“I wanted to give up and instead I am still here”

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The testimony of the journalist Giuditta Mosca who received from Ossigeno a gratuity for the partial coverage of legal expenses – See what the Ossigeno gratuity is. (read here)

I turned to Ossigeno per l’Informazione, in a moment that was not very happy for me – on which I will not dwell – and, even before an economic contribution, I found positive impulses from everyone: being listened to, trusted, a real appreciation of the kind of work done.

At a difficult time, finding sensitive and competent interlocutors takes on an even holistic value, with positive effects on the whole community. I was thinking of giving up everything, but instead I didn’t , I embarked on a path that I intend to pursue to the end, with renewed confidence and new-found enthusiasm.

If I had given up I would have been playing the game of those to whom selective censorship is useful. I would have, at the very least, put a spoke in the wheel of Ossigeno per l’informazione which pursues the opposite objective.

There is something profoundly wrong. There is something profoundly wrong if, in a state of law, one lashes out against a person – no matter what profession the person has, out of prejudice – just because he or she is doing the job well. It happened to me. I carried out a journalistic investigation of the methods used by psychotherapists, social assistants and public authorities in cases of child custody. An investigation that started in Switzerland and took me to Italy, to Lissone (MB). Here, after having uncovered outright wrongdoings in the work of an Italian psychologist, not only was she not able to admit her own shortcomings (although the Psychologists Order of the of Lombardy has recognized them) but she also decided to file an unspecified number of complaints against me, mostly dismissed , except one. It should also be said that, in a context of greater legal precision, that the prosecutor should have dismissed this case also but, net of other considerations that I will not make here, this was not the case.

I found myself gagged, because during the debates in the courtroom my lawyer advised me not to publish other articles but to wait. A wait that weighs like boulders on the lives of the families affected by this psychologist from Monza. Even this, however, is only one of the prices that are paid in restricting the media. There is not only the news in itself, there is the annihilation of consciences, there is the impossibility of showing the truth to the largest number of people possible.

A large part of my economic resources have been spent during the investigation: travel, legal advice, and other small expenses which, added together, make important sums. The lawsuit has cost me a lot, not only in terms of out-of-pocket expenses (lawyers and travel. I live in Rome but the proceedings are conducted in Monza) but also in terms of lost income. The time dedicated to the investigation I am making is obviously taking away from my paid work. And I took all the time necessary because the interventions of public institutions into the lives of citizens is a broad topic that deserves respect. There is not only Reggio-Emilia that recently jumped into the headlines, there is a national system that lives on abuse of the weakest, of silence, falseness and distorted realities.

Giuditta Mosca (wt)