In the court of public opinion, the daughter is always on trial. The societal response to a mother or father who disinherits a child—whether it’s someone famous like Joan Crawford who cut two of her children out of her will, referring only obliquely to “reasons that are well-known to them” or your next-door neighbor—is muted and more or less accepting. “Ah, yes,” culture murmurs, feeling sorry for the parent, summoning thoughts of an incorrigible or impossible child, a black sheep, the one you tried everything you could think of but nothing worked. There’s a collective nod, an acknowledgment that parenting is hard and, well, children can be difficult to deal with.

Keep Reading