Zombies are sort of a gender equality monster. Zombies are people that are dead but have the audacity to be up walking around. They aren't super strong, they don't have cool powers, and they aren't sexy (unless you think they are, and if you do, then you are beyond the help of any psychologist or priest, my friend). They have no ecological role or niche, and they don't procreate. In a very real sense they are unary. They are a singular. A zombie is a zombie. It's former identity, gender, sexual, species, really doesn't matter anymore. A male zombie is no more privileged or special than a female zombie and vice versa. Scary and gross is scary and gross.
Which makes them a great monster for these troubled times in which we live. Furthermore whatever causes the zombies (unless it is a bokor and these are real, traditional zombies) is no respecter of persons and positions.
The same holds true for the "survivors" in a zombie film or story. Nobody is special. One set of skills may be more useful than another, true, but that's up to the writer in the end. A major point of good zombie fiction is the normal people put in an extraordinary circumstance angle. It's not uncommon for the trained and equipped persons, such as police, military, and so forth, to find themselves eaten and zombified while the "normals" survive, albeit in reduced circumstances.
Actually there's probably a logical reason for that. In any survival situation those who put themselves in harm's way are the most likely to be harmed, while those who avoid danger have a more reasonable chance of survival. One's risk of shark attack decreases dramatically if one never goes swimming. Thus the more "heroic" types in any setting are the persons most likely to get killed. If this sounds like I am obliquely suggesting that the Final Girl trope means that said Final Girl is not actually strong or competent, well I am. Besides, the Final Girl, like everything else in modern cinema is a devalued joke. Everyone just seems to forget that Nancy (played by Heather Langenkamp) actually did some solid research/detective work, then went all book nerd and read up on booby traps and such all in preparation for her final fight with Freddy. Survival and success based solely on genitalia is just wrong, I'm afraid.
Sidebar over, that brings me back to zombies. I've noticed that in a zombie story not only is the monster a gender equalizer, so too are the survivors. The gun, the lovely, lovely gun was always the great equalizer. Gramma with a shotgun is worth any musclebound thug, and who doesn't like a good western where some gramma with a rifle shoots a varmint?
Maybe I was just looking for an excuse to say "varmint".
Yeah, that was probably it.
All of which is to say that you have quite a lot of options when it comes to zombies, try to avoid making them sexy.
Keep your pumpkins lit.
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