The process of re-linking parents with children in the context of gender-based violence, when the interruption of contact has been judicially ordered, is a complex issue that requires a case-by-case analysis.
Once the situation and the risk have been evaluated, based on a complaint of gender-based violence, the judges can indicate precautionary measures of protection to protect the victims of said violence, and interrupt the contact of the denounced father with the children. The laws of gender and family violence establish the application of urgent and provisional measures, under the premise of “making an end” to the situation of violence.
Then, the courts can order evaluation instances in order to consider the feasibility and convenience of resuming parent/child contact, indicating the necessary steps and conditions for this process to eventually start.
However, there are frequent practices, clearly in line with patriarchal and sexist ideas and beliefs, that have little to do with the rights of individuals.
Thus, we usually find that those who hold different functions in the field of justice or in spaces linked to it, can attribute a magical and healing value to the passage of time. As if somehow they had complied by obligation, almost against their will, by interrupting the father's contact with his children, and they can barely try to return to the "natural state" of things, guided by ideas such as "he is the father", “it is not good for the children not to see the father”, etc.
In these situations, in which their children are victims of violence, it would be interesting if the evaluations were an end in themselves, free from conditioning directions, to be able to observe and delve into what is there, what happens to each one, in identifying the consequences and damage caused by violence. The evaluations should be done without forcing them towards any predetermined objective, that is, not rigidifying the gaze to justify the reconnection, which often seems to be decided before starting the process.
Even when, formally, the primary objective of these processes of suspension of contact was to preserve children and recognize them as persons subject to rights, the opposite usually happens.
One of the most common forms of institutional violence in gender violence is the action of justice in processes of re-linking parents with children. A justice that violates the guiding principle in terms of children's rights, the best interests of the child, turning a deaf ear to the word of the protagonists. It is intended to keep the parent-child bond firm, in many cases even, despite the children's open refusal, and also despite the fact that nothing has been changed in the father regarding identifying his violent behaviors, recognizing them as a problem, making a specialized therapeutic work to modify them, and that the result of that attempt be positive. That is, nothing that ensures that resuming contact does not put the child at risk again.
How is it expressed? Faced with the so-called Communication Regime initiated by the father, justice puts into operation a whole dynamic and structure, which clearly go towards that objective at any cost. In these instances it is that, for example, co-parenting therapies are proposed, so that the mother and father can solve their "problems", agree on guidelines in relation to the upbringing of their children, and thus gender violence remained invisible in some page of the file and suddenly we find ourselves talking about “conflicts between adults”.
A separate chapter are the criminal complaints for preventing contact against mothers who try to protect their children and give place to their silenced voice. Many go to trial where women are convicted with sentences that adhere to the Non-existent Parental Alienation Syndrome.
The guiding principle that should guide justice operators in establishing a Communication Regime is the Best Interests of the Child, which provides for the Convention on the rights of children and adolescents and the new rules of the Civil and Commercial Code. Children have the right to be heard and to have their opinion taken into account. And not only that, but they also have the right to have a lawyer represent them, according to article 26 of the Code.
It is essential that the judicial operators who intervene in these files consider the reunion of the children in the context of gender-based violence in the family, having a complete and comprehensive overview of the situation, a risk assessment, and listen to the children when deciding on issues that directly involve them, thinking about their protection and their rights.
For all this, real training and the most sincere and profound awareness of the issue of gender violence are necessary. It is not enough to know that it exists, you have to believe it. You can't see what you don't believe.
Tamara Santoro Neiman y Andrea Palacios
The process of re-linking parents with children in the context of gender-based violence, when the interruption of contact has been judicially ordered, is a complex issue that requires a case-by-case analysis.
Once the situation and the risk have been evaluated, based on a complaint of gender-based violence, the judges can indicate precautionary measures of protection to protect the victims of said violence, and interrupt the contact of the denounced father with the children. The laws of gender and family violence establish the application of urgent and provisional measures, under the premise of “making an end” to the situation of violence.
Then, the courts can order evaluation instances in order to consider the feasibility and convenience of resuming parent/child contact, indicating the necessary steps and conditions for this process to eventually start.
However, there are frequent practices, clearly in line with patriarchal and sexist ideas and beliefs, that have little to do with the rights of individuals.
Thus, we usually find that those who hold different functions in the field of justice or in spaces linked to it, can attribute a magical and healing value to the passage of time. As if somehow they had complied by obligation, almost against their will, by interrupting the father's contact with his children, and they can barely try to return to the "natural state" of things, guided by ideas such as "he is the father", “it is not good for the children not to see the father”, etc.
In these situations, in which their children are victims of violence, it would be interesting if the evaluations were an end in themselves, free from conditioning directions, to be able to observe and delve into what is there, what happens to each one, in identifying the consequences and damage caused by violence. The evaluations should be done without forcing them towards any predetermined objective, that is, not rigidifying the gaze to justify the reconnection, which often seems to be decided before starting the process.
Even when, formally, the primary objective of these processes of suspension of contact was to preserve children and recognize them as persons subject to rights, the opposite usually happens.
One of the most common forms of institutional violence in gender violence is the action of justice in processes of re-linking parents with children. A justice that violates the guiding principle in terms of children's rights, the best interests of the child, turning a deaf ear to the word of the protagonists. It is intended to keep the parent-child bond firm, in many cases even, despite the children's open refusal, and also despite the fact that nothing has been changed in the father regarding identifying his violent behaviors, recognizing them as a problem, making a specialized therapeutic work to modify them, and that the result of that attempt be positive. That is, nothing that ensures that resuming contact does not put the child at risk again.
How is it expressed? Faced with the so-called Communication Regime initiated by the father, justice puts into operation a whole dynamic and structure, which clearly go towards that objective at any cost. In these instances it is that, for example, co-parenting therapies are proposed, so that the mother and father can solve their "problems", agree on guidelines in relation to the upbringing of their children, and thus gender violence remained invisible in some page of the file and suddenly we find ourselves talking about “conflicts between adults”.
A separate chapter are the criminal complaints for preventing contact against mothers who try to protect their children and give place to their silenced voice. Many go to trial where women are convicted with sentences that adhere to the Non-existent Parental Alienation Syndrome.
The guiding principle that should guide justice operators in establishing a Communication Regime is the Best Interests of the Child, which provides for the Convention on the rights of children and adolescents and the new rules of the Civil and Commercial Code. Children have the right to be heard and to have their opinion taken into account. And not only that, but they also have the right to have a lawyer represent them, according to article 26 of the Code.
It is essential that the judicial operators who intervene in these files consider the reunion of the children in the context of gender-based violence in the family, having a complete and comprehensive overview of the situation, a risk assessment, and listen to the children when deciding on issues that directly involve them, thinking about their protection and their rights.
For all this, real training and the most sincere and profound awareness of the issue of gender violence are necessary. It is not enough to know that it exists, you have to believe it. You can't see what you don't believe.
Tamara Santoro Neiman y Andrea Palacios