There’s also hermaphrodite connectors, connecting any way whatsoever. And then there’s connectors which are assigned male or female but when you look closely enough it’s not so clear any more: The general rule is that whenever a stiff conductor mates with a a springy conductor then the stiff one is male and the springy one female, but then have a look at e.g. DB connectors (serial, parallel, VGA cables) and you see that the ground/shielding is stiff on the side that is springy for all the signal lines, and the male connector thus completely envelops the female one.
CEE 7/3 sockets (German) are unambigiously female, while CEE 7/5 sockets (French) have a male earth, and then you have bisexual plugs, CEE 7/7, mating with both.
Isn’t the rule that the female connector should be closer to the power source and the male closer to the appliance? So you don’t accidentally shock yourself.
