UNITED STATES
Verdict
8 JUN 2017
MARCI A. HAMILTON
In this era of a White House that seems impervious to the concept of accountability, you might well think this column will be about President Donald Trump. That is a tempting topic to be sure given the constitutional Framers’ baseline belief in the fallibility of humans and the tendency to abuse power in light of Trump’s uncontrollable urge to turn every moment into a moment of self-adulation. But this column is about a more absolute power exercised in a corrupt way.
Have you seen The Keepers on Netflix yet? If not, sit down and binge-watch all seven episodes, though if you are pressed for time episodes 2 and 7 paint the picture sufficiently. The plot is about the death of a Catholic nun; the story is about the sexual abuse of child after child after child and two Catholic women tracking down every clue they can. It’s a true story.
I won’t give away anymore of the plot, but rather I want to put this docuseries in historical perspective. The Keepers marks an important development in the war against child sex abuse. It has been widely praised here and here and there is every reason to expect many will view it.
The Keepers arrives against the backdrop of the major motion picture, Spotlight, which won the 2016 Academy Award for best picture. It was the story of the Boston Globe’s Spotlight investigative team’s uncovering of the sex abuse scandal in the Boston Archdiocese. Spotlight was a tasteful and palatable presentation of that scandal. While victims were depicted, there was no explicit discussion of priests’ sex acts on children let alone portrayals of them, and the story revolved around the Boston Globe’s Spotlight investigative reporting team as they brought to light dangerous and ugly secrets.
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