This week we have good news that reaffirms and expands the guarantee of rights for children and adolescents. The expansion of LOPIVI (law for the Integral Protection of Children and Adolescents against Violence) has been approved, which will require the listening —the testimony— of children and adolescents in judicial and administrative processes where children and adolescents are involved, regardless of their age.One of the central issues of this expansion is the absolute prohibition of using the concept of parental alienation syndrome (PAS) in judicial proceedings. PAS is a fabricated false syndrome that describes the supposed manipulation that mothers practice with their children with the aim of turning them against their fathers in cases where the fathers have exercised violence against them or their mothers. In short, the use of this false syndrome by the judicial system has served to delegitimize the testimonies of boys and girls who declared that they did not want to be with their fathers due to the harm this situation caused them. Despite the repeated warnings from various professional bodies —especially psychology— about the lack of scientific rigor and gender perspective of this concept, as well as recommendations not to take it into account in the judicial system, the use of PAS and the lack of listening to children in violence proceedings has continued to be a common practice both in Catalonia and in Spain until today.This situation, denounced by dozens of organizations that address sexist violence and by the protective mothers, has persistently and systematically violated the rights of children and adolescents. As we said, this legislative modification will be a great step forward that will curb the existence of these practices; at the same time, it makes us realize —once again— that the judicial system cannot be at the mercy of the ideology of the professionals who embody it. The supposed objectivity of the judiciary is called into question when it becomes evident that sentences are tinged with political convictions and a social model that on many occasions do not respond to the complexity or advances of current society. The times when the family was understood as a patriarchal hierarchy where children could not contradict their parents and were not given credibility, when the man was the head of the familyand had the final word on what happened within the family institution. In short, the children were a Social advances —and, therefore, legislative ones— must always be in line with guaranteeing freedoms and rights for all people without limitation of age or situation. Laws must always be aimed at protecting the most vulnerable. Let us, therefore, congratulate ourselves because social demands regarding childhood are beginning to be heard.

A few days ago, a news story broke in the media that chilled us. It was, presumably, one of the most harrowing cases of violence against a baby by its parents that has been disclosed. As soon as it became known – and in the supposed search for context – several media outlets emphasized an aspect of this context that immediately aroused my indignation as a social work professional for 30 years. The greatest surprise of pundits and supposed 'experts' was how this situation had occurred, given that it involved a family they described as 'normal.' In this context, 'normal' referred to the fact that they lived in a neighborhood not designated as an area at risk of social exclusion, the father and mother worked, and furthermore, the mother was a nurse. In short – and without calling it such – it was defined as a family that had no financial problems. Thus, when reference was made to a "normal" family in these terms, it follows that all families with a situation of economic precariousness are not normal and, on the other hand, I also deduce from the context that what is said without being said is that, in families where there is no poverty, it is not usual for violence to occur or we have no way of explaining it. It seems particularly interesting to me to emphasize what is the mental framework that underlies half-said words. These frameworks can often determine people's lives without express intent. In this case, we are talking about stigma towards poverty, now called aporophobia. Under this classist premise, we understand that children in economically vulnerable families are always at risk and, therefore, under observation, control, and suspicion. On the other hand, those children for whom – due to the economic situation of their living environment – there are no mechanisms that allow the alarm bell to be sounded, may be experiencing situations of neglect or physical, psychological, or emotional violence without any protection mechanism being deployed, except in cases of extreme severity like this one.Although, in general, there is a high level of professionalism in the various public systems for child and adolescent protection, as well as in the health system, stigma can operate and does operate both at a structural level and in the specific area of individual perception. Stigma leads us to accept as a society a system where all children who attend only private circuits (especially educational and health) do not receive the same level of control as in the public sphere. Precisely because we think that in “normal” families all this does not happen. And, on the other hand, we have also accepted that the places where families go to request economic aid for situations of economic vulnerability are analyzed from top to bottom. Everything is understood and explainable from a particular analysis, but the final result is a structural classism and often racism that presents a bias in the social perception regarding the relationship between violence and economic inequality.

Does the patriarchal context nullify or condition women's decision-making capacity? If so, how and why? Is this incapacity – if we accept it – inherent in all women, or are there differences? Where can we begin to set limits? How has fiction contributed to distorting the idea of consent? In this choral piece, six commentators explore the (im)possibility or difficulty of women saying no and the open cracks through which we can operate to reverse this inequality.