No one's saying women need to be coddled; the problem is that people recognize that the current state of the industry/the internet are
jerks. You can only tell people to ignore bullying so long, especially when those doing the bullying aren't being punished, but those that are being victimized by it are being told to instead change this perceived weakness about
themselves.
People should not have to worry about being made fun of while they're trying to learn something difficult. Recently we had that female Mozilla employee whose code (for a personal project, no less) was made fun of by three semi-prominent developers on Twitter. The consensus on HN was that there was nothing wrong with her code, but that she was being picked on solely for being a girl. In bringing the issue up, two of the three apologized, with the third going the route of "It isn't my fault you are offended,".
That is why it is important to foster good relationships, positivity and trust early-on. It has nothing to do with treating anyone like a princess and everything to do with the truth of how people treat women online (and off) and allowing these girls to find mentors and people that inspire them that they can better relate to.
The commenter you linked to doesn't realize that within that repo, there's a Team of everyone that signed up for this, allowing them to start projects and teach amongst themselves. That is the end-game here; allow people to learn without concern. No one seemed to have a problem with the concept of private repos before this and the Ada Initiative's private repo was highly successful; I wonder why.