My Wife and I love hot wings. The hot ones only (no honey whatever). So the mess and eating like a caveman is not an issue.
Now I’ll try just about any type of BBQ, but my Wife does not like it. I think it’s because of an underlying sweetness. She doesn’t like any type of ‘Chinese food’ that has a sweet component either. Sweet and sour pork is right out.
This, as others have stated as well. Messy foods just aren’t something most women pick as a group eat. You’ll never hear a woman say “Them was some good ribs! Just run me through the car wash. I’ll hold on the the luggage rack.*” Plus, there is something primal about big slabs of meat and ribs cooked low and slow with lots of smoke. More of a guy thing to both cook and consume.
I’d amend that to say that “fine, respectable restaurant” and "good" BBQ probably don’t belong in the same sentence. In particular, advertising “our spacious restaurant, complete with a full-service bar, dark woods, polished brass” doesn’t bode well.*
I haven’t been paying a lot of attention to customer gender at our main local BBQ hangout. There certainly are a lot of women eating there.
Female abhorrence of messy, fattening foods isn’t an obvious thing in Ohio, as exemplified by the Ladies Night Out phenomenon at Mexican restaurants, where full-to-oversized meals are generally accompanied by plenty of margaritas and shrieks of drunken amusement.
*there was a character in one of Calvin Trillin’s books about food, who inquired suspiciously about a recommended BBQ place, wondering if they had plates (not a good omen).
I don’t think it’s specifically gendered, as much as a question of constitution.
The dainty and delicate of any gender will have a problem with BBQ done right. It’s assertive, it’s overpowering, it’s hearty and fatty and messy primal.
My wife loves a good barbecue, especially mine :D.
Also, note that the rather stereotypical “KC style” barbecue (which is sweeter and more heavily sauced) isn’t the only variety. Texas-style dry BBQ with a hot but not-too-sweet sauce available at the table is our favorite, followed closely by East Carolina smoked pork with vinegar/mustard mop.
I like barbecue. I’ve never really been much of a girly-girl type, though. Dunno what groups of women in general do, it’s been ages since I’ve been out with a group that wasn’t mixed-gender.
I heard that a real Southern belle can eat an order of BBQ chicken and nothing gets sticky beside her fingertips.
Dennis
I’m a guy who doesn’t like BBQ.
Ah, you’re doing one of those user name/post type thingies. 
I ecall some woman telling me, “I treat my body like a temple. You treat yours like a tent.”
Mrs. Plant (v.2.0) loved ribs.
So you went to one restaurant, one time and concluded that women simply don’t like BBQ?
I see mostly women at my local coffee shop. Is it reasonable of me to question if men even like coffee at all?
Maybe women don’t frequent that place or other BBQ places as much as men. I really only go out to a place to eat if I’m with my family, which includes men. Although I have gone to Famous Dave’s with a girl friend, too. Meanwhile, my dad goes out to Famous Dave’s all the time to eat with old coworkers. It’s less ‘I don’t like BBQ’ (because I love BBQ) and more, ‘I don’t go out as much, and when I do I like to go to varied places, rather than the same place all the time’. And that’s still just me - I’m not speaking for other women at all.
Which is kind of interesting because women are still (slightly) more likely than men to be obese in the US.
Settling it which way?
I’m not fond of barbecue. Most actual barbecue I’ve encountered has included rather more “charred black” than I prefer - you might call it manly and primal, but I call it burned. It’s mediocre if you’re lucky. And I have no interest in making a mess of myself (sauce in my manly bread? Heck no!) so if I can’t eat it with a knife and fork, fork that.
Perhaps the annoyingly common trope of restaurants serving BBQ in a psuedo-picnic format of bench tables, paper plates, cafeteria trays, with a paper towel roll in front of you is a turn off? I never understood why a great steak dinner can be had in a civilized atmosphere, but the presence of bbq sauce means that your dining experience needs to be treated with the refinement of a prison slop line?
You talkin’ to me? In my observation when you’re talking about BBQ sold at an establishment (as opposed to cooked on a grill in somebody’s backyard) the atmosphere is part and parcel with the food. You get a roll of paper towels because the food is messy, and the food is messy because if it wasn’t messy it wouldn’t be barbecue, it’d be something else, like that steak dinner you mentioned.
The fact that most of it’s covered with burned strips is just an attempt to replicate that “amateur with a grill” experience as well.
I agree that much of the BBQ experience is trope-ish. For example, I like BBQ but I don’t like country & western music, yet many restaurants have a strong C&W theme. However, there are some practical differences between a steakhouse (or fine Italian, Asian, etc. restaurant) and BBQ. You don’t eat steak, pasta, etc. with your fingers, but much of BBQ (chicken, ribs, corn on the cob) is eaten with the fingers and covered in sauce or dry rub. Chicken can be eaten with a knife and fork, and corn with cob-holders, but I’ve never seen ribs eaten any other way than with one’s fingers. As ninja’d by begbert2 
the roll of paper towel is a very welcome practicality and not merely a reverse affectation.
Ms. P doesn’t like it, but she’s vegetarian. She’ll go to a BBQ joint with us and order all sides, or fish if they have it. Sons and I all love it.
I love barbecue.
I’m also aware that it isn’t very good for me (salt, fat, sugar) and it isn’t good for my dental work (damn it). So it is a rare treat. But I talked to chef at a cafeteria I frequent about putting the slaw on the pulled pork sandwich (because he didn’t have pickle chips to put on them) and after that experience, he implemented just about every suggestion I gave him. Now, I’m not claiming to have thought up this wonderful tradition, but it’s not well-known here in MN.
Just got my attention 
I adore good BBQ, and historically have not minded getting messy for good food however crutch and chairborn has changed things - I don’t want to get anything on my crutch grips [a lovely purple soft molded silicon] and wheel rims can get ones hands slightly dirty and I detest using baby wipes on my hands then eating - carries the nasty taste along with the food.
But I have absolutely no issue having hubs bring good Q home =) I can have him bring me a slightly soapy wet wash cloth, a rinse cloth and a hand towel so I can clean the gorp off my hands before hobbling to the sink to wash up properly.
[though I have to admit, at home we frequently cheat and toss a flat of ribs into the sous vide still sealed in the heavy from the abbatoire to the grocery plastic caseing, let it perk along at 160 for about 36 hours and drain out the juices, and a quick process of removing the meat from the bones and cartillage and I can use a fork and not get my hands gorped up =)
I liked gates BBQ when I was in Kansas city.
According to a grub hub pdf I looked at, men are 50% more likely to order meat dishes than women.
https://get.grubhub.com/blog/online-ordering-data-gender-differences-in-takeout-dining.html
I like barbecue just fine. It’s a big favorite in my family and our “go to” for large gatherings, we order a couple of trays of barbecue, rolls, slaw, beans, etc. and we’re good to go. Although I usually make a big green salad - something the women appreciate more than the guys.
That respectable restaurant in Overland Park seems to have a masculine vibe, though. Flat screen TV’s (showing sports, I bet), hunting trophies on the wall, and, yes, a menu that’s rather short on light options - it’s not the type of place a group of women would tend to select for their night out. Unless they all had a simultaneous craving for barbecue, which is a much higher bar than liking barbecue.