First, I do think some of it is not just teacher demographics; I think the learning style promoted in American schools serves girls, in the aggregate, better than it serves boys. But more directly addressing your post, I don't think the point about teacher demographics is that boys can't respect women; I think it's that they're less likely to see women as role models.
I always tried to downplay this stuff -- race-blind-and-gender-blind and all that to treat all people equally -- but I have a son and three daughters now and in spite of us never really making it a Thing, gender is a Thing for them. My kids were curious about video games but my daughter got turned off by a lot of them because "how come so many of the characters are boys." No matter what I said, she couldn't get past that. She felt like video games weren't for her. Is it crazy that boys might subconsciously feel the same about school? "If it's for boys how come all the teachers are women?"
I always tried to downplay this stuff -- race-blind-and-gender-blind and all that to treat all people equally -- but I have a son and three daughters now and in spite of us never really making it a Thing, gender is a Thing for them. My kids were curious about video games but my daughter got turned off by a lot of them because "how come so many of the characters are boys." No matter what I said, she couldn't get past that. She felt like video games weren't for her. Is it crazy that boys might subconsciously feel the same about school? "If it's for boys how come all the teachers are women?"