Tell you what: personally, I’ve never really had any particular urge to learn gemara (my dad asked me if I wanted to when I was younger and I kind of wrinkled my nose and said it sounded too complicated), but I’d feel a lot better about not being able to (by the system, at least) if someone would give me a reason why. The discussion recently came up in a class in school led by a very well-known rav who was asked the question and said it wasn’t part of the mesorah. A girl then responded that until the time of Sarah Schenirer it was just barely part of the mesorah to teach women any Torah in-depth at all, but now it’s acceptable- would gemara ever gain that level of acceptability? He looked very uncomfortable and completely skirted the issue (which I’ve discovered usually entails repeating whatever was said already in an authoritative voice and then going into a whole convoluted mashal that doesn’t really apply in the hopes that by the time it’s over we’ll have forgotten the question already).
If the girl’s point was incorrect, then why didn’t he say so? If she was right, then why not give some other answer if there is one?
Is there a real answer besides mesorah and the whole thing about women’s brains working differently that we’ve chewed to pieces on that other thread? If women want to, why can’t they?