This whole sordid mess was of course a product of a suffocating confessional society. But don't just blame the Pope of Rome and his clergy. Blame De Valera, blame Padraic Pearse, blame the vast majority of the citizenry who wallowed in this stifling culture. Scapegoating the nuns and asking why they didn't die of malnutrition is a grotesque cop out.
I agree perspective is needed, but that perspective needs to include all aspects of how these institutions were run and what went on. Certainly the conditions and how they arose and the culture that let them arise is one issue, but so is the culture of those who run the place that felt it ok to place/dump dead children into a spetic tank that was in use without any record of death or burial.
The other issue that is harder to ignore though is the focus here on this being an Irish problem. It isn't. And that sort of casts some doubt on where ire should be directed. Without doubt the state was complacent in all the issues, but then it's hard to understand why there would be similar issues in the Nun run institutions in Australia and America. I didn't know the influence of the Irish state extended quite so far and also countries not noted for their overwhelming Catholic influence on state affairs.
Or is the common factor Irish Catholic Institutions?
The "placing" of babies in unmarked, undocumented graves is indicative of several things and this does include the tacit acceptance by the state and society. But it is indicative of a greater influence and culture across all church run insitutions and not just here, everywhere they operated.
Whether we look to blame the Pope or De Valera is up to individuals, but De Valera didn't exploit the Vatican's status as a separate state to remove all documentation on abuse and conditions in instutions immediately prior to the various inquiries in diplomatic pouches so that they couldn't be seized.
I'd be inclined to apportion blame across all those involved, tacit or direct if it were just an Irish problem. Every where there was an institution, there was abuse.
Look to the common denominator in that fact. It isn't the Irish State or the Irish people.