from what i know about wilde, i would say it's just lord henry being a sexist pig. oscar wilde was pretty outspoken for the time about women's rights and society's problems in general—he made fun of society's problems a lot in his writing, in fact. he was the editor of the woman's world even, which was all about forward-thinking and seeing from the perspective of a woman. additionally, he wrote a woman of no importance which is satirical but largely about sexism, i believe. in this case, i think he's intentionally writing henry this way to make him dislikable. a huge and very intentional part of henry’s character is being a detestable sexist, so in this case it’s almost assuredly the character (: