NEW YORK
New York Daily News
BY MARCI HAMILTON NEW YORK DAILY NEWS Monday, November 9, 2015
The movie “Spotlight” is being welcomed with Oscar buzz. For those of us laboring in the vineyard of child protection, this is music to our ears, because this story — about the Boston Globe journalists who revealed the Catholic bishops’ callous cover-up of prolific pedophile priests — will likely do more to educate the public about child sex abuse than the Boston Globe news stories it is about, or the other child sex abuse scandals in the news, from Penn State and Syracuse to Horace Mann School, Woody Allen and Josh Duggar.
The greatest barrier to child protection is ignorance. The movie shows smart, experienced journalists struggling to comprehend what was right in front of them. “Spotlight” will likely educate millions about the ways in which adults and institutions we trust protect adults and put children at risk every day.
Despite news coverage of one scandal after another, most adults still trust their instincts regarding who is an abuser and who is not. That is dangerous. Until parents, teachers, clergy and all other adults understand the cunning moves of pedophiles and the ease with which we as adults let abusers persist, kids are at serious risk.
“Spotlight” should carry special significance in New York, where, unlike in Boston, so little of the truth about the bishops’ cover-up has surfaced. That is because New York shares the ignominious distinction with Alabama, Michigan and Mississippi of having the worst civil statutes of limitations for child sex abuse in the United States.
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