The Government Delegation in the Canary Islands commemorates the 20th anniversary of the approval of Organic Law 1/2004, of December 28, on Comprehensive Protection Measures against Gender Violence with a series of interviews with experts in the fight against male violence and protection and assistance to victims.
This series of interviews with professionals in the judicial and police field, which will be published throughout the month of December, also includes the government delegate in the Canary Islands, Anselmo Pestana, in an analysis of what was involved in the approval in 2004 of this Organic Law and the challenges faced by administrations and society as a whole in guaranteeing the protection of victims and continuing to take steps to eradicate this scourge.
The first interview has as protagonist María Auxiliadora Díaz Velázquez, judge of the Violence against Women Court number 2 of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, who points out that the approval of LO 1/2004 meant the transition from the consideration of gender violence as a private problem to a problem of the whole society.
“There has been significant progress since the approval of this law, all as a result of the fact that there has been a huge increase in the number of convictions that have been established since 2003, when it was barely condemned for gender violence, until now, that we have carried 900 convictions in the Canary Islands on gender violence (…) This means that society is fully aware and considers totally reprehensible the fact of attacking the physical, psychological and emotional integrity of a woman,” says the judge.
“We’re so much better than we were 20 years ago. Above all, we have advanced as a society in the reproachability of acts that are recorded in the context of the couple or ex-couple. But we are still quite tolerant of economic violence, we are tolerant of pornography, we are tolerant of prostitution, we are tolerant of trafficking in human beings for the purpose of sexual exploitation and we are also tolerant of crimes against sexual freedom,” he adds.
In her professional field, María Auxiliadora Díaz recognizes that the General Council of the Judiciary “has put a lot of effort” into specific training on gender violence in all jurisdictional orders, but points out that it is necessary to continue working to introduce the gender perspective in the foundations of judicial sentences.
The judge also expresses her concern about the development of the field of Artificial Intelligence and, in general, the use of technology, which has seen an increase in the number of complaints as a result of violence through Information and Communication Technologies (ICT).
“I’m very concerned about AI,” he warns. Today, women are not present in the field of technology creation (…) What does that mean? That means maintaining the gender roles. Because, if I am a man and I have stereotypes, I will manifest them in that AI and that will therefore mean the maintenance of those social roles that we are trying to eradicate.”