User blog comment:Miskos3/Fairy Tail Chapter 388: Erza vs. Minerva, Review/@comment-24277053-20140613150437/@comment-2214433-20140613150721

Actually, I thought of that too. It's quite plausible. Although given what we know about Jiemma, it doesn't seem like gender matters to him, if a person is "weak", they aren't of any use.