Really interesting thoughts all around. I agree with the reproductive subtext. It is definitely there - it is why people treat women's bodies like communal property and try to police their use or prize, say, a missing blonde woman over a missing woman of color, whose disappearance goes with scant notice.

These traits were no doubt once very valuable (or least within the acceptable margin of error of survival), but they become a liability in a world like ours has become (crowded) and a barrier to a greater happiness.