Interesting. If someone were describing a word as "icky" in Internet subcultures, I'd guess "moist", not because it's actually icky, but because it's Internet subculture.

It's sort of how if someone on the Internet said "He's got a fedora", I would conclude that they're saying "This guy is a dork". In the real world, it would likely be a statement of fact, and based on the girls I hang out with, a statement of fashion.

Without evidence to back it, I'd hypothesize that this is a subculture effect, more than a gender effect.