Run down
Very general run down. Basically for those of you not familiar with the situation. The catholic church had a mad amount of power in irish society, ran hospitals, schools, orphanages, basically everything bar the local pub. If your son became a priest it was a massive credit to your family and possibly even better than them becoming a doctor. The local priest(s) were royalty and treated as such.
A lot of abuse both physical and sexual happened at the hand of priests who held important roles in the society. It was basically hushed up, the child who was abused was ostracised because how could a priest do such a thing? Then the priest in question was transferred to a different diocese. The police were told to ‘lose’ the reports and nothing much was ever really done and people’s lives were ruined as a result.
Fast forward a few decades, more and more people start reporting sexual abuse as adults and are taken more seriously. In the mean time the catholic church and priests have lost a lot of credit. People call for an enquiry. It’s eventually done but not without serious pressure and objection (as seen in the video) from lawyers/barristers and the church itself. Most victims are trying to be made look like they’re after money and not justice for the atrocities.
Victims were eventually compensated to a degree, but the church had done irreparable damage to those poor people and to itself, in Ireland. The government in power at the time has also been thrown out.
