarre: He is now fomenting a panic about sexual abuse in public schools.
The bizarre turn of events that brought him to this point required several steps. Like a great many members of the conservative-movement apparatus, Rufo has put himself at the disposal of Florida governor Ron DeSantis. Spurred by his socially conservative allies, DeSantis signed a bill restricting schools from discussing sexual orientation.
At first, Rufo hurled this accusation at Disney, which criticized DeSantis’s law. A combination of motives seems to have inspired him to turn the subject from Disney grooming to public-school grooming. Rufo had already built his career around discrediting public education. Possibly he or somebody on DeSantis’s staff realized that convincing the public that Disney’s staff is filled with pedophiles might not help the Florida tourism business.
Rufo’s piece runs all of six paragraphs long. It begins with the premise that DeSantis’s critics deny sexual abuse ever occurs in schools. “The New York Times, for example, accused conservatives of having a ‘freakout’ about imaginary ‘grooming’ in public schools, and the Washington Post dismissed concerns about sexual abuse by teachers as a ‘QAnon conspiracy,’” he writes.