Commenting on the court chronicles of the Mandatory Joint Custody law
A 9-month-old baby divided up as if it were a plot of land.
"Court 'divides' infant between Athens and Volos. The Single-Member Court of First Instance of Athens issued a groundbreaking ruling regarding the custody of a nine-month-old infant, following the parents' divorce, determining that the child's residence time would be split between Athens and Volos. The decision was issued after the mother moved with the child to Volos, without prior written agreement between the two parents or relevant court authorization. Given that custody remains joint, the court decided that the child should reside in both homes, ensuring balanced communication with both parents, and that the mother would cover the father's travel expenses" - from the newspaper TA NEA.
What "groundbreaking" achievement are we talking about?
The recent court decision imposing alternating residence for an infant just 9 months old, splitting its life into 10- and 20-day periods between two different cities (Athens and Volos) with a distance of 350 kilometers, on the pretext of the father's lack of written consent to the mother's relocation and under the guise of parental "equality," slides into a purely punitive stance toward the mother, essentially disregarding the true best interest of the baby. This has been, from the outset, the most fundamental distortion of the law and its supporters: that instead of courts judging the interest of the child, they judge the rights of the parents.
Family law is explicitly child-centered. It does not exist to reward or punish adult behavior, nor to balance out their claims. Imposing such travel on a 9-month-old baby (with the mother even being obligated to cover the travel expenses) constitutes a violation of the stability and predictability that infancy requires. Even an adult is unable to adapt their life by changing environment and home every few days, so how can this be demanded of an infant?
Bending the rod the wrong way.
The ruling's argument that the alternative solution — a few hours of contact with the father in the mother's place of residence (even in temporary accommodation) — would expose the infant to "excessive hardship," tends to invert reality. Developmental psychology teaches that in infancy, stability of environment and of the primary caregiver is of fundamental importance for forming a secure attachment. Prolonged separation from the primary caregiver and continuous exposure to exhausting 4-hour trips will certainly have a traumatic effect on the baby's psychosomatic development, creating risks of future developmental disorders.
Even more so, behind a nine-month-old infant there is also a postpartum mother. The ruling glosses over, painlessly and easily, the circumstances under which a woman in the postpartum period is led to relocate. Returning to her hometown is often the only path to survival (seeking a supportive family network, housing and financial security), especially when support is lacking in the place of the marital home. The court's judgment completely disregarded these real needs, prioritizing rigid formalism, while very often in such cases there is an element of violence involved. For a woman to decide, in the hardest period of her life — the postpartum period, however much this is concealed from society at large — to relocate, is not a decision made without there being a serious problem within the couple.
The Solomonic Courts of the Tsiaras Law.
Alternating residence, first of all, is not provided for by law. The only provision that actually does exist in the law is the best interest of the child, which is what the judicial authority must serve. In any case, it cannot be applied horizontally and dogmatically to infants under conditions of enormous distance in kilometers. This particular ruling produces a dangerous and "abusive" case law, which sacrifices a child's peace and health on the altar of judicial equalization of parental rights.
It is no coincidence that it is fathers' rights and men's rights organizations that celebrate such rulings, and not the professionals who actually work to protect children. This ruling comes to confirm, in the most emphatic way, that the Tsiaras law distorts the child-centered character of family law and now — blatantly — treats children as real estate property, like a piece of property whose "owners" must divide it up.
We are deeply shocked by this ruling. It doesn't concern only this particular woman and her infant. It embodies a logic of gendered punishment and social exemplary punishment against a woman who dared to become independent. The message being sent is that claiming one's autonomy can come at a heavy cost, with no regard for the best interest of the child. Such rulings do not affect only those directly involved; they act as a deterrent and intimidation for any woman thinking of leaving an abusive or suffocating relationship and building an independent life. That is why we do not see these as isolated incidents, but as rulings with a broader social and political footprint.
We increasingly see that psychological resilience, self-assertion, independence, and a woman's refusal to stay silent are being turned into elements used against her, reproducing the stereotype of the "malicious," "vindictive" or "manipulative" woman. And we are doubly concerned when these stereotypes are also reproduced inside courtrooms, under the wings of the Mandatory Joint Custody law and under the auspices of an organized lobby with access to the entire network of power.