Anyone no matter their birth or gender can become enlightened, this angered the elite and many people tried to kill Buddha for upsetting the caste system and power structure of his time.
The basics in Buddhism including the mindfulness movement are easy to access because of the internet. However most of the mindfulness movement has stripped away the original message taught by the Buddha.
What is difficult to find is why Buddha taught the Dharma, the history of Buddhism, especially early Buddhism. That is one of the reasions I am posting these articles, Buddha was fighting a corrupt system, the Brahmans had a lock on the spiritual market and the teachings of the Vedas.
Buddha stripped away the corruption, threw away the empty rituals like bathing in a particular river or killing animals to win and better birth, starve the body to free the soul and taught the ordinary person to break free of their conditioning and self-caused suffering.