> In 1700's, europeans thought they were raising the natives to their level.
They really didn't. They might have thought they were raising them a bit but never up to their level.
> In 1900's, some germans thought they saw jews as having excess privileges and need to be brought down.
They really didn't. Such propaganda was simply used to make people feel better about the hatred they felt, and to channel it wherever the Nazis wanted.
> In 2000's, feminists think men have an excess of privileges in society, and that they need to tilt the scales in women's favor.
They don't think it; they know it because that's scientifically proven. If you want to put it another way, women have a dearth of privilege.
> They're all instances of trying to pull society from what it is to what it thinks it ought to be.
Yes, in opposite directions.
> Also, women were never put in chains.
Seriously?
> If they thought they were being put down
They don't think, they know.
> there were many opportunities for them to have thrown down the metaphorical chains and shackles men have placed on them
And that's exactly what they're trying to, and have been doing at least since 1848, but it's slow work -- just like those other examples. Have blacks achieved parity with whites in America yet?
> Instead all we have is a relatively benign tweaking of laws in their favour.
First, it's not in their favor, but a little less against it. Second -- the problem of sexism is very different from racism in that women, while subjugated, have never been considered "foreign", and so the power struggle wears a different shape in either direction.
> ... historical attempts to bridge the difference between what society is and ought to be.
Of course it's everyone's duty to help shape society in the form they think it should take, but that doesn't mean the content of those attempts can be compared -- at least not so haphazardly.