If it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a village to abuse one.” This line from the film Spotlight emphasizes the sad fact that when something horrible happens at home, most people don’t want to know about it. And—as psychiatrists—we know too well that those closest to the victim can “turn a blind eye.”
The 2016 Oscar winner for Best Picture does an excellent job of portraying the brave and thorough work of the Boston Globe’s investigative journalism team known as “Spotlight.” The Globe would later go on to win the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for the exposé that was the result of the investigation dramatized in this film.
Sometimes silence is loud. The film sheds light on the important issue of sexual abuse and illustrates the most damaging part of abuse—the failure of those who were supposed to protect the victim. Our experience living and training in Boston made the movie particularly disturbing to watch. We have savored the hot dogs at Fenway Park. We recognized the South End Buttery. We know the steeples rising amidst the rundown triple-deckers. How could its inhabitants have been blind to such a devastating problem for so long?
– See more at: http://www.psychiatrictimes.com/trauma-and-violence/psychiatric-spotlight-child-sexual-abuse#sthash.7obZZFlO.dpuf