If GTA 5 did not include a female protagonist, the media would cry misogyny.

If GTA 5 did include a female protagonist who went through some awful things just to make her way in Los Santos, the media would cry misogyny. Possibly even louder.

Progression is a word that's used a lot, but rarely has any weight behind it. As you touched upon, progression for the sake of progression is useless.
There needs to be a clear and concise reason to include a playable women in a GTA game that isn't to appease certain demographics.
The only way that Rockstar could include a female in the game is if she was stripped of all the things that make her female. She's become almost completely gender neutral.

Think about it.

If she kicks ass, then the feminist media will insist that the game is objectifying women.
If she gets ground to dust, the feminist media will insist that the game is catering to male power fantasies.

So Rockstar won't be able to create a compelling story because the female character is already severely limited. So she'll become bland, too avoid any danger that the character might become unlikable.

Or at least until feminist videogame critics cease existing.