“After all, we’re pretty sure that we want the species and the country to continue into the future, and since biology has made only one of the sexes able to ensure this (with minor assistance from the other needed, to be sure)”

Too many men actually do seem to believe this, which is why women need abortions and the CSA, but would the Guardian publish it if it wasn’t satire?

The suggestion that “There is no gender pay gap in the UK, there is only a mothers’ pay gap.” ignores the fact that mother is a heavily gendered role. Why is there a mother’s pay gap and not a father’s pay gap? That’s surely gender inequality. Even if child benefit and child tax credit do make up for the earnings that women lose by having children, the fact that their incomes are topped up by the state while men can earn the same money themselves probably has implications for women’s status and might be another thing which is used to justify male privilege. Even if they get the same money, it’s still a wage gap.

Authority is probably one of the things associated with women’s combat roles, but I wouldn’t go as far as saying that it was the key. Once we bring the concept of patriarchal equilibrium into play the exclusion of women from combat roles can be changeable and have culturally specific causes without undermining Goldstein’s generalisation that it’s more or less universal at a certain level of abstraction. You’re probably right that in situations where women are slightly less unequal they get slightly more opportunities, but there are other situations where things are different. The Soviet Union used female soldiers in WWII but this wasn’t an indicator of greater gender equality (see this comment thread at Historiann for more details). Goldstein mentions that although the Soviet air force had female combat pilots, the female squadrons tended to be given obsolete aircraft and more dangerous missions.

I’m wary of using the modern wage gap as evidence though, recent studies seem to show that the modern wage gap barely exists and that the wage gap only opens up with motherhood. There’s an article here- http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jun/17/pay-gap-mothers-children-inequality

I’d postulate, warily because I’ve done little to no research on this, that authority is a/the key indicator of women in combat roles (prepare for gross over-simplifications). Where women held power independent of men (i.e. Ancient Persia) then they could become involved in combat (Darius I’s mother commanded her own army- but didn’t actually fight). Where religion gifted authority then women could again, command (Joan of Arc), or even fight (the Hussite Revolution, with its female peasant soldiers). Where revolution gifted authority then again, women can fight (anything from the Rote Armee Faktion to the Paris Commune). Where a woman’s authority was restricted to the home then women could see combat in its defence (the early modern examples you gave).

Any thoughts?