Been reading A LOT of Christian perspectives on gender roles lately and my brain sorta aches from the weighty and emotional back-and-forth of it all.
One interesting argument put forth by the complementarian/patriarchal side (I'm so so so sorry, I've read so many articles in the last 12 hours and I can't find which one it was. Terrible of me I know.) is the 'you shall desire your husband and he shall rule over you' curse, as an excuse for imbalance of power in male-female relationships. Um, yeah.
This could all just be me misreading and misunderstanding the Bible, so please feel free to discuss, but when I think of Biblical curses, I don't think of them as being the same as Biblical commands. When God curses Cain, the first murderer ever, Cain cries out that the punishment is too harsh and he fears that other people will see his cursedness and use it as an excuse to carry out their own vengeance and kill him. God tells him that anyone who does so will incur a punishment seven times more severe! So is a curse something that people need to rush out and fulfill on behalf of the cursed person? I've never thought so.
When God curses Adam and Eve He doesn't go to Adam and say, "Look, you're wife's going to desire you: rule over her." He says it to Eve, giving her a concrete consequence of her behaviour. He gives Adam a concrete consequence for Adam's behaviour too: life's going to be hard and short and work will be difficult and painful. If we are meant to enforce the opression of women, does this mean that we should tear down any man who finds himself in a fulfilling and enjoyable job?
It's an imperfect metaphor but I always saw God as the doctor going, "You jumped off the cliff at this angle: these are the bones you broke." The curse is not a part of God's original plan for the Earth, but a symbol of the Earth's brokeness! The curse is not a command on which to base behaviour but a sign that tells how commands have been broken and behaviour is not as it should be!
When humanity rebelled against God's command, it's as if the perfectly running train was driven off its tracks by a rebellious driver. Now the train is broken - but we should still try to drive the train on the tracks as was originally intended, right? Even if the train is broken and halting?

I am not a feminist; at least, I don't agree with all the agendas of second- and third-wave feminism. I tend to be very THAT BATHWATER STILL HAS A BABY IN IT about nearly everything, so I find it very difficult to definitely pick a side on political and social issues. I place a lot of value on traditionally 'feminine' qualities, many of which cop a lot of ridicule and abuse these days... such as a propensity to prioritise family life, community and children over breadwinning... or simply virtues that are seen as 'feminine', such as patience, meekness, gentleness and compassion. Let me make myself clear: I don't see these characteristics as particularly gendered at all - I value these qualities wherever I find them in humanity, whether it be male or female. Feminism and I can't agree a lot of the time because it seems to me that feminists reject these values and ideas in favour of qualities more traditionally 'masculine', such as leadership, independence, fighting spirit and courage. Which are all fantastic, wonderful qualities... just not necessarily better than those qualities traditionally seen as 'feminine'.