Fox News host Tucker Carlson is blasting what he described as the “sexualization” of children by teachers and urging parents to “fight back” against curriculums focused on gender identity and sexual orientation in schools.
Carlson has in recent months railed against issues of gender, sex and race being included in discussions and curriculums in elementary schools during his top-rated prime-time show on the country’s most-watched news network.
“What you’re seeing is a society that hates children,” Carlson said on his show Monday.
“You would have to hate children in order to sexualize them. Because sexualizing children screws them up for life. Ask anyone to whom it has happened, period,” he said. “No one should put up with this. No parent should put up with this for one second, no matter what the law says. Your duty, your moral duty, is to defend your children. This is an attack on your children and you should fight back.”
Carlson suggested that in a “healthy” country “with an intact social fabric, neighborhood dads would give out instant justice to anyone who even thought about sexualizing their kids.”
“And if you doubt that, go out and try it in Bulgaria or South Africa or the Solomon Islands. Good luck. Let us know how that ends, if you can still speak,” he said.
The host’s comments triggered a storm of backlash from pundits and media watchdogs who have long been critical of Carlson and Fox News more generally, some of whom suggested his words amount to a call for violence against members of the LGBTQ community.
Others defended the host’s comments.
“Have to call you out,” former sports broadcaster-turned-conservative pundit Michelle Tafoya tweeted at a staffer at the liberal media watchdog Media Matters for America who had shared a clip of Carlson’s comments. “Where is he ‘calling for violence’?? If you are referring to the phrase, ‘fight back,’ you are intellectually dishonest.”
Carlson and other conservative commentators have also decried hospitals and doctors who have made news for providing gender-affirming health care to children, pushing back at officials who have supported such procedures.
“These are sex crimes,” Carlson said on Monday. “And the people committing them should be punished. Now, try and say that out loud anywhere but on Fox News. You can’t. Why can’t you? Because it’s true, that’s why.”
“You can’t say the true things,” he added. “You can claim that the Earth is flat and no one gets exorcised. But when you start saying things like ‘All lives matter’ or ‘Sexualizing my children is a crime and if you keep it up, I’m going to hurt you because I am the dad’ — say that? You’re done.”
Experts who track misinformation and hate speech have pointed out a number of hospitals, schools and other facilities that have been targeted by conservative critics and have faced an increased threat of violence in recent months.
Last week, the FBI announced that it has made an arrest in connection with a hoax bomb threat against Boston Children’s Hospital, which is home to the first pediatric and adolescent transgender health program in the United States.
Carlson has previously argued that parents have a right to protect their children from government edicts or societal pressures.
In April, he told his viewers to call child protective services and report the parents of children wearing masks outdoors.
“These are not people who want to leave you alone or your kids alone,” Carlson said this week. “These are weirdos getting creepy with other people’s children. That’s exactly what it is.”