About the nonsensical assignment of gender to nouns I agree in principle but just a quick tip for the particular example in the footnote: “Mädchen” ends in -chen which is the diminutive form of a word (originally “die Magd” for a young woman). All words ending in -chen are neutral. Similarly, “das Bübchen” could refer to a young boy and is also neutral.
Hope this helps and good luck with learning German. If it wasn’t my native language I wouldn’t want to learn it but I do love it.