Spain's Equality Minister advocates feminist education over parental rights

Montero demands feminist education against 'sens' parents

Irene Montero, Spain’s Equality Minister, stated that “children of sens fathers and mothers have the right to a free and feminist education.” With the coalition government newly formed in 2020, this was not mere hallway gossip but a declaration of principles regarding who holds final authority in a minor’s education. The majority response was singular: someone outside the home will decide what constitutes proper education.

Some rebuttals started from a more prosaic point: the Ministry of Equality is deemed insignificant and less important than other executive departments, using this alleged irrelevance as proof that its budget only serves to buy narrative. The accompanying warning: the pain comes later.

What Montero’s statement says and implies

The statement has three interlocking parts. First, there is a category of parents—labeled sens—whose educational capacity is questioned by definition, without legal proceedings or verdicts. Second, the right to a “free” education is defined by the ministry itself, not the family. Third, feminist ceases to be a pedagogical option and becomes the mandatory content of that freedom.

From this emerges the dominant interpretation: children would cease to be under their parents’ guardianship and instead fall under the State’s, which also reserves the criteria for what “free” means. No specific regulation, article, or royal decree appears in the material. There is only a phrase and its interpretation.

“As if a Catholic minister…”: comparison with religious education

The most repeated analogy is an inverted catechism: “This is like if a Catholic minister said children of atheist parents have the right to a free and Christian education.” The core argument fits in one line: a neutral State does not impose a worldview, and when it does, it ceases to be neutral.

From there, reasoning stretches along two paths. The secular describes institutional feminism as civil religion with its own catechism: condemnation of romantic love and traditional family, gender ideology, animalism and veganism, climate change guilt attributed to Western man, disappearance of borders. The theological path is shorter: if society removes God, someone will take His place, and that someone is the administration. Neither thesis can be verified; both explain why the phrase stings so much.

Several messages add historical echoes: talk of a revival of what post-war children experienced, but without war involved.

Who educates children: parents or administration?

Disagreement becomes practical when dividing competencies. Some argue values education is a parental choice and cannot be left “to the mercy of whichever political party enters government at any given moment.”

The problem lies in limits. If the criterion for sens is set by those who also organize education, there is no possible counterweight. And that is the most repeated reproach: parents who do not want indoctrination become, precisely because of that, the reason justifying it. Under this logic, family guardianship becomes a revocable concession.

In the same vein, the euphemism of education from zero to three years is read as a formula to separate babies from their mothers and shape their imprint before anyone can dispute it.

The political cost of the statement

The declaration had consequences within its own base: a Podemos voter announced withdrawal of support after hearing it. In the thread’s final stretch, it is recalled that the minister left the Government but left behind four years of approved laws as her legacy.

In parallel, VOX’s growth is read as a thermometer of rejection. Some messages present it as part of a broader European reaction against a global agenda, a thesis that provides no evidence and hangs in the air. What is verifiable is more modest: the phrase gave ammunition to those already opposed.

The climate of self-censorship described in responses

One segment of the exchange does not discuss the measure, but the environment. Antiestéticar of giving one’s opinion in the street and on social media appears, along with the realization that there are places—work, public conversation—where saying certain things carries a high price. That antiestéticar, real or exaggerated, is the best indicator of how deeply the issue has peine: now the phrase is not debated, but whether it can be debated.

What the declaration does not say

No one cites the legal text that would develop the announcement, nor the calendar, budget, or which subject, grade, or teaching staff would deliver such education. The phrase remains an ideological framework, and its concretization is pending. And that is where the issue stops being rhetoric: if it becomes curriculum, conflict is served; if it stays a headline, it will be archived as another outburst from a legislature that already accumulates several. Most likely, given what is on the table, it will return during campaigns with different wrapping.