The tragic death of the brilliant Korean actress Kim Sae-Ron felt personal to me. Her taking her life was attributed to being groomed, used, and dumped by Kim Soo Hyun, the star of the recent hit, Queen of Tears. As someone who was sexually abused as a child and preyed upon by an uncle, this incident triggered my suppressed rage.
The allegations against Kim Soo Hyun are that he groomed the late actress Kim Sae-Ron when she was still a minor. The reports insinuate that Kim Soo Hyun was in a 6-year relationship with late actress Kim Sae-Ron. From the time she was 15 years old and he was 27. In a twist of macabre revenge, it seems, Saeron took her own life on Kim Soo Hyun’s birthday, February 16, 2025.
What Is Grooming?
Grooming is the predatory desensitizing process leading up to sexual abuse. Groomers manipulate someone, often a child or teen, into a trusting relationship only to exploit and abuse them. Grooming is an insidious process whereby predators stealthily condition their child victims to be okay with sexual behavior. It allows offenders to gradually dismantle their natural boundaries and inhibitions before sexual abuse occurs.
The single-minded focus of these predators is only on their needs and desires. The child-victim is just an object or plaything to be used for their satisfaction. Once the victim outgrows their ideal age-preference, where she is no longer naive, compliant, idolizing, and subservient, she is cast aside like a piece of trash.
The Dysfunctional Family System -The Vulnerable Victim
Victims are usually vulnerable, lonely, neglected, and unseen by their dysfunctional family system. They’ve often prematurely grown up in adaptation to their lack of care and support at home. Being adultified or parentified makes one more susceptible to the charms of “the cool, wise adult” in one’s life, especially one who showers them with attention, praise, and gifts. We all have an intrinsic need to feel we belong and matter to someone.
Many young children, girls especially, who are victims of grooming feel unseen in their families. I know I was utterly neglected after my mother died. No one was interested in me, how I felt, or what I needed. I guess Sae-ron must have felt the same. Having been the family breadwinner since she was a child.
Predators don’t pounce immediately. They set a trap so that the minor sees them as a friend and benefactor. They wait for the child to be in crisis or upset with family, then they adroitly step in as the savior, “someone who can help,” before showing their true colors.
Chronophilia – Variations of Child Attraction Sexual Preferences
When it comes to minor-attracted offenders, it’s essential to know that not all sexual interests are the same.
Sexual attraction varies greatly. Some people are attracted to different genders, ages, looks, and personalities. This diversity is normal. While for some people their sexual interest is only in one age group, for others they have interests in more than one.
The different sub-types of child sexual attraction are:
Infantophilia 0- 5 years old (including toddlers and infants).
Pedophilia 5-12 years
Hebephilia 9–14 years
Ephebophilia 14–21 years
Based on studies conducted around the world, about 20% of all men in the global population are hebephiles, that is, sexual attraction towards kids who have entered puberty, the age range of 12-15 years. The attraction is so common in the male population, the authors of the DSM* have declassified hebephilia as a mental disorder.
The Stages Of Grooming
Grooming can be simplified into six core consecutive phases:
Phase 1: Targeting and identifying vulnerable individuals:
Children and adolescents are the easiest targets, particularly when they come from a dysfunctional home, lack parental guidance, support, and love. A child’s desperation for connection and care is schemingly exploited.
Phase 2: Gaining the Trust of the child and oftentimes the parents and caregivers:
In the beginning, predators are the epitome of trustworthiness. They are sweet-talking, charming fakers. On the surface, grooming a child can look like a close caring relationship between the offending adult, the targeted child, and (potentially) the child’s caregivers. They slowly work their way into the lives of their victim as a friend, ally, and benefactor. Predators slowly lull their targets into a false sense of security.
Phase 3: Filling a Need. It involves identifying a specific gap in the target’s emotional support network:
Perpetrators utilize tactics such as altruism, flattery, gifting money, and meeting other basic needs. Tactics may also include increased attention and affection towards the targeted child.
Phase 4: Isolating the Child: The perpetrator uses isolation tactics to reinforce their relationship with the child:
They instigate situations where they are alone together (babysitting, one-on-one coaching, “special” trips). These one-on-one relationship moments fill the emotionally starved child with even more longing to trust and spend time with the predator. Here’s where they slowly begin touching, hugging, and building a close bond with the child.
Phase 5: Sexualizing the Relationship. Predators gradually expose the child to sexually explicit material and sexual touching.
Pedophiles normalize sex so that when physical abuse is initiated, it feels less inappropriate and shocking. Once emotional dependence and trust have been built, the perpetrator progressively sexualizes the relationship. This occurs through talking, pictures, and creating situations in which both are naked (swimming). The adult exploits the child’s natural curiosity and trust using stimulation to advance the sexual nature of the relationship.
Phase 6: Maintaining Control of the child-victim.
The last but most defining in the predators’ grooming playbook is control over the victim’s life. To maintain control, perpetrators use secrecy and emotional manipulation. like blame, and threats to maintain the child’s participation and continued silence.
The Worst Part Of Grooming
The worst thing is when parents or caregivers allow grooming to happen. Like in Soo-ran’s case, the parents were aware of the inappropriate relationship yet turned a blind eye to their child’s exploitation. It was convenient to have an older, financially loaded, and connected male in their child’s life. Morality be dammned
In my case, just after my aunt angrily accused me, at age 13, of trying to seduce her husband while my grandmother sat there disapprovingly. A week later my grandmother insisted I go out for a ride with this same uncle to feel better. If I did not go, I was a bad person, not obeying my grandmother and not being grateful for the kind offer. It was crazy making. It warps your thinking process.
Usually, groomers are high status in society, this illusion creates blind spots in people’s perception. It’s not possible for such a great man or woman could do such a horrendous act. Thus, when a child shares their discomfort about a particular person’s illicit behavior, parents don’t believe or dismiss their children’s experiences.
Often, if the groomer is family, the parent prioritizes and values the relationship with her relative more than with their child. It is heartbreaking, and the most insidious reason why incest continues for generations in a family.
This kind of betrayal is so hard to overcome, and the shame and rage of it keep many victims stuck for years.
Becoming Susceptible to Further Abuse In Adulthood
As someone who experienced grooming as a child and manipulation of power dynamics as an adult, it destroys your cognitive thinking ability and sense of self. Being sexually abused by an adult who you think knows more than you, whom you trust, whose relationship with you shouldn’t be sexual at all, is devastating.
For me, it destroyed the normal process of sexual maturation and learning to naturally pair bond with partners my age. In my early twenties, I fell for the charms of a much older man who was an ace manipulator.
Being raised in abuse, conditions, you to normalize, accept, and survive through uncomfortable situations. You have no boundaries, you don’t know that you are allowed to have boundaries. You never had the basics for what is and isn’t okay or healthy. It’s only much later that you realize what it means to consent to something.
Did Kim Soo-hyun Groom Kim Sae-ron
Survivors Suffer Life-long Impairment
A study recently published in Development and Psychopathology determined that individuals who have survived childhood sexual abuse (CSA) are more likely to experience various mental disorders, suicidal tendencies, health risks, poor oral health, and sexually transmitted diseases.
They also face difficulties with relationships, financial decision-making, and are more likely to exhibit antisocial behavior. This was true even after considering other factors like gender, socioeconomic status, household dysfunction, other adverse childhood experiences, and adult sexual assault.
Being exploited sexually as a child breaks you, in different ways and all over again as you get older. The utter grief you feel as you break through your delusions and understand the horrendous cruelty of the concerted, selfish actions of everyone around. The very people who were supposed to help you harmed you, hurt you, and destroyed you.
It is possible to heal, but you’ll never be as functional a person as someone who didn’t have that specific kind of abuse. Every day, every interaction can be a struggle,
Protecting Your Child
The problem with grooming is the insidiousness of the process. It begins with normal loving interaction between the child and the predatory adult. Nonetheless, it’s the parent’s job to be alert and nip things in the bud the moment something seems off.
Remember, almost all CSA involves sexual grooming. Thus, parents need to be able to identify red-flag sexual grooming behaviors. Furthermore, perpetrators often engage in familial sexual grooming so that they can access the minor without detection.
The rule of thumb should be to treat every male around as a potential “bad guy”. Coaches. priests, scout leaders. youth pastors, teachers, older cousins, older brothers, sisters, and friends. Then there are the usual suspects, stepfathers and boyfriends who prey on divorced or single mothers. Be vigilant of babysitters and day care providers, too. The thing is, until your child can speak, they are the most vulnerable. After they can speak, you still need to watch them like a hawk and limit who can and cannot be around them unsupervised.
As parents, we can help prevent our children from being victims of the molesters and abusers who stalk the world. The best approach is to teach children and families early on about private parts, safe/unsafe touch, etc. We have to keep the communication lines open. Rules apply to everyone, no one is exempt. And as parents, you have to be willing to speak up and stop being nice. Your child needs to know that you have their back 100%.
Image source: Pixabay
Further Reading:
The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma – Bessel Van Der Kolk
Healing from the Trauma of Childhood Sexual Abuse: The Journey for Women – Karen Duncan
The Courage to Heal: A Guide for Women Survivors of Child Sexual Abuse – Ellen Bass
Healing Steps: A Gentle Path to Recovery for Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse – Sharyn Higdon Jones
The Trauma Myth: The Truth About the Sexual Abuse of Children–and Its Aftermath – Susan Clancy
