FAMILY LIFE UNDER THE YOKE OF PENAL DEVICES

Abstract

This is an article created to allow the reflection on the exacerbated use of the judicial apparatus to resolve conflicts in the family arena, especially when the penal provisions anticipate responses in an exclusively punitive perspective. Based on the author’s professional experience, working in a technical sector of the judicial system, created to attend, primarily, the demands arising from Family Courts, and based on the study and research on the thematic family life of children and adolescents, was defined to present some elements resulting from observations and evaluations carried out with families in contexts of litigation. Initially, the vicissitudes of marital disruption were discussed, seeking to differentiate between conjugality and parenting, in view of the right of children and adolescents to family life, regardless of the parents' conjugality status. In the sequence, the authors used illustrative fragments of a marital dispute, involving report of sexual abuse, aiming to alert to the uncompromised use of laws, the result of which implies sanctions and restriction of the rights for those involved. Finally, the importance of qualified professionals to listen to the complaint was highlighted, avoiding superficial analyzes that not take into account the subjectivities at play in family plots.