Words have always been fungible. What they meant at one time means something else in later days. “Gay” is an example of that. While it is still important to be well-groomed, that is, your appearance is clean and neat, the alternative definition of “grooming” is something entirely different. The legal definition of child grooming is as follows:
Child grooming refers to an act of deliberately establishing an emotional connection with a child to prepare the child for child abuse. Child grooming is undertaken usually to carry out sexual abuse and other child exploitation like trafficking of children, child prostitution or the production of child pornography. Currently child grooming occur [sic] through the use of internet.
I am pretty well informed about changes in our society, and I understand what happens in “child grooming,” but when I read the definition in this form, I still was shocked. My attention was turned to the proliferation of this horror when I ran across the EARN IT Act.
EARN IT stands for Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies. This legislation was introduced by Senators Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.). It is intended to push online technology companies to seriously confront child sexual abuse material that is presented online. It also removes the blanket immunity those companies enjoy for violations of laws related to online child sexual abuse material (CSAM).
Senator Graham said,
There are tens of millions of photos and videos circulating throughout the internet, showing the most heinous acts of sexual abuse and torture of children … The days of children being exploited on the internet and their families being unable to do anything about it are coming to an end.
The support for this Act is bipartisan. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) agrees:
Tech companies have long had ready access to low-cost, or even free tools to combat the scourge of child sexual abuse material but have failed to act. Millions of these horrifying images go unidentified and unreported by the tech platforms that host them because there are so few consequences when these companies look the other way. That ends with the EARN IT Act.
Even if the EARN IT Act is passed, your kids are not free of danger. I strongly urge you 
to access the Missing Kids website and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Glean information from these and other sources. Contact your Representative and Senator and ask them to vote for the EARN IT Act. Don’t take it for granted that your kid is too smart to be duped by these criminals. Constantly review with them what the dangers are, how to recognize them, what to do if they have an encounter and immediately tell you about it. And remember, these dangers lurk for both boys and girls.
See my post of July 25, 2021, where I addressed other ways and places your children are being “groomed.”