Michael Douglas and Glenn Close star in the 1987 film, Fatal Attraction. The underlying stereotype of the scorned woman seen in popular media is very much alive in the U.S. family court system.
By Amy Polacko, Ms., October 3, 2023
“You play fair with me, I’ll play fair with you.”
This is what Alex Forrest, famously played by Glenn Close, tells Dan Gallagher in the 1980s thriller Fatal Attraction. But most viewers come to think she’s anything but fair—going off the deep end after Dan has an affair with her but won’t leave his wife. Alex is portrayed as hysterical, unhinged and possibly borderline personality disordered. (You may recall her boiling Dan’s daughter’s bunny in a pot.)
But, while this movie may seem extreme, the underlying stereotype of the scorned woman is very much alive in our family court system every single day. The misogynist trope of the “hysterical woman out for revenge” is used quite effectively by coercive controlling abusers—and, as a result, some women lose custody of their children and are financially ruined.
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