Why do some in our community cover for molesters? A few reasons:
It wasn’t so long ago that covering for molesters was considered the frum thing to do. Don’t make a shanda for the goyim. The difficulty here is that cover ups rarely work, and the exposure of the cover up is sometimes worse than the actual crime itself. So now there are two shandas for the goyim instead of one, the crime of molestation, and then the cover up.
Others wrongly believed that covering up would give the molester the chance to get cured. Except there is consensus among psychologists that molesters cannot be cured. General society has handled molesters far better than we have in the past. The Government demands prison, and upon release, the legal label of registered sex offender, which means that a simple background check will likely prevent this deviant from working near children.
Still others covered for molesters because they believed the denials of the molesters, and not the accounts of the children. There is an element of self-preservation at work here. Confronting the evil of a crime like child molestation is not an easy thing to do. Confronting evil means challenging evil, and doing something about it. Look at how many people denied the Holocaust while it was happening. And there have been other genocides since then that some have denied. Moshe and Ahron had to confront Paroh alone. Others stepped away.
We’re now going in the right direction, and Yeshiva World News, and vnishmartemmeod, should be credited for hosting this important discussion.