Hey everyone

I recently started dm-ing dnd for the first time and have an amazing group with a few kind of experienced players. The only female of the group played an Aarokocra, and it was a bit of a fun joke at first calling the character feather face, etc.

Over the session though characters were literally shutting her up everytime she tried to speak (which is rough because she's the most knowledgeable out of all the players). I tried to negate this by making a lot of NPCs treat her well but the other players still kept it up.

One of the players said that it fit his character though, as he hates everyone. I told him he should be trying to shut everyone up then, not just the Aarokocra.

Any ways to deal with this kind of thing in the future? Maybe after a few fights the team will be a bit more interdependent?