The end of patriarchy is nigh. So numerous commentators have claimed, in response to the recent election of Ursula von der Leyen as European Commission president and Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer’s nomination to become her successor as German defense minister. Both women hail from the center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU), Germany’s largest party. Following Chancellor Angela Merkel’s resignation as party chairwoman in December, Kramp-Karrenbauer (known as AKK) has herself become CDU leader.

In one prominent photo doing the rounds, von der Leyen and AKK hold hands with each other while smiling against a backdrop of German soldiers. It’d be easy to conclude that the aesthetics of politics — or perhaps even politics itself — have changed. Commentary on the photo has been strongly reminiscent of the response to the “situation room” photo of Hillary Clinton, taken during the pursuit and execution of Osama bin Laden. Already, back then, some claimed that Clinton’s visibly emotional expression, her hand over her mouth, her shocked eyes, revealed a qualitative difference in feminine reactions to war. They even went so far as to suggest that the way in which foreign policy was being conducted had changed.

But putting women in power isn’t the same thing as feminism — or, at least, not all kinds of feminism. The notion that women will naturally be “motherly” or “more caring” rulers isn’t just sexist, it’s manifestly untrue — Margaret Thatcher and Angela Merkel didn’t exactly prove to be champions of the oppressed. It would, perhaps, be unfair to judge von der Leyen or AKK simply by invoking these other women’s actions in office, even if they belong to the same political family. So let’s look at their own records.