I'm in the middle of Seven Deadly Sins myself and liked "The Slow Knife" a lot, especially for featuring those rarely-seen female Cardassian officers.
Honestly, I'm not happy about the way the books seem to have interpreted the Cardassian military as sexist in the human way, with including women in combat roles being seen as progressive. The impression I got from DS9: "Destiny" was that Cardassian females were considered more intelligent than the males, so that they were qualified for more intellectually refined jobs like scientists and engineers while the dumber male of the species was relegated to strongman and soldier roles. It wasn't so much that women were unfairly excluded from combat roles as that they considered those roles beneath their dignity, and if anything it seemed to be the men that were considered inferior. I liked how different that was from our conventional expectations, and I regretted that later portrayals of Cardassian culture didn't pick up on that.
I'm afraid I must disagree with the phrasing "unfairly excluded from combat roles" - no, I misspeak. Not the
phrasing, which may be legitimate, but the troublesome implications, or those
I read into the post, at least. Since when has combat been a privilege? Millions of men and boys throughout history would have been happy and far better off if keeping them out of combat and danger was a priority for any human society. The fact that some women might desire such roles in the modern military and be restricted from them, while, like any discrimination, arousing sympathy, doesn't then turn the whole affair into an assumption of female inferiority - quite the opposite, since it's always been assumed that males have a responsibility to combat in service of others. The "progressive" position, I say, would be one that challenged male (particularly lower-class male) disposability, rather than pushed for "a few females can move their stalled careers forward, too", which may well be legitimate frustration, but the sort that if focused on makes the slant of one's perspective very narrow and resting on a apparent pre-conceived notion of where attention is needed (i.e. zeroing in on the supposed requirements of the females to the exclusion of the big picture). (In your country, selective service requirements would be a place to start looking). The small minority of females unfairly held back from desire to be in combat, or to be assumed legitimate participants in conflict, while certainly a legitimate frustration for those individuals, is nothing compared to all the males who are and have been expected to face at least the spectre of combat worldwide. If we're going to "challenge conventional expectations", I'd start with challenging the idea that perspectives on any issue should revolve around what sort of a deal the woman is getting.
Anyway, as for Cardassians, I actually like the 'sexist military' interpretation, myself. It made sense to me. I assume that the cultural expectation and/or assumption that females are more naturally inclined to scientific excellence is in part, as the books have seemed to interpret, tied to the paternalistic desire to keep females (their wombs, anyway) away from combat, a kneejerk attempt to keep them from entering a dangerous profession in large numbers. That is to say, Cardassia has a bit of a problem where two of its driving survivalist desires come into potential conflict. Cardassia venerates the military and service to the Cardassian war machine; it insists that this career path is a high calling, if not the very highest. Since serving the state and channelling your excellence into Cardassia is a requirement for all citizens, one shared across the two genders, and since both sexes gain social influence and esteem through pursuit of career (see: legal system, intelligence service, etc.) this leaves a bit of a contradiction, in that females are going to be driven by the same propagandistic fervour to serve the military and attain that higher social acceptance, and often elevated status, that serving soldiers receive. The Cardassian traditionalist establishment doesn't like this, because they operate on the kneejerk "shield the child-carrier/child-bearer" instinct (and it does seem to be precisely that, since otherwise females are not, it seems to me, afforded that much in the way of societal focus; Cardassians are not gynocentric even if they have some conservative qualities suggestive of it, if anything they lean the other way, with females being seen at times as a general frustration impeding the smooth functioning of society (recalling, for example, Damar's theatrical sighs about females when his girlfriend and Lang have a misadventure).). There's a bit of a missing link of comprehension regarding
why the male role is held in esteem (something many, many Earth societies have succumbed to, including, I imagine, the American military system you allude to). Not as bizarre as the Ferengi's "pull as hard as you can outward but keep the females right there unmoving in the middle!" approach, but then no-one is as bizarre and irrational as the Ferengi in this regard, are they?
Anyway, like many ideologically-driven societies, Cardassia can't or won't openly acknowledge the contradiction - it's sending a message that girls should want to join the forces, but it doesn't want girls to join the forces - so it needs to encourage other existing stereotypes and assumptions in order to achieve what it wants. Don't face the problem, just deflect, or patch over it.
Encouraging the (pre-existing?) idea that the sciences are the natural place for females, and that "men don't make good scientists" helps channel all those nicely patriotic women away from the military. Encouraging the idea that science is best left to females disencourages many males who might be considering such a path, so freeing up the science roles for the establishment to then relegate the females too. "Males aren't naturally equipped for that, wouldn't you rather join the forces?" is, in my mind, a means in part to then be able to turn and say "Females are naturally equipped for science. Wouldn't you rather go there than into the military? Yes, you would". It's a neat little system they've got going, even if it's not an official policy (these things don't need to be, they happen organically). I mean, a controlled, ideological society such as Cardassia is going to be adept at this sort of manoeuvring.
I think the sexist military makes perfect sense and adds another interesting wrinkle to the Cardassians, in that it gives us the "frustrated female commander" archetype that you don't get in many of the other cultures.
"Battle fleet, prepare to move out! Oh, er, but not you, Gul Girl, you, er, you go chart that nebula. For science. Females are good at that!" And Gul Girl, who wants the accolades and status that comes with military action, etc., is of course going to be greatly frustrated that she's being held back, held behind her male colleagues. Which, as
The Slow Knife shows, makes her a useful pawn for the Order when needed, because they can exploit that. Exploiting the blindness in the rest of Cardassia is what the Order does, one assumes, which is partly why it wants the blindness to stay. It all works so neatly. Nothing could possibly go wrong with this system!
(I also like how the
Terok Nor books made Ocett sterile, and reinforced that a woman without a womb... obviously isn't "a woman", she's more a sexless being (well, not entirely. Some of her men are clearly chafing at being "stuck under the female" - "try to resist the urge to send probes firing into anything even remotely shiny,
please try and act like a Gul"). And she of course believes the "males aren't curious enough/don't make good scientists" idea, so ironically reinforcing an assumption that in turn plays a part in the mechanics of keeping females from acceptance in the military... that's Cardassia for you. It's a blind place. Except for the Order....
Anyway, that's what I think.
