I don't think it's fair to blame the audience for what happened there. (Not to pick on you; people diss the HN community left and right all the time and say all sorts of things that aren't true, and I sometimes feel like standing up for what's good in it.)

By far the best thing about this thread is how many women have been posting their thoughts. That's excellent for the same reason that a systems programming thread with lots of systems programmers would be.