Today, the family is the community most wounded and most opposed by the cupio dissolvi of individualistic mass society.
M. Veneziani, L’amore necessario, Marsilio, 2023
The offensive against the traditional family
According to many observers, the pandemic period has marked an authoritarian shift in the attitude of Western states towards their citizens, ushering in a phase in which individual freedoms are systematically subordinated to higher needs, linked to the various emergencies that follow one another without interruption.
In truth, this trend had manifested itself well before the arrival of the Wuhan virus, and rather has its origins in the reaction of Western liberal elites to events (such as Brexit, Trump’s first election, the success of anti-establishment and Euro-critical parties) that highlighted the presence of dangerous resistance to the path that those elites had meticulously mapped out: globalization, green conversion, mass immigration, declining birth rates, and the pervasive spread of woke ideology. There is no doubt, however, that the management of the pandemic has provided an opportunity to test the reactions of the population to measures that severely restrict individual freedom. This experiment, especially in countries such as ours, has yielded rather encouraging results for those who intended to pursue and reinforce that strategy.
One of the determining factors for the success of this approach is certainly the process of disintegration of the traditional family, seen as a natural nucleus of resistance to the affirmation of the principles of fluid society and new nomadism, preached relentlessly for years by the billionaires of the World Economic Forum, and then translated into criteria for action for individual governments by the UN, the EU, and other supranational bodies. Hence the unprecedented offensive we have witnessed in recent years for gender indoctrination in schools, for legislation in favor of surrogacy (which the Italian government is among the few to have opposed with a law defining it as a universal crime), and for the increasingly pressing delegitimization of the role of parents in their task of educating their children.
The historical goal of the left: to take over the education of children for the state
The idea—deeply rooted in post-Marxist demands, and then reworked and enriched with further meanings by woke-progressive ideology—of taking away the role of educators from parents and delegating it entirely to schools, to be transformed into places of permanent indoctrination, has dominated the Western cultural landscape for years, largely dominated by the liberal left and its powerful sponsors. In this way, the state tends to acquire a monopoly on the knowledge and principles to be transmitted to the younger generations, minimizing the interference of parents and their transmission of values and principles that are “dangerously” traditional or in any case not aligned with those of the fluid and “resilient” society designed by the supranational establishment.
It is clear that an operation of this magnitude cannot be carried out without encountering obstacles and opposition, especially in countries such as ours, whose constitution enshrines both the principle of protecting the family “as a natural society based on marriage” and that which establishes “the duty and right of parents to maintain, instruct, and educate their children.” Moreover, Italy is currently governed by a conservative coalition whose political program expressly includes the defense of the traditional family.
Yet the media and political pressure from the progressive bloc is so powerful and pervasive that defending those principles and electoral promises is by no means a foregone conclusion. Among the most recent and relevant examples, suffice it to mention the violent controversy that accompanied the discussion of the government’s bill on informed consent in schools, currently being debated in the Chamber of Deputies, which provides for the obligation of written parental consent for any curricular or extracurricular activity related to sexuality and establishes an absolute ban on teaching such subjects in nursery and elementary schools.
Well, in the face of a law that simply involves parents in their children’s education, without imposing any general restrictions on sex and emotional education—except for the youngest children, as common sense and the sacrosanct protection of children dictate—we have witnessed hysterical and belligerent reactions from columnists, politicians, and militant feminists, scandalized by the mere idea that educational institutions should not be given carte blanche in one of the most delicate and complex subjects for the growth and development of adolescents. There has been talk of a “sex-phobic and sexist attack on public schools,” of medieval obscurantism, and even – with a considerable leap of imagination – of branding the law as a factor weakening the fight against violence against women and “femicide.”
The case of the Chieti family
The blatant instrumentalization of certain reactions signals how much the progressive world has invested politically in these issues and the strategic importance it attaches to controlling the educational and pedagogical function. In this context, even an apparently minor event, which in other times would have been the subject of local news articles, can become a true paradigm of the ongoing ideological clash. We are referring to the initiative of the juvenile court against the so-called ‘forest family’, consisting of Nathan Trevallion and Catherine Birmingham and their three minor children, who had decided years ago to live in a house located outside populated areas, in the Chieti area, as a result of their choice of lifestyle – questionable but certainly legitimate – in direct contact with nature.
The court suspended the couple’s parental responsibility and ordered the transfer of the three children to a foster home, while temporarily allowing the mother to remain with them. The court’s decision stems from a report in 2024, when the family went to the hospital for mushroom poisoning, Following this, in May 2025, an order was issued entrusting social services with responsibility for decisions regarding the placement and healthcare of the three children, allowing them to remain in their home for the time being and providing for monitoring of their living conditions by the same social services.
Following a report presented by these services, which highlighted the precarious living conditions, the lack of running water, and the health risks, the juvenile court issued an order on November 13 suspending parental responsibility.
Whatever one’s opinion of this couple’s choice and their ability to guarantee a healthy and dignified life for their children, and regardless of the instrumental controversies that many commentators and politicians have engaged in, the debate should focus on the limits within which state intervention in the life choices of citizens and their families can be justified. In this sense, such intervention should not exceed the scope of violations of laws or principles expressly enshrined in the legal system and, in this specific case, those that protect the health and safety of minors.
From this point of view, there is no doubt that the report made following the poisoning incident necessitated an investigation into the family’s living conditions, nor could the possible health or other deficiencies found as a result of these checks be ignored.
However, if one reads the text of the order of November 13 carefully, it is clear that the main reason for the deprivation of parental responsibility is the reference to Article 2 of the Constitution, namely the alleged lack of social relations that characterized the lives of the three children. Given that the parents deny that they intended to isolate themselves completely and claim that they ensured that their children could cultivate relationships with other children, it is highly perplexing that the court has taken such a serious measure based primarily on the alleged violation of this principle, which, however significant, cannot be considered to prevail over that of Article 30, which, as already mentioned, establishes the right and duty of parents to maintain and educate their children.
Removing children from their parents is such a serious measure that it must necessarily be supported by serious and indisputable reasons, based on facts or behavior that could put the physical and/or moral integrity of the child at risk. And in the case in question, as far as can be inferred from the court order itself, it does not seem possible to identify such a dangerous situation. One can obviously disagree with this kind of lifestyle choice and even consider it potentially harmful to the children due to their limited social interaction with their peers, but it is frankly astonishing that this could lead to a decision that removes them from the presence and affection of their parents.
On the other hand, it is quite curious that the issue of social relations should take on such decisive importance in the court’s decision, when there is no record of a single court or magistrate having raised any objection during the pandemic, when millions of children were left at home for months, deprived of all contact with their peers, first because of the lockdown, then by the closure of schools, even though it was already known at the time that the risk of Covid infection for young people was absolutely negligible, comparable to that of common flu.
In truth, this show of force by the state against a family that has chosen an atypical lifestyle, that educates its children through home schooling, that does not follow TV series, seems to imply a negative judgment on such choices rather than a real desire to protect children, as if shunning the rituals and habits shared by the vast majority of citizens constitutes a kind of disobedience to the more or less direct forms of control that the new society intends to progressively impose on its citizens.
This family has basically practiced its own particular form of ‘going into the woods’ which, although devoid of the political and ideological meanings attributed to it by Ernst Jünger in his Der Waldgang, cannot but arouse, as such, the utmost aversion and distrust on the part of the state apparatus.
