Picture of Dr. Linda Algazi, Ph.D

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A female tailor-shop instructor in a maximum-security jail, wooed by two convicted murderers, helped them with their plan to escape. She’s been charged with smuggling hack saw blades and other tools to the inmates inside of frozen hamburger meat.

A female tailor-shop instructorIn the end, she sort of came to her senses and managed to escape with her own life. She’s in jail, one of the escaped prisoners is dead; the other is in critical condition.

Why would a married, church-going, mother of a Marine and wife of a firefighter, be vulnerable to men like these and to such a scheme?

Probably for some of the same reasons, other women, in more fortunate situations, fall for internet romance scams and unwittingly end up duped out of a lot of money.

It can happen to anyone, under the right conditions, but women, in their fifties and sixties seem to be the most vulnerable to what feels like the proliferation of scam artists, who promise and then demonstrate what feels like friendship, interest , caring and finally, romance.

For the perpetrators, money is the usual motivation. Sometimes, it’s just about the conquest or about getting out of jail.

Women-victims, are likely to be love-junkies. The bad guys have studied how to get and then use the information they accumulate over time (mostly from the women, themselves} to lure in their prey.

“50 Shades of Gray” showed up in bookstores and in the movies last year, arousing the imaginations of millions of women. The fictional Christian Gray, wangled himself … burrowed himself… into the world of a virginal college student and into the romantic and erotic imagination of millions of real women. He didn’t need money; he needed her submission.

What the hero promised was undying devotion in return for her life. Except, he didn’t say so, exactly. With a hole in her heart, our heroine was an easy score. The movie provided a blueprint, of sorts, for those interested in such misdeeds.

Even women, who claim they would never be caught dead reading a romance novel, let alone, having an affair, were tickled.

At the movie’s end, the heroine finally “gets it” when Christian goes too far, even for her sensibilities.

As their “game” was set up, she did have the magic words to stop his bondage demands. Rather than using them, however, in what seemed like a passive aggressive moment, she blames him. Shame on her character too.

Oh, the web we weave.

Another generation of love-sick women came out of the closet, in 1985, when the movie “Bridges of Madison County” was released. Therapists, all over the country were inundated with female clients jealous of the affair that Meryl Streep’s “Francesca” had with Clint Eastwood’s “Robert Kinkaid,” the romantic photographer who flitted in and whom she sort of flitted out of her life.

“Francesca” made the extreme “love-sacrifice” to give up a man she knew for four days, to “honor her commitment” to her husband and kids.

More women than not, rooted for Francesca to run off with Robert.


Just to remind you that LOVE and the desires of the heart are a “constant,” if you’ve read the book “50 Shades of Gray” in 2011-2015 or seen the “50 Shades of Gray” movie in 2015 this will take you back exactly 20 years to 1995 when “The Bridges of Madison County” was released upon the women of America — the original 1995 trailer.

This 2nd video is a favorite scene of many where the Francesca Johnson’s “husband” is utterly clueless to the extreme emotional battle that is PHYSICALLY overwhelming Francesca Johnson (Meryl Streep) sitting just inches away from here on the bench seat of their old pickup truck — as Francesca watches her recent new lover Robert Kincaid (Clint Eastwood) driving in the rain ahead of them — obviously LEAVING town —and Francesca— forever.

This 3rd video is about making of: The Bridges of Madison County; and the insightful Interview with Meryl Streep about her character, working with Clint Eastwood.


Think about this:

The author of “Bridges of Madison County” was a man. Was his motive to promote the sanctity of marriage or… to celebrate, that by never having to really share the burdens of living, his hero gets by remaining a perfect illusion with no responsibility?

Movies are safe fantasy; these two are female porn. (Most men hate the idea that this kind predictable drivel could be titillating.)

Better to watch them, though, than to lose money or your sweet marriage or to be sucked into a scam to free killers who may be after you next.

Women, beware.


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