Dating advice that makes my head want to explode

I have been having this conversation with my friends--some of whom perpetuate the offending concept--and I've now been provoked into sharing it with you: I'm both enlightened and infuriated by the feminism-ruined-dating strain of dating advice. I'm discovering a fine line between aspects of that strain that resonate and those that are just plain offensive. I should say that even some ardent proponents of the idea don't tie it with fixed gender identities: they're not saying that women need to be more feminine; they're saying that we can't have it both ways. If we're going to take on more 'masculine' characteristics, we should be prepared to have that kind of relationship. Let me see if I can convey how this applies to me, based on my last relationship, while maintaining anonymity and privacy. I also want to reiterate that the post-mortem lessons are not of the "we could have made it work, if only" variety; they are of the "we would have weeded each other out as incompatible, early" variety. I absolutely don't regret that that didn't happen. I think we both needed/wanted the relationship to work (and had reasons to believe that it would). That said, having gone through it and the aftermath, I'm not interested in a repeat. So here's what I can buy: women needn't pursue a guy unless they want to keep pursuing throughout the relationship. As it were, I did not pursue F.; he pursued me. But once I was effectively wooed, I took over the planning. It wasn't a control thing; I just had a lot going on in my life (existing theater subscriptions, etc.), so it was easy to ask if he wanted to come along. And before I knew it, I was the only one doing the asking--an arrangement that annoyed me instantly. Now--here's where the gender "neutrality" comes in: this arrangement may work if the woman is content being the initiator, but I'd had it. I started to question whether he even wanted to see me, in spite of other positive indicators. I felt like I was expected to keep time over the weekend available for him--and so, when other plans came along, I always asked if he wanted to join in--and the pattern reinforced itself. Again, this wasn't objectively bad; it just wasn't the relationship I wanted. It got really bad when I was trying to plan a wine-tasting outing--something he said he'd wanted to do--and I found myself thinking, "do I want to be in a relationship where I'm the one even planning, much less pulling teeth to plan, a wine-tasting outing?" And so I did what I do: I communicated directly about what wasn't working for me. This didn't go over well. But I digress. Yes, I want to have it both ways: I want to be with someone who takes initiative most of the time, but there are still going to be things that I want to do and that I want to feel free to suggest, without a guy thinking he's off the hook for planning. I can understand, without being offended, that women like me have ruined a generation of guys because there are things we want to do in this world, and we're not going to wait for a guy to do them. I can hear, without being offended, the following: "There are a lot of men on the planet who are spoiled and lost their hunting skills. They’re used to women doing everything for them." Again, those relationships can work, if that's what you want. I'd say my parents' relationship is like that. That is not what I want. So I buy it: women could benefit from sitting on their hands a bit more, especially early on. What bothers me is taking this all one step further and pushing women into an entirely passive role. We're supposed to keep our schedules open, in case a date comes up? That sounds like really bad, counterproductive advice. There's another aspect of gender-laden advice that I can buy, but it goes both ways. Some people love to point out that women don't understand that men and women are interested in different things, and so women "promote" their masculine traits and put themselves in competition with the men they'd want to date. The guy equivalent of this would be that many men don't understand that women aren't as visually driven; crotch shots and even shirtless shots do nothing for us. That is not what we're looking for in a partner. But since that works for guys, some guys think it's what would work on women. Conversely, women (apparently) don't understand how little men care about their professional and physical accomplishments. They don't care that we may be a partner in a law firm, or run marathons or climb Mt. Everest. Most men look for women who don't just offer exactly what their guy friends offer, i.e. competition, intellectual discourse, etc. They're looking for someone to be nurturing and feminine. Fine. But I'm seeing this tension between two strains of advice coming from the same sources: (1) Be yourself, know yourself, be happy--no one else can make you happy; only happier; and (2) Tone it down. Be flexible, don't compete, let go of yourself a bit. You can do both of those at the same time, kind of. It's when the second half is promoted to the extreme that I get offended. A man can't respect your intellect and be attracted to you at the same time? If he respects you, you're friends or business partners? Really? I get that attraction isn't based on things like intellect and accomplishments, but can't they coexist? And--keep in mind, I've always been happy single, and I maintain that you can't be happy in a relationship unless you're already happy single. I'm a proponent of the idea that someone else can only make you happier. That said, that "er" is nothing to sneeze at; when that relationship was going well, I was exuberantly happy. Given the choice between happy and happier, I'll take happier. Ergo, I'm happy single, but I've come to understand/see for myself that I'm even happier in a (healthy) relationship. But you can't be happy in a relationship if you give up too much of yourself, and there's a point last night--when I was listening to this relationship webinar--that I said, "f* it." It was the same "f* it" I felt when my friends said, "men don't want to date a vegan." I mean, well then, I'm sorry but that's who I am. And I feel the same way about some of this stuff. I understand that for men, a romantic connection/attraction isn't intellectually based, but for me, being able to connect to someone intellectually is essential. Not central, but essential. If I have to "tone it down" and "play dumb"--and I understand that there's a difference between not being overly in-your-face and competitive, which is fine, and playing dumb, which is not. But when the dating advice gets to the point of advising women to be overly passive, etc., that's when I say "f* it." If you're indeed right that that's how it has to be, than I'm better off single.