From one perspective, the bar should be lowered. Lowering the bar is acknowledgement of discriminatory practices towards opportunity. How can a black person study if he is banned from a library? Similary, a hostile and overly macho tech culture can diasadvantage women from learning. Especially if the learning is not from books but from other people/men. (Which is the majority of info needed to succeed in a workplace. The majority of needed info is NOT book smarts but relationship gated info and privileges)

So the existence of an entry bar exists only because of a lack of mentorship culture out of gated access to information. In school, something i've seen is terrible TAs explaining things purposefully convolutedly to "haze" newcomers.

The give and take aspect with all information, including programming knowledge is fundamental. For men, it revolves around mutual respect, but men almost seem to want something from women before dolling out any infor whatsoever. The most minimum of which is being friendly and nice in a "I heard you're the awesome expert to ask about this, ur so great! I hope you can teach me! :)". While the requirement for men is to not be an asshole. "Hey, can you explain this?"