ABSTRACT
The 19th and 20th century stereotype of women as passive and inhibited is challenged due to important social changes in the 21st century: the feminist movement, the reassignment of gender roles within the family, and the movement of women into the workplace. In comparison with women in treatment in the 1970s certain women today have been observed to be outright aggressive, entitled and providing considerable challenges to their families and analysts. (Not very seriously) a “Cleopatra complex” has been put forth describing similarities between Cleopatra and these “outrageous” women. They lack the superego controls that would contain their aggression. They are symbiotic with their mothers who indulged them. They have younger brothers who they bullied and dominated and do not do well in life. Like their mothers and grandmothers, they have pathological relationships with men. Grandfathers, fathers, and husbands are passive, and accept aggression and ridicule. They are charming. They suffer from unconscious guilt over their aggression. On several occasions they tricked the analyst in enactments they refused to analyze.
