I'm trying to follow the logic here - but isn't making a big deal out of a female referee counterintuitive? Like isn't calling a woman a 'badass bitch' for doing something that hundreds of men have done with relative ease implying that it was more difficult for the woman to do - thereby destroying the equality preached in the first place?

I will never forget I got off a plane one time and the pilot was female and like 10 women in front of me were all going "hell ya girl" and high-fiving her as they deboarded. I understand the sentiment, but doesn't that sentiment kind of say "we weren't expecting this from you (or your gender)" and thereby kind of discredit the notions of equality that people preach in the first place?