“On a motorcycle, when you do one thing wrong, a whole bunch of wrongs follow right behind.”
This is what people mean by respecting the bike. You are never in any way “insulting” the bike by not being skillfully at par with it’s capability. Nor is it a bar to aim for in the term. The phrase has been way over thought.
Respecting the bike is meant to be in terms of respect of what it can and will do to you should you lose your head for a moment and try to lay into it before your skills can accommodate. Or if you are not a fan of that phrasing maybe go old school an ” You need to recognize!” or “Appreciate the amount of power under you and the agile quickness at which it can handle turns and stops lest you be caught unawares and unsaddled” . The phrase/term is just used a general way of saying “Hey , man that bike is big, you been riding how long?…..man be careful”…. or..” What kind of num nut are you? You realize your bike has a bigger displacement then most compact cars…. your gonna kill yourself!” , at which point the conversation swiftly turns to either silence or negative.