I Never Gave Homophobes A Second Thought. Then My Husband And I Became Dads To Twin Girls.

As a gay man, I’ve managed to escape a lot of the homophobia that afflicted many of my peers who grew up in the ’80s and ’90s. I started coming out at 14, in an Asian American enclave in Silicon Valley. Though it wasn’t the gayest place one could grow up, I felt reasonably safe coming out and never felt particular pressure to perform or mask my identity.

This continued into college in New York City and well into my adult life in Raleigh, North Carolina, where I now live. I always felt I could be openly gay and never feared homophobic attacks.

This changed when my husband and I suddenly became dads to twin girls in the summer of 2020. Our girls were placed with us for adoption at four and a half months old. Despite the chaotic circumstances of those early COVID days, we quickly settled into being dads. The girls did all the things babies do, and we did all the things new parents do, including worrying that we were doing it wrong.

For me (and, to a lesser degree, my husband), there was also a worry about leaving the house with the girls. I’m very visibly Asian, and my girls are very visibly not. (My husband is white, and though my girls are not white, they could pass for his biological kids if you squint.)

This was around the time that the word “groomer” was gaining widespread usage on Fox News, Twitter and Truth Social. It’s a term that implies that just by educating children about sexuality and gender identity (or even just existing in their presence), queer people are sexually manipulating them. It is particularly violent and vitriolic when aimed toward LGBTQ+ parents, or parents of queer kids.

According to the Human Rights Campaign , “anti-grooming” narratives surged over 400% on social media following the passage