I don't understand your reasoning. The Sovereign (not the king) is the fount of honors (although depending on the country there might be some restrictions). Queen Regnants are Sovereigns, just like their male counterparts. So, if the Sovereign in a country has the right to confer this kind of title (king/queen) on their spouse that would be the case for either a reigning king or queen.
However, the fact that wives of male Sovereigns are often called queen is -at least in Europe- not necessarily because their husband conferred the title of queen on them but because of the law regulating royal titles in that country or social norms (for example, Queen Máxima's official title is 'Princess of the Netherlands' but by social custom, she is called Queen - while in many other countries 'Queen' is the official title of the king's wife).
I think royaljul73 may be making a point that the inequality is rooted in discrimination against females, not discrimination against males.
As you pointed out, the laws and/or social norms regulating royal titles in most European countries (Spain is an exception) automatically confer titles on wives of royal men, but not husbands of royal women. But the origin of these laws and customs is not a wish to reward women with titles in preference to men (which, if that were the case, would be pure discrimination against men).
These laws and customs originated because it has always been presumed that when a man married a woman, the man would naturally be the master of the house and the woman his helpmate, not the other way around (and that presumption is a form of discrimination against women).
Usually, if for example a Prince of Denmark marries a Princess of Sweden, she becomes a Princess of Denmark but he does not become a Prince of Sweden. But the reason is
not that she as a woman is treated as more deserving of titles. It is because she as a woman is expected to give up her role in the Swedish monarchy, move to Denmark and take up a subservient role as a consort within the Danish monarchy, while the man keeps his birthright role and privileges.
So although the Princess would be the one receiving a new title, I think would be fair to say that, she, not the Prince, would be the recipient of discrimination in this case.
It seems that mainly in the Middle East, it is up to the Sovereign to either confer or not confer that title upon their spouse (see for example Jordan, where some of Hussein's wives were queen while others weren't). And in those countries, the Sovereigns are still males.
Though I am only well-versed in titles in the current European hereditary monarchies, I think the traditions tend to differ in monarchies where polygyny is the historical norm (whether or not it is still practiced today). When a sovereign was expected to have multiple wives and (step)mothers, a norm of automatically conferring the equivalent of a Queen title on all wives was less feasible, as there needed to be systems to, at minimum, distinguish between the most powerful wife, mother or dowager and other consorts.
Summary of Q&A in Billed Bladet #44, 2015.
Where a Christina Rasmussen is embarrassed by PH wanting to be king and why does the DRF continue to allow him going on like that?
Jon Bloch Skipper explains that any changes in PH's title is solely up to QMII, so she's got the ape. (Because she is the only one who can request the Parliament, through the government, to change PH's status to king since this requires a change of the Constitution. Any other titles does not require the approval of the Parliament).
Then he adds: "Having said that I also wonder why the court doesn't soon put a lid on this discussion, which is not in line with Danish history and tradition and which hurt the Prince Consort personally and the DRF as an institution.
Based on various Jon Bloch Skipper columns that Muhler has kindly translated and shared on this forum, I have formed the definite impression that Mr. Bloch Skipper is, to be blunt, not a credible source in legal matters. At best, he seems to have trouble distingushing between the written law and unwritten custom. (At worst, he simply invents things - I hope that worst case is not true.)
To factcheck his above-quoted column from 2015:
1) The Constitution of the Kingdom of Denmark, the highest law of the land, can be read in its entirety online on many different websites. Here is a full English translation (out of convenience, I am posting a current publication, but I am willing to search for an archived version from 2015 if someone requests it):
There is not a single word in the Constitution on the subject of royal titles, even in general. Absolutely nothing in the Constitution validates Jon Bloch Skipper's specific claim that the monarch has authority over certain royal titles but not other royal titles. (In addition to his claim that the monarch cannot confer the title of King but can confer other royal titles, he has also claimed that the monarch cannot remove the title Crown Prince but can remove the title of Prince. There is no evidence in the Constitution for that claim, either.)
2) Henrik was the first male spouse of a sovereign of Denmark. Thus, "Danish history and tradition" in regards to titles of specifically male consorts began and ended with him. From that perspective, to style him as King would have been no more and no less Danish-traditional than to style him as Prince.
On the other hand, if one takes a gender-neutral perspective of "Danish history and tradition", then most consorts of Danish monarchs have borne a title (Queen) which is considered the equivalent of their spouse's title (King), and Henrik bearing a lower title was an exception from of tradition.
To give Mr. Bloch Skipper the benefit of the doubt, perhaps he was referring to Danish traditions among non-royals. A man who marries a Countess does not become a Count, and a man who marries a Miss Jensen traditionally does not become Mr. Jensen. But if Mr. Bloch Skipper was appealing to non-royal tradition, then he ought to have been arguing for Queen Margrethe II to renounce her own royal title and become Countess Margrethe of Monpezat, since nonroyal women traditionally give up their own titles and surnames on marriage.
Personally, I don't think Mary gives a hoot about titles. Unlike Henrik, I think she recognises that extremely privileged people moaning about something as silly as titles makes them seem really ungrateful. But I don't see why she shouldn't be made Queen when the time comes. As it's been mentioned countless of times before: historically, Queens range lower than Kings.
