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Scope/title

[edit]

Following on from the AfD closure, I thought I'd raise the issues of scope and title again so we can move on with tightening this article up. It seems off to me that we now have a dedicated article for the "scandal", but not the abuse itself. Per WP:CRITICISM, this runs the risk of POV issues and has resulted in parts of the article feeling like a WP:COATRACK.

I suggest unmerging the content from Child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom#Group-based child sexual exploitation into this article, and retitling it "Group-based child sexual exploitation". This will clarify the scope as well, since the article is currently defined primarily by op-eds, rather than experts. Importantly, it also means we can properly define group-based CSE here, rather than on another article, with sections for research, statistics, the full history of events, and a section for the political and media coverage that has ensued. We can later spin off any sections if they need more space, but at least we'd have all the basics in one place.

Any thoughts on this, @Kowal2701, @LeChatiliers Pupper, @Simonm2223, @Hemiauchenia?

ETA: Removed two misspelled usernames. Apologies for the ping, if these are actual editors! Lewisguile (talk) 08:29, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I meant to tag @Newimpartial and @Riposte97, but tagged the wrong names. Lewisguile (talk) 08:31, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I agree, when the inquiry comes out and we have good quality coverage of it would be the time to have an article on the politics of this. But for now it’s well within the domain of sociology and criminology. If this scope is to be kept, then there should probably be a title change, both aspects of the title "grooming gangs" and "scandal" fall under WP:POVTITLE and there’s no indication it’s the WP:COMMONNAME, but what to idk. In the broader scope, this issue would still get good coverage per WP:DUE Kowal2701 (talk) 08:41, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Tbf "grooming gangs scandal" is used by the FT, Economist, Independent, Sky UK, and Hayton 2025. I think a case could be made for both articles existing, but we should work on the broad-view first, then fork off a subsection/s Kowal2701 (talk) 09:36, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agree, if this had been proposed in the AfD, I probably would of supported it as an alternative. Then there can be a WP:BALANCED article without undue focus. Naturally at present, it presents an undue focus. For now, this scandal can be a section within a broader scope as proposed, given the quantity of content that can support it from the other article. CNC (talk) 09:16, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I said the AfD should have focussed on scope and NPOV rather than, as it ended up being, notability. The notability isn't in doubt. Lewisguile (talk) 09:22, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Talk:Child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom has been notified of this discussion. CNC (talk) 09:21, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I should add, as well, there was a lot of work done on the Grooming gangs moral panic page before that was merged too, so we can look across the history of any related pages to develop the one we end up with here. Lewisguile (talk) 09:28, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • As per my thoughts at the AfD, there will be a notable subject around the inquiry, but that will not be called this. If the article is kept with this name, it should probably be looking at WP:BESTSOURCES to discuss how the scandal has been weaponised and politicised. That is, it is not about the cases at all, but about the politicisation of a subset of cases, and the suggestions that (a) where victims are older children, the suggestion is that police and prosecutors pursued lesser charges than rape in such cases and (b) that the police have been reluctant to record the ethnicity of offenders. However, both of those will be better treated by the inquiry article. This title, if pursued under that topic, will require merger into the inquiry article (or rename this one, perhaps, if it is possible to do it properly).
    The alternative of renaming to Group-based child sexual exploitation will treat such group based cases as a spin-out of Child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom. We can do that, but there is less that can be encyclopaedically said about this than people suppose. It is the politicisation of specific cases (in ignorance of others) that has led to this point, including inspiring the flood of voters who came to the AfD following X and Breitbart articles advertising the discussion. That those voters parroted the Breitbart line ("it's not fringe") was unhelpful, because what they did not do is to take account of the discussion in the AfD about what the subject is. I expect a reader looking for this article needs to know something encylopaedic and neutral about what the heck Elon Musk is wittering about this time, and not looking for a spin-out of the general issue of child abuse, specifically about cases where paedophiles have acted together.
    So in essence, I certainly support a repurposing of content, I expect a page move is required, but I am not convinced Group-based child sexual exploitation is quite correct. I'll ping in Yngvadottir at this point, as someone whose (brief) keep !vote did consider content, and who I find is usually a thoroughly neutral and analytic editor. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 09:34, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    IMO it would be best for the article on the Casey Report to address the inquiry, as they are closer conceptual bedfellows. This article is about the phenomenon itself, not individual investigations or assessments of it.
    Your proposal that the weaponisation of allegations of CSE should be included has huge merit. I believe it should have its own heading on this page, but that (like this whole page) it should include high-quality (especially recent) sources. Part of the trouble editors will face is that the factual ground on which the cultural/political battle has been fought has changed and will continue to change.
    Otherwise, I encourage you to stop 'fighting the last war' as it were, and accept the result of the AfD. Insofar as your arguments to change the scope are, in effect, that you don't think the article should exist at all, I don't think that's in keeping with the spirit of consensus. Riposte97 (talk) 11:39, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I don't think you can have read my comment very well if that is how you summarise it. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 12:31, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Thanks for pinging me, but I doubt my ability to thread the needle on this topic. Like Riposte97, I agree that weaponisation of the cases/issue should be included; but I believe we're in COMMONNAME territory with "grooming gangs", and that alternate titles about "groups" risk sounding as if they're not specifically about this British topic. FWIW I think "moral panic" tips over into POV, although the viewpoint that that's what it is should take up a lot of the article real estate. Yngvadottir (talk) 03:26, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Thanks for your input. I don't disagree. I'm less happy with the word scandal but that, too, may be warranted by sources. I haven't done all the reading yet though. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:54, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Lewisguile I certainly think that some broader context around GBCSE may be warranted to contextualise the offending which gave rise to this article, but I would have to oppose any change in the article's scope. This article was created specifically to address the Grooming Gangs Scandal, as that term has been used in numerous RS. I see that topic as having two limbs:
1) the sexual abuse of children by grooming gangs operating primarily in the North of England; and
2) the long-running failure of British institutions to respond, or even acknowledge, the problem.
It may be the case that GBCSE is a noteworthy topic in its own right, but that's an argument for starting a new page, not changing the scope of this one. I can see now, reading back, that we may have been at crossed purposes at times due to a fundamental difference in thinking about what this article should be about. I'm sorry that I've failed to address that until now. I've certainly always seen the page as referring to the Grooming Gangs Scandal discretely, but would be more than happy to collaborate on the creation of a broader GBCSE page with you! Riposte97 (talk) 11:32, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Any page here must be led by the sources. What WP:BESTSOURCES frame the topic in this way? Note, we are not looking for newspaper coverage now. This is an encyclopaedia, not a news aggregator. Let's find the sources and start with those, and that will show how the subject should be framed. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 12:35, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
A short selection of good sources:
- https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2025/07/01/the-grooming-scandal-abuse-today/
- https://theweek.com/crime/the-grooming-gangs-scandal-explained
- https://theconversation.com/the-uk-failed-grooming-gang-victims-by-not-seeing-children-as-children-259098
- https://www.economist.com/britain/2025/06/18/the-grooming-gangs-scandal-is-a-stain-on-the-british-state
- https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/opinions/2025/4/5/the-uks-grooming-gang-scandal-is-about-race-class-and-misogyny
- https://news.sky.com/story/grooming-gangs-scandal-timeline-what-happened-what-inquiries-there-were-and-how-starmer-was-involved-after-elon-musks-accusations-13285021
- https://madrascourier.com/opinion/how-political-correctness-shielded-pakistani-grooming-gangs-in-britain/ Riposte97 (talk) 12:39, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Again, did you see where I wrote Note, we are not looking for newspaper coverage now? Look, here's something better:
  • "At the Limits of 'Acceptable' Speech: A Feminist Analysis of Official Discourse on Child Sexual Abuse". Feminist Responses to Injustices of the State and its Institutions: Politics, Intervention, Resistance (1 ed.). Bristol University Press. 2023. ISBN 978-1-5292-0728-6.
Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 12:43, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
You may not be looking for newspaper sources, but they are appropriate for the article scope as it stands. I’m not entirely sure what the contents of that chapter you have linked are (you aren't going to expand on that?) but if it fits the scope, have at it. Riposte97 (talk) 12:55, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Have a read of WP:BESTSOURCES. I have only skimmed that chapter and read its conclusion. At this point we are in source discovery. We are looking for the best sources that exist. Others, like that one, which are in scope need to be found and we need to read them. Having read them, we will have a better idea of what the notable subject(s) is/are. The question we are trying to answer is this: what does someone searching for encyclopaedic information on the "grooming gangs scandal" (with or without the word scandal in there) need to know that is not encapsulated in National Audit on Group-based Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse or Child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom#Group-based child sexual exploitation? Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 13:04, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Sirfurboy are you asking a serious question? To me it seems very unlikely that the high-quality scholarship on this article's topic will be encompassed in those two locations. Newimpartial (talk) 01:36, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I agree, which is why my view was that this page is a POVFORK. As we have kept the page, I think we need to ascertain what it is that the page should be saying that is a separate subject from the existing pages. I don't think the AfD established that, because it was heavily influenced by outside coverage, and most of the keeps did not grapple with that question at all but merely stated it is not fringe and is notable. So we are left with an article we must write, whilst not duplicating the two articles that we have. Grooming gangs will be a search term. What are the BESTSOURCES saying about grooming gangs specifically that we can say encyclopaedically to fulfill the information requirement of the information seeker? Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:44, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There are loads of academic sources linked in the above discussions. Kowal2701 (talk) 13:10, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Would it be possible to list them here? Perhaps we should create a sources table? But either way, having all the sources we need to read in one place would be helpful. Thanks. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 14:16, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Grooming gangs scandal: what has the UK government done so far?
That's the FT using the phrase grooming gang scandal,
Broadly people know what is meant by grooming gang scandal - making the title too broad would mean we would eventually get to a point where the grooming gang coverage once again needs to be split out all in all it would be best to have a reasonable conversion about it now. LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 20:13, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think I’m leaning towards having both articles, and rewrite this article once we get decent sources. I think it’s best this one is mostly on the political response, rather than covering everything from the phenomena to media coverage and politics. Idk, I’m just wary that by having the racial scope were just mimicking exactly what the UK media has been so strongly criticised for, ie. giving more coverage to these cases because the perpetrators were brown. Framing this is so difficult, imo for this article it’s between having the scope on the whole shebang, or limiting it to an aspect like media coverage or political response (or both). Kowal2701 (talk) 20:25, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Having both articles would be fine;
> ie. giving more coverage to these cases because the perpetrators were brown.
I agree this is not good to simply repeat that but my alternative concern is that we would go "too far the other way" the shutting down of reliable news sources does not bode well for being able to balance two deeply entwinned but not necessarily contradictory perspectives.
Especially when the two perspectives are held in very different spaces (academia vs centre <-> centre right institutions and media) LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 20:43, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed. See what others think. But it's worth saying that it can be true that British-Pakistani men are overrepresented in statistics for this, and that the media have disproportionately highlighted the cases, they're not mutually exclusive, and if we can get the article to communicate that nuance neutrally I think we'd have done well. Kowal2701 (talk) 20:51, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Exactly. And even the best evidence regarding that is that British Pakistani men are overrepresented in some areas and in specific time periods. The Casey audit clarifies that this cannot be assumed to apply more generally and in other areas yet. More information is needed to prove that, so that's what we should say. Lewisguile (talk) 20:58, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Wonderful I think there is some agreement here, could you expand on your idea to cover media and political responses.
How would it change the scope of the article?
If such an approach was taken I would be in favour of using as little wikivoice as possible simply;
This is what X source says
This is what Y source says
With care taken in what sources are used.
Perhaps under some headings like;
- Lead
- (Brief very fact based) background on what the actual events are
- Academic research
- Media coverage
- Political response
--
Or do I have your idea wrong? LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 21:00, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think we could merge the background and media coverage sections, and just have another one on political response which would include subsections summarising our inquiry articles (and start by discussing lack of response). AFAIK there aren't academic studies answering the big question so no need for that section? Imo criminology and sociology are best left to the broad article. I completely agree about WP:ATTRIBUTE. Kowal2701 (talk) 21:10, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Seems like a sensible way forward. Riposte97 (talk) 01:04, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, I think we're inching closer to a consensus. Good work, everyone! Lewisguile (talk) 08:29, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Let's go where the consensus leads then. CNC (talk) 08:40, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
So I am still not convinced we are presenting the scandal properly. If the title remains as Grooming gangs scandal, then the Casey Audit is pretty clear that the scandal here is the way the British state approached the issue, that they didn't treat victims as innocent children, but saw them in some sense as complicit, and that sensitivities around collecting ethnic data prevented them from quoshing a moral panic regarding the Asian narrative. This does no one any favours at all, and least of all those in the Asian, Pakistani or Muslim communities who needlessly suffer as those with malicious intent use this obfuscation to sow and spread hatred. This was politically weaponised by the far right - both by establishment and non establishment parties (Bhattacharyya et al., 2021), and that is the actual scandal.
If the page is about the scandal, with that in the title, the background must be the background of the moral panic, and not of group based abuse generally. If we drop the word scandal from the title, we have a general article about group based child exploitation, and we should probably start with its historical origins. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 09:41, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
AFAICT there are two narratives, the one you said, and the one that concern for community cohesion and political correctness caused inaction/inefficient practices. Does the Casey validate the second narrative in any way? The Economist article favours the second one which is unusual. Kowal2701 (talk) 10:11, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
So I suggested there were two parts in my comment. (1) not treating children as children and (2) misguided sensitivity around the data collection that meant we cannot combat malicious intent and obfuscation because we lack data. That seems to be what the Economist says too. Their subheading reads:

It involved a toxic combination of victim-blaming and misguided political correctness.

Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 10:34, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The BBC implies that failure to collect data on ethnicity inhibited research into the cultural and social drivers of the issue. One of Casey's recommendations is The government should commission research into the drivers for group-based child sexual exploitation, including online offending, cultural factors and the role of the group. Might we be able to present both narratives? Kowal2701 (talk) 10:47, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, but note that cultural factors are not limited to ethnicity here. Casey says As a key part of the nighttime economy, taxis have historically been identified as a way children can be at risk of sexual exploitation (page 10). That is, she takes seriously the fact (noted by others) that one of the driving factors here was that the night-time economy contains poorly regulated risks - and the fact that the night-time economies in her focus areas were dominated by an ethnic group in those areas could explain correlations that malicious parties have presented as causative, whilst ignoring the more likely causative correlation (that they were taxi drivers). It is clear that she would like better data to untangle this, but that her primary concern is that the night-time economy be better regulated. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 11:05, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Sirfur, you are clearly misreading the sources, and potentially letting your POV get in the way. There are, as you say, two parts to the scandal. The first is that the British Government (and local and devolved governments) failed to properly address the issue. The second is that, for reasons of politics, the ethnoreligious aspect of the issue was covered up. It is difficult to support your assertion that the 'scandal' refers to a failure to dispel the 'myth' that there is an ethnoreligious aspect to the issue. On the contrary, your assertion would seem to run directly counter to the point RS are trying to convey when referring to the scandal. Riposte97 (talk) 13:15, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
agree there isnt any tension between including secondary sources saying ethnicity data has not been properly collected by the state
and secondly other and the same secondary sources saying the night time economy needs less loopholes. LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 13:18, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I am not sure anyone said otherwise, did they? Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 13:23, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Interesting. What is my POV? You say I am misreading sources. In fact, I am reading sources. See the list below. Are you? Can you help with the summaries please? Note that in addition to the Economist, mentioned above, the Casey Audit that I have quoted and Bhattacharyya (2021), we also have the likes of The Conversation [1] posted above by you, which headlines with "The UK failed grooming gang victims by not seeing ‘children as children’", which you have omitted in your summary of what you think this is about. The BBC news at one just had a full report making the same remarks. Is your summary that omits this therefore perhaps, rather, your point of view? Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 13:31, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
@Riposte97, I think there is a slight issue with your framing in that, generally speaking, most of the RSes conclude it wasn't a "cover-up" (which implies intentional conspiracy to suppress or hide information), but rather a "fear" of being branded racist (i.e., self-censorship, avoidance of the issue) and a failure of local authorities/police to properly help the victims/treat them seriously. The language of a "cover-up" doesn't come from the RSes, but from tabloids and the same people Casey says have been using this to play politics and stir up "hatred". There are isolated incidents where people may have been told not to look into something, as in one of the local inquiries, but there isn't evidence that this was widespread or common. It's more "incompetence rather than malice", as the saying goes. Framing it as a "cover-up" is, then, not supported by the WP:BESTSOURCES.
As such, @Sirfurboy's summary seems an accurate summary of the evidence, based on the sources. I imagine where we will have the most disagreement is on what the emphasis is within the factors listed above, but so long as we bear in mind the caveats of the data so far (e.g., that conclusions can't necessarily be drawn about ethnicity) then we should be fine. Lewisguile (talk) 10:46, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Sirfurboy's summary of the scandal, except that there are two POVs tacked onto the lack of data on ethnicity. I think we do have to include the POV regarding potential cultural factors (which I don't think Casey meant to refer to night-time economy) to maintain NPOV, but only as an aspect in the broader picture, rather than a hyperfixation on it.

Many of the SCRs have called for further research into ethnic and cultural patterns to establish if there is an actual over-representation of ethnic minority offenders in organised CSE.

and

it is also clear that the debate over the reported over-representation of certain ethnicities within organised CSE is not going to disappear, but that there needs to be further empirical research conducted and more open debates held.

Kowal2701 (talk) 11:52, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
What do you mean by "POV regarding potential cultural factors"? I think we're at risk of confusing correlation/causation if we're not clear. Per that quote, Colley is saying cultural and ethnic patterns should be examined to establish if the disproportionate number of Pakistani men is accurate. Cultural factors are specifically related to numbers in that quote.
The B&S quote doesn't go further than that. It is again related to "over-representation" related to ethnicity. Neither of these are making causative claims, but are saying we need more data to clarify the numbers.
Any perspective on why numbers might be higher than expected would fall into the "responses" section, and is all effectively conjecture at this point. Lewisguile (talk) 15:35, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Casey suggests cultural factors as one of the possible drivers of the issue which means causal. Bhatti and Sinclair conclude (emphasis mine)

First, it is possible they are linked to GLCSE through media reporting, and this may explain why more police resources are used to target the areas where they live. Second, media reports may have systematically ignored GLCSE cases not involving Pakistanis. Third, those originating from traditional cultures (e.g. the Mirpur region of Pakistan) may be particularly attracted to GLCSE. Fourth, the formation of groups of like-minded Pakistani offenders is more likely than for other Muslims because there are two-and-a-half times more Pakistanis than the next largest Muslim group (Bangladeshis), making it easier to generate a critical mass. The process of group formation and solidarity may be assisted by the caste and biradari systems practiced by some Pakistanis. Finally, it is possible that Pakistanis are more likely to work in the night-time economy with its opportunities for GLCSE.

, it appears to be this sort of uncomfortable inductive reasoning (because we have no information to work with) that Colley means when she says more open debates held? Maybe I'm misinterpreting, but thankfully it's not our job to interpret anything, we can just report what the government said and wait for better analytical sources. I do think we shouldn't make assumptions, ie. be agnostic on ethnicity being a correlation/causal in some way. Kowal2701 (talk) 18:23, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That quote is a better example—thank you, @Kowal2701. The prior quotations provided didn't say the same thing. I think it's fine to use Casey's comments with attribution, as we would with any governmental report of this kind. Lewisguile (talk) 06:45, 8 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Ditto Bhatti & Sinclair, of course, if that's WP:DUE. The issue with B&S is that it's so rarely mentioned by other academics. We had a discussion on this previously, so I'd be wary of introducing it uncritically unless we can find multiple RSes which refer to it. In part, this is because it's published not in an academic journal, but a professional journal for social workers and family court staff. It's therefore unclear if it had any peer review. Lewisguile (talk) 06:47, 8 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agreed, I think B&S is best put in the broad article anyway. For this one we can just put Casey's recommendations and the government's response. B&S only has only been cited 3 times Kowal2701 (talk) 14:04, 8 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
+1 to this LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 13:16, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
the background must be the background of the moral panic. Bizarre that Sirfurboy is still referring to this as a "moral panic". Wishful thinking! cagliost (talk) 10:01, 6 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It is what the sources call it. Are you reading the sources?

This moral panic replayed familiar mythologies of the ‘gang’ – characterised by alien cultural practices, operating under a racialised honour code, and demonstrating an uncontainable deviant masculinity (Bhattacharyya et al., 2021)

and

In both towns, the perpetrators were predominantly British-Pakistani men and media emphasis on the dynamic between ‘Asian men’ and White victims, gave rise to the ‘Asian grooming gang’ panic that dominated news reporting of CSA in England (see Cockbain and Brayley, 2012; BBC, 2015b). (Tucker, 2023)

.And many others. The Casey audit does not use the term about this, but does say This does no one any favours at all, and least of all those in the Asian, Pakistani or Muslim communities who needlessly suffer as those with malicious intent use this obfuscation to sow and spread hatred. Sowing and spreading racial hatred through a racial narrative where we do not have the data is a classic moral panic. The audit does not vindicate those who think the term should no longer be used, and we have otehr sources that analyse the moral panic in depth and point out discrepancies of approach between reporting of white criminals and asian ones (Alexander, 2024). Now I haven't finished my reading, but if you are not seeing this described as a moral panic, you, perhaps, have not started yours. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 10:43, 6 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I agree with Sirfurboy here. A significant number of RSes describe this as a moral panic, so that should be included and properly weighted. Lewisguile (talk) 06:49, 8 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If not media response - civil society perhaps
If this article is to be balanced I would stress I strongly feel there needs to be some RS perspectives that seems to be saying oh wait have the institutions dropped the ball on this one and fail to protect children. Similar to your comment lower down with the BBC. LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 13:16, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Again, this is news coverage, not scholarship. That's the problem we keep running into. At the moment I'm seeing two in favour of keeping the current scope and title, four for broadening, and one that agrees with "grooming gangs" but is unclear on the rest. Is that about right so far? Lewisguile (talk) 20:30, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I think you might do well to ping everyone from the AFD too to ensure a well balanced discission. LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 20:29, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If you know of any experienced editors that would approach this thoughtfully feel free to ping per WP:APPNOTE. Issue with pinging everyone is that we’d just get knee jerk supports or opposes which isn’t terribly helpful Kowal2701 (talk) 20:41, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There's also the canvassing issue. Lewisguile (talk) 23:32, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Agree, the last article was merged into Child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom#Group-based child sexual exploitation - so if the article is now going to be kept it only makes sense to unmerged the content. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 09:36, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
True. Lewisguile (talk) 06:49, 8 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
So, I think we're just waiting on the final decisions at RSN and the admin/CTOP clarification request, and then I think we can progress with this? Are there any outstanding issues we need to work on in the meantime? I think we have a good list of sources here now. Lewisguile (talk) 09:53, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I think that Group-based child sexual exploitation in the UK is a valid topic for an article which would cover the history of such abuse and make use of sources such as Child Sexual Abuse in Victorian England by Louise A. A. Jackson. It would also deal with the cases mentioned by u:Astaire in the RM discussion below. I also think that the current scandal is a notable topic by itself, both because of the abuse itself and because of the reaction to it and its impact, all of which have been extensively covered in RS.

Considering that the article as is deals exclusively with the events that took place in the last ~30 years, the right question is what course of action would cause the least amount of disruption and produce articles that the clear for the general reader.

  1. Keep this article as it and create an article Group-based child sexual exploitation in the UK with the history of group-based exploitation and abuse of children in the UK.
  2. Re-name this article to Group-based child sexual exploitation in the UK. A lot of new content would have to be added while the content related to the "grooming gang scandal" would have to be pruned. A new article would be created to deal with it.

It seems like the second option would be much more contentious and in the end would not produce better encyclopaedic content, therefore I'd favour the first option. I'm not against renaming it but personally I can't think of names that would satisfy the NPOV and WP:COMMONNAME policies better than the current name. Alaexis¿question? 08:53, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

"Responses to group-based child sexual exploitation in the United Kingdom" would seem to better apply to both policies, but also to the suggestions in WP:CRITS. "Group-based CSE" continues to be the preferred term among policymakers, academics and the police. "Grooming gangs scandal" is more popular in the media, but WP has an WP:ACADEMICBIAS. "Scandal" or "criticism" in a title rarely supports NPOV, as by its nature it focuses on one perspective on this issue.
Either way, I think there's a consensus for a "main" article, which should hopefully prevent this one from becoming a WP:COATRACK and any issues of WP:UNDUE in the general CSA article. Lewisguile (talk) 10:09, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Scholarly sources

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Feel free to ignore WP:TPG and annotate, add sources, or replace links with WP:TWL ones. There are a few more from 2015 and earlier. Kowal2701 (talk) 14:46, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Good work. Thanks for laying the groundwork here. I'm convinced we can make a good article here, we just need to get the scope right. Lewisguile (talk) 20:31, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
There are guidelines produced by the government, like Working together to safeguard children and Child exploitation disruption toolkit, which may be useful Kowal2701 (talk) 14:37, 8 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Chapters

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This source speaks of moral panic. The ‘Pakistani grooming gangs’ have been leveraged for Islamophobic purposes by both state and non-state actors with remarkable success. It shows how and why the narrative was moved to ethnicity whilst also speaking to the major issue that the state did not treat the victims as victims. It frames this within a culture-war context, and finishes by coparing with the treatment of Shamima Begum. While the white girls of Rochdale and Rotherham symbolised the (threatened) purity of the nation, the treacherous Begum became its antithesis.
This source is critical of current approaches from a feminist perspective, arguing that the focus on race/ethnicity obscures that these are gendered crimes, with 92% of offenders being male. Through the obvious omission of a critical discussion of masculinity, the official discourse here is shaped by the state’s inability to respond effectively to feminist concerns. page 90, and the focus remains on ethnicity, communities, victim-blaming, troubled families and individual professions, yet nowhere is there a critical appraisal of gender. page 92. Secondary to the thesis, it discusses both race and also occupation and the night time economy - recognising these matters of discourse, but not about these. Their point is ‘Patriarchy is the most important contributor to child sexual abuse’ (Bolen, 2001: 34). page 79 and that in a patriarchal power structure, [it is able] to dominate discourses and to disqualify and silence women and children’s experiences of violence, and that it is a critique of this dominance and avoidance of accountability that feminism must centralize. Page 80. Good points, but largely absent from the current narrative. (That is the point). Being absent, it is not clear how this can be included in the encyclopaedic article.
This source is an ethnography, and looks at Asian masculinities. The original work looked at the Asian gang moral panic and this one updates, and spends some time on the Asian grooming gang issue, which it calls a moral panic and discusses in detail why this is a classic moral panic, citing other sources on this list too. It looks at stats, the Jay report and the Casey review. It shows the limits of reporting, discusses what the reports actually found, but how the race issue was seized upon. This is likely to be a very good source. Coverage especially on pages 19-25.

Requested move 1 July 2025

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The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. Consensus not to move. Concerns expressed were that the move changes the scope, which is currently being discussed. Valereee (talk) 21:16, 9 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Grooming gangs scandal → Group-based child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom – The current title is not exactly ideal because it expresses a contentious political POV. I think "Group-based child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom" is the most reasonable, neutral title for the topic, regardless of article content, because it reflects how academic sources refer to the topic (see Talk:Grooming_gangs_scandal#Scholarly_sources), and the current "Grooming gang scandal" title has an unclear scope that is being used to exclude relevant information from the article. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:12, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

We’re already in the middle of discussing this above at Scope/title. Please close this. Kowal2701 (talk) 21:19, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
No. You are free to propose alternative titles in the move req. Hemiauchenia (talk) 21:23, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The nom also doesn’t refer to any policies or sources, just invites people to !vote with personal opinion. Kowal2701 (talk) 21:24, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • okay that’s better, Support per WP:BESTSOURCES and WP:ACADEMICBIAS, "Group-based" can be replaced by "Organised" or "Localised" as both are fairly common. Have no clue how we’re going to structure this, though obv this issue will still get good coverage per WP:DUE. Makes more sense to prioritise writing a sociology and criminology article before a political one. Kowal2701 (talk) 21:34, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    If you're saying that the name should be changed so that the proposed article is written before one on the Grooming Gangs Scandal, I’m not sure of your reasoning. If that's not what you're saying, please clarify it for me. Riposte97 (talk) 21:56, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    This is more about changing the scope, we don’t have high quality sources justifying a political focus Kowal2701 (talk) 22:04, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Well, then, my concerns are justified. This topic was kept at AfD just a couple of days ago. It's hugely premature to be trying to argue again it's not worthy of an article. Riposte97 (talk) 01:29, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    The closer said the article could stay because the general topic was notable, but explicitly said this didn't prejudice further discussions about the title. Lewisguile (talk) 20:33, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I'm now leaning towards having this article on the media coverage and political response, and have a broader article on group-based CSA, this way we wouldn't have to include subsections on media and politics in the broad one which would inevitably violate WP:PROPORTION like at Child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom, we can just have a hatnote to this Kowal2701 (talk) 20:46, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That may work. It seems to be where the consensus is heading. Lewisguile (talk) 08:13, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose - the two topics are obviously distinct. The scope of this article does not preclude the creation of your proposed article, but I am concerned that efforts to change the name and scope of this article are really just attempts to delete this article through the back door after the failure of the AfD. No one has given a good reason why they believe Group Based Child Exploitation in the United Kingdom and the Grooming Gangs Scandal actually refer to the same thing. That's probably because they clearly don't. Riposte97 (talk) 21:53, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    The "scandal" is the politicisation of the phenomenon of group-based child sexual exploitation. The demographics and ethnicity of the offenders have been central to the politicisation of the grooming gangs and have been the subject of academic study, not all of which has been supportive of a "moral panic" narrative e.g [2]. It makes sense to have a single article that presents the context of 1. the broader prevalence relative to other kinds of child sexual abuse in the UK. 2. the research behind the demographics (both ethnicity and employment) of gang-based child sexual abuse in the UK. 3. the reaction of UK authorities to child sexual abuse and the reported lack of action, and the political response. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:06, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    No, the "scandal" is not "politicisation". It is the WP:COMMONNAME, as documented here, of the cover-up and its aftermath. cagliost (talk) 09:48, 6 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose This changes the scope of the article. We just finished an AfD where it was decided to keep the article, this is a bad faith move request attempting to defacto delete the article by changing the scope after it was just decided we keep it. Ratgomery (talk) 22:01, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    If you think this is bad faith, take me to ANI, I don't think people will be very impressed. Hemiauchenia (talk) 22:06, 1 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    This is an editor with 157 edits. This raises issues about off-site canvassing. Lewisguile (talk) 20:41, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Most of editors who have replied to this discussion I would not consider to be "established users" (less than 1,000 edits or even 500 edits in most cases). Hemiauchenia (talk) 20:44, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Agreed. This is a problem. Lewisguile (talk) 20:50, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Thanks for referencing, looks like an issue. Are these mainly/all !voters from the recent AfD that was canvassed? That would make sense here. I've had a look and didn't find any off-site for this yet. CNC (talk) 21:07, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Given Wiki Admin ban people and IP addresses for challenging the sacred cows (e.g. that there was a moral panic - tell Casey that, after apologising to the people banned for pointing out that the rape gangs were in fact rape gangs) a low post count is inevitable.
    The opposition is legitimate irrespective of how many times Ratgomery has posted. 82.1.54.207 (talk) 22:41, 8 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I was not canvassed. I watch and edit multiple articles relating to UK politics. Ratgomery (talk) 20:57, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    Ratgomery was involved in previous discussions. I don't believe it's appropriate to accuse them of being canvassed on the basis of a low edit count alone. Riposte97 (talk) 21:43, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose I saw this discussion mentioned at Wikipedia:Neutral point of view/Noticeboard. Just skimming through this article, it does seem like "Grooming gangs scandal" (from the article: Allegations of governmental and institutional failures to respond to the problem or to downplay or cover up the issue have been described as a grooming gangs scandal) is a distinct topic (with a different scope) from the proposed title. Maybe create the Group-based child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom article first, then see if this article should be merged to that article. Some1 (talk) 00:22, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose - whether or not Group-based Child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom is an appropriate article for Wikipedia, it is not this article. There does not cease to be a scandal whether or not there is another topic as well.
To me, the proposed title presupposes that "what Wikipedia should be talking about" is real grooming gangs, rather than the wider issues this article addresses. I see no basis in policy or sources for this preference held by certain editors. Newimpartial (talk) 01:32, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. "Grooming gang" terminology is widely used in RS and is the popular name for this phenomenon. The proposed move changes the scope and makes the page less cognizable to users. Grooming gangs controversy might be a solution to acknowledge that some sources (thought not, evidently, the UK government) contest the phenomenon's significance as a meaningful sub-phenomenon of group-based sexual exploitation or of sexual exploitation itself.
I have to say unfortunately that I share the concerns of Riposte97 regarding this name change, which would seemingly significantly change the scope of the article, being proposed almost immediately after a consensus to keep an article specifically on the subject of the grooming gangs scandal. Woshiwaiguoren (talk) 02:47, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Only 284 edits. Lewisguile (talk) 20:49, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
...okay? I was not canvassed on or off Wikipedia, but was tagged in along with everyone else that participated in the prior AfD from 2024. I have made good faith contributions to the discussion here and elsewhere. In the recent AfD, I specifically made a note to the closer that off-Wiki attention was distorting the debate, despite that distortion being on the side of the argument that I supported. I resent the notion that my participation in this discussion is somehow improper or illegitimate and think you ought to clarify your meaning or apologize. Woshiwaiguoren (talk) 06:30, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
True you were pinged into it. Lewisguile it's probably worth checking the previous AfD for future !vote noting (for users pinged in specifically), unless you were just referencing edit count as not WP:ECR. CNC (talk) 07:35, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I was primarily noting this as the prior AfD's closer mentioned the media coverage of the issue and the risk of off-site canvassing. Note that there was also coverage in certain news outlets of the topic area in 2024 as well, so it's entirely possible people were canvassed back then and continue to be pinged after their prior contributions.
But I also mentioned it because this is a contentious issue (though whether it's WP:ARBPAK, WP:CT/R-I or both is up for discussion), where off-site canvassing has occurred (alongside doxxing of WP editors), and so WP:ECR may be relevant to any closer or any possible future discussion of sock puppets, canvassing, etc . However, I take your point, @Woshiwaiguoren, that you were tagged in to this discussion and have taken part in good faith, so I apologise if my comment appears to be a personal attack or an assumption of bad faith. That was not my intention. I'm just trying to keep track (see the warning at the top of this discussion). Lewisguile (talk) 07:57, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Hi just to say your argument is well put no matter how many edits you have, I hope you are not put off wiki by this. LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 13:20, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose - discussion hasnt closed LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 20:02, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Support per WP:BESTSOURCES and unclear scope of this article. Newspaper articles are not sufficient, on their own, to establish that the scope of this article is WP:DUE per WP:ACADEMICBIAS. The wider topic as a whole should be covered, though. Note that there was a previous decision to merge a similar articles ("Muslim grooming gangs" and "Muslim grooming gangs moral panic") into the Child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom article, and this article also covers similar ground, but from a different POV (hence why so many are arguing it's a WP:POVFORK. Lewisguile (talk) 20:37, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Note: There are several editors here with fewer than 500 edits at the time of !voting, and more with fewer than 1000. Is this page covered by any contentious topics policy? I think there are potentially issues with off-site canvassing. Lewisguile (talk) 20:48, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Can get the talk page protected Kowal2701 (talk) 21:12, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think seeking page protection is really justifiable. The most parsimonious explanation for the presence of these editors is that they participated in the previous discussion and now follow the page. They are permitted to participate. Riposte97 (talk) 22:03, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
If they were canvassed to appear there (the closer noted this was a possibility), that doesn't really make it any better. If the article had extended protection, for example, we'd ignore !votes from accounts under 500 edits. As this is potentially within several contentious topics areas, that's not an outrageous suggestion. Lewisguile (talk) 23:21, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I don't think it's appropriate to seek to exclude !votes solely on the hunch that votes against your position may have been canvassed. This is particularly the case once an RM has been opened and seems to be failing. These editors are engaging in policy-based reasoning. There is no proper basis to believe they have been canvassed, and biting them is unduly harsh. Frankly, I expected a higher standard of conduct from you. Riposte97 (talk) 01:02, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It’s not really best practice for new editors to dive into the most contentious articles anyway. Can we not do the grandstanding please, we know there’s been off-wiki canvassing in this topic and it’s not a good look defending or enabling it Kowal2701 (talk) 07:41, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It's not grandstanding to point out that we are not somehow better or more qualified than other editors because we have passed an arbitrary number of edits. Riposte97 (talk) 13:05, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
WP:CLUE begs to differ with that theory. CNC (talk) 13:10, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
That essay doesn't seem to be directly relevant. Riposte97 (talk) 13:35, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It might be best to end discussion of this here as calling people grandstanders or enablers of canvassing is not going to productively improve the article or sort some consensus on scope if anything its only going to make this page more acrimonious.
On the substance I would say 200+ edits is not brand new and the argument made is original, canvassing is a real problem I'm sure you didnt mean to say that @Riposte97 is enabling it. LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 13:53, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I approve of snow at this point per WP:WASTEOFTIME, the discussion above is a lot more production and moving forward with progress. I didn't !vote so that is my vote if not clear, and after a fair amount of participants in 24hr none are supportive, so might as well just wrap this up already and move on. CNC (talk) 14:44, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
This is covered by WP:ARBPAK so have added appropriate talk and edit page notices as necessary, not sure how I didn't see that before. As for page protection, that would require disruptive editing, which I don't see yet. CNC (talk) 07:52, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Is it not also covered by WP:CT/R-I ("the intersection of race/ethnicity and human abilities and behaviour", broadly construed)? Not so much the "abilities" part but the "behaviour" part. Either way, the CT policy is the same for both. Lewisguile (talk) 08:09, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Have never seen that one around on race-based articles, so I'm assuming not per "Race and Intelligence", implying the intersection of both. Also not a ctop expert here and broad is usually very broad I find. CNC (talk) 08:23, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, so the page ws originally titled "Race and intelligence" but the description refers to the intersection of "race/ethnicity" and "ability or behaviour", so seems to have been broadened to cover all topics where a behaviour or ability is attributed to/associated with particular ethnicities. I believe the prior topics in this area already had an WP:ECR warning in place, so one consequence of this article being created as opposed to those old articles being reinstated is that the ECR hasn't carried across (but probably should). Is this something worth raising at arbitration enforcement, just for guidance/clarification? Lewisguile (talk) 09:46, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Probably, I'm not very familar with AE but was going to recommend along those lines on your tp as had a suspicion based on the canvassing that occurred it would benefit from some sort of preventative protection. Whether canvassing is considered disruptive, even if editors are not identified as being disruptive, is where I'm a bit lost on the subject. Pinging ScottishFinnishRadish in the hope of some clarity on this in the meantime, as a bit clueless on the race/ethnicity ctop as well, let alone whether there is a case for ECP among other things. CNC (talk) 09:56, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Take a look at ScottishFinnishRadish's talk page. I don't think this article is covered under those but have asked specifically what is required to start the discussion to get it designated as a contentious topic. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 10:04, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
As a follow-up to this, as the recent edits here and here suggest, some editors appear to be issuing blanket "oppose" votes against any sort of change (and that thread isn't calling for the deletion or renaming of this article, but is following up on the consensus emerging among editors to clarify the scope of this article and develop a "main" article to cover the topic more broadly). Lewisguile (talk) 10:59, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose. Are we really doing this again? The AFD closer found consensus to keep this article, at this title, three days ago. "Group-based child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom" is not an adequate rename for this article because there are plenty of incidents of organized child sex abuse in the UK that are not part of the "grooming gang scandal". See e.g. Kincora Boys' Home, Medomsley Detention Centre, Kidwelly sex cult, etc. While "scandal" may seem POV, media sources in the UK and US are indeed calling it a "scandal" in article voice, as I demonstrated in this comment. And I don't actually see most of the academic sources above as all that relevant to this article. The "scandal" refers to UK institutions covering up the abuse and failing to pursue justice, while the academic sources either analyze the general phenomenon of organized sex abuse in the UK or counteract narratives about "Muslim grooming gangs" roaming the English countryside. Thus they don't really cover the "scandal" as such. Astaire (talk) 20:59, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    The last close was about deletion, and the closer specifically said they didn't make a decision about the right title. I did raise a thread above to avoid jumping into another official process so soon, but also, it is fine to raise the topic of the title and scope following the keep decision. Lewisguile (talk) 23:25, 2 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose: My position about this whole issue was made clear in the original discussion. I think "Pakistani Muslims" should be included in the title for scope and specificity, which is what this article and the 'scandal' is mainly about - i.e., Pakistani Muslims grooming children and girls for sexual abuse. As Wikipedia editors, our role is to report notable and verifiable subjects as per RS. We try to be specific especially with titles. It is not our job to sanitise the title and hid what the subject is all about in the article's body - which I believe is what's going on here. The article's title should tell the reader what the article is about before they even get to read it. I'm not happy with the current title either, but would rather accept it as per community consensus than the proposed one. On that bases, I oppose the proposed title, and I'm inclined to agree with Riposte97. Wikipedia is not the type of project where we censor things just because they are controversial and/or may offend certain religious beliefs or ethnic groups. If that was the case, many of our articles will be pulled down. No religion or ethnic group gets special treatment here. We report on what RS say rather than use our own biases or fears to sanitise/censor articles/titles - which in the end, cheats the reader. A reader who is not familiar with the subject will not be able to tell specifically what the article is about by just reading the title, because the title itself is vague. Notwithstanding, I rather settle for this than the proposed one. Tamsier (talk) 05:26, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    RS frequently refer to the matter as "grooming gangs," with no ethnic or religious qualifier in the name. Also, plenty of participants and some entire rings that fit the pattern are not Pakistani. Doesn't seem justified to add that to the title, nor is sanitization the only reason to exclude it. Woshiwaiguoren (talk) 06:33, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    +1 to this, additionally there does not appear to be a consensus in RS
    Some eg Casey, and media reporting on it highlight -> that poor ethnicity data complicates this question, eg ethnicity data even where it is recorded is assigned by a police officer and not self reported often to broad categories eg Asian.
    Some others specifically argue it isn't a broadly British Pakistani issue but hyper localised to Kashmiri Pakistanis.
    The grooming gangs are rapists from sub-communities – Kemi is right to say so LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 13:36, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    I remain on the fence about this title, but I think this comment is a prime example of why the proposal does, in fact, have merit. No, Pakistani Muslims should not be in the title. No, that is not what the scandal is actually about. Rather, the ethnic element is a right-wing dogwhistle from the current title. The actual scandal lies in how the police and British state have dealt with the issue. The single greatest failing was in not seeing older children as children [3]. Another failing is that we cannot tell anything about the ethnicity for certain because that was not recorded. All the evidence we have suggests that there is not an ethnic element to this and the largest ethnic group involved is white British, BUT that we cannot know anything for sure, because the data was not collected over misplaced sensitivities. There are other recommendations too, but it is clear that the scandal is not about a single ethnic group. The scandal (and I would prefer a more neutral word, but it does get reported in news sources as a scandal) is the way the British state has prosecuted the trafficking of older children by organised criminal gangs. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 06:41, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
      • "the largest ethnic group involved is white British" I thought that White British are the main group responsible for nearly all crime in the United Kingdom. Are there exceptions to the rule? Dimadick (talk) 13:52, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
        They are. The Casey audit complicates things when it talks about a "majority" (as do most other sources). What she really means is "disproportionate". So, the majority of offenders are indeed white British, but in at least three regions there are a disproportionate number of South Asian perpetrators among the 2/3 where ethnicity was recorded. It's also true that other national data has previously suggested white offenders were a majority and disproportionately large (so above the ~85% or so expected). There are a bunch of caveats to all this, such as differing definitions of what's being recorded, incomplete data, ethnicity being recorded by the police instead of by the offenders themselves, flaws in research methods (or reliance on flawed data), etc. Lewisguile (talk) 09:53, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
      > A previous piece of research from 2015 found that of 1,231 perpetrators of "group and gang-based child sexual exploitation", 42% were white, 14% were defined as Asian or Asian British and 17% black.
      > The problem is that the data is from only 19 out of more than 40 police forces and nearly a decade old.
      > Another issue is that the ethnicity of the offender is recorded by police officers rather than self-assessed, and uses broad definitions, such as "Asian".
      > The 2020 Home Office report found this could result in offenders being classed as "Asian" while being from other backgrounds.
      > In 2022 the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse investigated abuse in six cities, external which had not experienced a high profile grooming case.
      > It found evidence that gang-based abuse was happening, and of widespread failures by the police to record the ethnicity of perpetrators.
      Grooming gangs and ethnicity: What does the evidence say? - BBC News
      I'm really not sure there is strong evidence to be making any sweeping statement about ethnicity, the best secondary sources seem to agree that ethnicity data is poorly recorded and fraught with problems in its interpretation. LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 13:57, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
      Given Casey found the Police were not adequately capturing the race of the rapists, that the police and councils were complicit in preventing investigation for fear of being found 'racist', that there were racial and religious factors in the abuse mean that claiming this is a white issue is frankly racist itself. 82.1.54.207 (talk) 22:47, 8 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
    That's probably something that should be kept an eye on as the cover-up is investigated.Halbared (talk) 21:33, 3 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Support, articles should be named for the subject not newspaper hradlines. -- LCU ActivelyDisinterested «@» °∆t° 09:39, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Oppose as this is about the specific scandal and the proposed title is too broad. I don't think we should be going through a repeat of what happened last time (one of the more embarrassing things on this site). Also see Astaire's comment, and I would also agree with Tamsier. — Czello (music) 09:43, 4 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose. "Grooming gangs scandal" is the WP:COMMONNAME, as exhaustively documented here. The proposed change is not succinct and not an improvement. Personally I think "grooming" is a euphemism for "rape", but the common name is "grooming gangs",and it is widely regarded as a "scandal" (see above link). cagliost (talk) 09:52, 6 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

It is also an official name used by the UK Gov and parliamentarians to label this issue:
Historyexpert2 (talk) 15:25, 6 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Hansard is not a reliable source, I'm afraid. Politicians can be equally guilty of using politically charged language—that's why they're politicians, and why we have an WP:ACADEMICBIAS. Lewisguile (talk) 06:39, 8 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Oppose, with same reasoning Cagliost, above: WP:COMMONNAME, and UK Gov usage. Jpbrenna (talk) 21:06, 9 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Clarification request

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Please note Wikipedia:Arbitration/Requests/Clarification and Amendment requesting clarification regarding contentious topics. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 06:37, 5 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Update: The request was closed with consensus that this does indeed fall under the Race and intelligence contentious topics policy (see WP:CT/R-I for more information). Lewisguile (talk) 11:59, 8 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

List article

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List of grooming gang incidents in the United Kingdom's been created. Not sure what to do with it. Lots of the references don't mention "grooming gangs" which means their inclusion in the list is original research. We have Template:Child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom which lists all cases, which is already included on this page. Kowal2701 (talk) 12:41, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I agree, and I think the list article should be deleted. There's also Child sexual abuse in the United Kingdom#Notable incidents, which mostly overlaps with the list article. Maybe we could add a list section to this article (Grooming gangs scandal), but that would also lead to duplication. — Chrisahn (talk) 13:26, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
I’d say merge to the notable incidents section, there’s already a sentence in the background section of this article listing cases. Kowal2701 (talk) 13:34, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Lots of the references don't mention "grooming gangs" which means their inclusion in the list is original research.

I do see a mention of grooming gangs in every inline source. Historyexpert2 (talk) 15:36, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Literally none of the refs in that list mention the phrase "grooming gang(s)" apart from ones for Telford, Rotherham, and Rochdale. Kowal2701 (talk) 15:43, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes they do. See:
for instance. Historyexpert2 (talk) 15:54, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
It is also grouped collectively with the other grooming gangs in this timeline:
So based on that, I believe there are enough entries to make a list, not just based on news reports, but on sources grouping the grooming gangs together (in the case "sex gang" is though to be different from "grooming gang", which I believe is the argument you are trying to make). Historyexpert2 (talk) 15:59, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
"Grooming gang" is a distinct term, what appears to have happened is you've grouped CSA rings involving brown people without specific criteria for inclusion. The Sky article is okay and can be used for more of them, but there's still too much WP:OVERLAP with the notable incidents section in CSA in the UK, and this looks like a WP:POVFORK from that. Kowal2701 (talk) 16:14, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
WP:RS, like the above Sky article, but also government reports, scholarly publications, refer to this as a separate category from Child sexual abuse in the UK.
It is already consensus in the previous move discussion and the deletion discussion that grooming gangs are a separate topic from "Child sexual abuse in the UK", and that this topic is not a WP:POVFORK.
If you'd want to request a merge or deleting it on "POVFORK" grounds. I'd believe it would be more proper to start a deletion or merge discussion to update this consensus instead of performing a unilateral move (I do not say you did the latter though). Historyexpert2 (talk) 16:19, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Before starting a deletion discussion or a merge discussion, it is useful to carry out a WP:BEFORE. There are a couple of issues:
  1. A list article must meet WP:LISTN. So what sources treat "Grooming gang incidents" as a list? On this one, there may well be sources, but it must be something that frames the topic specifically, which may be tricky under that title.
  2. An article must not synthesis sources to state something the sources don't say. Editors choosing which cases are included without clear inclusion criteria would be synthesis of sources. It is the treatment as a list that leads to clear inclusion criteria.
  3. What is the information need we are attempting to fulfil with this list? That will answer whether a merge may, in fact, be better per WP:PAGEDECIDE.
Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 16:36, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
1. and 2. are already covered by the WP:RS grouping together grooming gangs by city, like that Sky news article above.
If there is belief 3. is a hinging point, or otherwise that there are issues involving 1. and 2., then anyone is more than welcome to start a deletion or move discussion. Historyexpert2 (talk) 16:43, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
The Sky News article appears to be looking at the causes of the Asian grooming gang narrative and is not a list of all grooming gang cases. Neither is it attempting to treat grooming gang cases as a group, it is providing a timeline for why Elon Musk was interfering in British politics. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 16:49, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Neither is it attempting to treat grooming gang cases as a group, it is providing a timeline for why Elon Musk was interfering in British politics
Can you explain further your statement, based on the source title being:

"Grooming gangs scandal timeline: What happened, what inquiries there were and how Starmer was involved"

Historyexpert2 (talk) 16:54, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. I reached my conclusion from reading the article and not the headline. The scandal hit the headlines again in January after Elon Musk attacked Sir Keir and minister Jess Phillips for failing children. It does not seek to list all grooming gang cases, it provides background for that intervention. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 17:35, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Here is a passage directly from the article:
How did the grooming gangs scandal unfold and what prosecutions have there been?
2001: Names of taxi drivers who allegedly picked up girls from care homes in Rotherham to abuse them are passed to the police and council from 2001. The first convictions were not until 2010, with the latest in 2024 - a total of 61.
2004: A Channel 4 documentary about claims young white girls in Bradford were being groomed for sex by Asian abusers is delayed as police forces warn it could inflame racial tensions. It was finally shown three months later.
2010: 11 men, predominantly of an Asian background, are convicted of offences connected with the sexual exploitation of children in Derbyshire.
Based on that I am curious why you are saying the article

does not seek to list all grooming gang cases

I think it would misrepresent the source, both its title and content to say that. Historyexpert2 (talk) 17:40, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Do you think there have only been three cases? Really? Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 17:50, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Are you sure you read the article? Riposte97 (talk) 21:40, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
Some further quoting.
2001: Names of taxi drivers who allegedly picked up girls from care homes in Rotherham to abuse them are passed to the police and council from 2001. The first convictions were not until 2010, with the latest in 2024 - a total of 61.
2004: A Channel 4 documentary about claims young white girls in Bradford were being groomed for sex by Asian abusers is delayed as police forces warn it could inflame racial tensions. It was finally shown three months later.
2010: 11 men, predominantly of an Asian background, are convicted of offences connected with the sexual exploitation of children in Derbyshire.
2011: Times journalist Andrew Norfolk starts receiving tip-offs about child sexual exploitation by predominantly Asian men in Rotherham. It was his insistence on pursuing the story, despite being called racist and concerns the far-right would latch on to it, that eventually led to a national inquiry.
2011: A girl abused by a grooming gang in Huddersfield writes a letter to a judge about the abuse she had suffered. It was not until 2013 that another victim came forward to police to make formal allegations, then dozens of girls and men were interviewed over the next three years. Victims and their families said they repeatedly told police and authorities but nothing happened.
2011: Operation Bullfinch is launched by the police and council in Oxford to look into a child sex abuse ring in the city. The first convictions are secured in May 2013, then 2015, 2016, 2019 and 2020.
May 2012: The first grooming gangs convictions of men from Rochdale and Oldham see nine found guilty of being part of a child sexual exploitation ring run out of two takeaways in Greater Manchester since 2008. A further five from the Rochdale area were jailed the following year.
May 2013: Seven men have been jailed, it emerges, at the conclusion of child sex abuse trials relating to offences in the Telford area.
2014: 13 men are convicted of the sexual exploitation of children in Bristol at the conclusion of Operation Brooke.
2017: A total of 29 men from a Huddersfield grooming gang are charged but a reporting restriction prevents media from reporting on the case to avoid prejudicing other cases. The ban was criticised by far-right groups, with Tommy Robinson - also known as Stephen Yaxley-Lennon - jailed for 13 months (later reduced to nine months) after admitting contempt for filming outside a court during the trial.
2018: Twenty men, mainly of Pakistani origin, who were part of the Huddersfield child sex abuse ring are convicted of 120 rape and abuse offences against 15 girls, and sentenced to a total of 221 years.
Three separate trials had to be held as there were so many of them. More men have been convicted since then, bringing the total number to 41 by August 2021.
2023: A Grooming Gangs Taskforce is set up by Rishi Sunak's government, with qualified officers from all 43 police forces in England and Wales, and data analysts. In May 2024, 550 suspects had been arrested and 4,000 victims identified.
2023: Nine further men are charged with sexual offences in Rotherham under Operation Stovewood. Most of the offences took place between 2003 and 2008.
2024: Operation Stovewood sees 11 more men from Rotherham convicted for the abuse of vulnerable girls.
2025: Seven men were found guilty of using two teenage girls as 'sex slaves' in Rochdale. Their trial heard evidence in relation to 53 sexual offences, believed to have been committed between 2001 and 2006, over 72 days.

Historyexpert2 (talk) 17:55, 13 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Moved to Talk:List of grooming gang incidents in the United Kingdom
 – The Move discussion should be on the source or target page. I have moved it. There is also a move template header missing from the target that I'll add. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 07:56, 14 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]
are we voting to move this again??? LeChatiliers Pupper (talk) 13:19, 1 August 2025 (UTC)[reply]

This pre discussion was being used as a merge discussion with people starting to !vote. The merge discussion should have been either on the source or target page, and it didn't have a specific proposal (still doesn't, but feel free to merge one in, Kowal2701) I have thus moved it there and it has its own section now. Sirfurboy🏄 (talk) 08:09, 14 July 2025 (UTC)[reply]

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