I sometimes watch these court shows on TV for lack of anything better (I don’t waste money on cable), and I’ve noticed a few changes regarding how women are portrayed. Just a decade or so ago, you’d never see women cast as the “bad guy” in a domestic case. It was all straight-up Steve Wilkos type TV, with men as monsters and women as innocent victims.
While shows hosted by men still almost never take a hard line against women, a few female hosts are starting to rip into the entitled, spoiled and manipulative younger women who are pulling strings to kick their husbands, ex-boyfriends and other men around.
Below is the second part of a Judge Judy show in which Judy gives the third degree to a young woman who swore out a TRO on her babbydaddy after coming to his house at 4AM and kicking down the door:
I think we’re seeing the beginning of a cultural recognition that things have gone too far. It’s pretty sad that men are refusing to say or do anything about the abuses and it’s left up to older women to make the point, but perhaps that’s simply the nature of politics.
In any event, at least people are starting to wake up. When you see it on TV, you know it can’t really be swept under the carpet any longer.
