The nature of the anti-gender movement is contradictory — but do the advocates of this movement care?

Judith Butler begins Chapter Three, titled Contemporary Attacks on Gender in the United States, by examining how the anti-gender movement, from her perspective, solely existed internationally. She writes:

For several years, I encountered the anti-gender ideology movement only outside of the United States. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 93)

While this may initially sound like an uninformed claim, the reality is that the anti-gender movement has gained significant momentum and now holds considerable influence in American politics. Butler’s claim, however, is not surprising considering how other countries might seem more rigid in enforcing a gender binary — such as those where the language is gendered (see: Spanish which uses “el” and “la” to denote masculine and feminine). Butler writes:

I thought, naively, that the anti-gender ideology movement had no place in the United States because the term “gender” had a more or less normalized usage in the Anglosphere. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 93)

Butler’s hesitancy to delineate the anti-gender movement in the United States stems from the fact that the term “gender” was once relatively uncontroversial and commonplace. It lacked the culture and political baggage it carries today. This shift is evident when people sarcastically ask “What is a woman?” when they already adhere to a Platonic notion of gender. However, the true question lies in how gender first became a problem:

[Gender] first became a problem resonant with the international anti-gender ideology movement in the context of debates about transgender identity when Evangelical groups weigh in. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 94)

At this juncture, Butler is not denying the significance of the women’s suffrage movement, but instead highlights how contemporary issues surrounding gender took shape with the emergence of transgender identities. Many people who claim to support gender equality between (cis)men and (cis)women still refuse to recognize transgender individuals as deserving of certain legal protections. What makes this especially urgent is the role Evangelical groups have played in mobilizing opposition to transgender rights, asserting that trans identities deviate from the gender ordained by God.

Butler explores how this tension manifests particularly in education, where a sharp contradiction emerges: Evangelical groups argue that granting children too much freedom leads them explore diverse gender identities, which they view as a form of leftist indoctrination. Yet these same groups impose their own fixed, religiously motivated views of gender, effectively barring students from engaging with alternative perspectives. Butler thus poses a crucial question: where does indoctrination truly lie, when one side is so intent on policing thought and restricting inquiry.

As a result of Evangelical groups policing varying gender identities, censorship is inevitable:

Let us remember that certain words are being imagined as so powerful that only through censorship is there any hope of depriving them of their power. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 95)

Butler acknowledges the role of censorship — particularly the policing of language — and how it obstructs comprehensive education about gender. The terms most frequently targeted tend to reference non-normative sexual or gender identities. For example, there have been efforts to prohibit the use of words like “gay” or “transgender” in educational settings. Yet Butler points out that censorship often has the unintended effect of amplifying the power of what is being banned — whether a word, speech, performance, or text — by imbuing it with heightened symbolic significance. Still, the broader aim of these Evangelical groups — and of the anti-gender movement more generally — produces something worth examining:

The aim of bands such as these is not just to rally the base but also to produce a form of popular support driven by a passion for authoritarian power. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 96)

Political speeches are often emotionally charged to “rally the base,” encouraging a sense of unity among supporters. But unlike movements aimed at resisting or dismantling fascism, the groups Butler critiques demonstrate a particular affinity for authoritarian power. These groups derive comfort from being told what the truth is — in this case, what gender is — and have no interest in entertaining alternative perspectives (unless, of course, to mock them). In conversations with individuals aligned with the anti-gender movement, I’ve noticed a recurring pattern: they fail to recognize that their own understanding of gender is itself a theory. And if they end up acknowledging that they put forth a theory, they continue to insist their theory is the correct one. Simply put, these individuals subscribe to gender essentialism without educating themselves about other theories, such as: Butler’s earlier theory of gender performativity, her newest notion of gender-as-phantasm informed by Jean Laplanche explored in this book, or even Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s gender assemblage theory.

Instead of engaging with alternative theories, individuals in the anti-gender movment are drawn to the authoritarian nature of their worldview. The censorship of words, teachings, and concepts becomes a political maneuver — a strategy to consolidate support by silencing other views. Butler further explains:

The idea that being expose to an idea is enough to be indoctrinated by it assumes a seamless and quick passage from thought to conviction, bypassing all judgment and evaluation. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 98)

Members of the anti-gender movement often assume that simply being exposed to non-normative gender identities leads individuals to change their gender on a whim or randomly adopt these ideas without critical intervention. Ironically, this uncritical acceptance is precisely what members of this movement have fallen into. Butler challenges this assumption as overly simplistic — people do not encounter a concept and instantly transform their identity; the process is far more complex:

One learn about an idea, considers what it means, and is then asked to come up with ideas of one’s own about whether it is right, or how to best interpret it. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 98)

As an educator, I find Butler’s point entirely accurate: when individuals encounter a new idea, they engage in a process of self-reflection, testing its validity against prior knowledge, reasoning, and research. Interpretation is not passive but active. However, members of the anti-gender movement often bypass this process entirely, assuming instead that individuals — especially children — are immediately indoctrinated upon exposure to non-normative ideas. In my experience teaching middle and high school students, the reality is quite the opposite: students frequently enter the class with rigid, unexamined beliefs. Through structured debate and engagement with new material, they are encouraged to criticially assess their views. This does not mean I expect them to abandon their beliefs, but rather that any belief held after thoughtful reflection will be more grounded, and any action taken will be more informed.

Butler writes:

The harm censorship does is justified by the imagined harm it seeks to stop. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 99)

There is no doubt that censorship is harmful. Yet it is often justified by appeals to imagined consequences. For example, while transgender individuals already face disproportionately high rates of hate crimes and suicide, censorship contributes to social stigma and unacceptance, thereby worsening these real and immeasurable harms. Still, proponents of censorship rationalize it by pointing to what they perceive as a greater threat — such as the fear that exposure to certain words or ideas might cause their children to become transgender. In this framework, the speculative harm of exposure is treated as more serious than the actual harm faced by marginalized individuals.

Ironically, in order for a politician to present a bill about words that ought to be banned within a certain space — like an educational space — they must repeat those very words:

The censor chokes on its own discourse, spitting forth the condemned words, and yet that muffled rage does become law. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 100)

One interesting point that Butler notes is that members of the anti-gender movement completely misunderstand the role of educators concerned with gender:

… In this phantasmatic transfiguration, the body is penetrated by these “ideologies” as if those who have taught us most about sexual consent and autonomy are the ones who are violating both principles with their teaching. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 102)

Butler introduces the concept of “phantasmatic transfiguration” to describe the fantasy-driven logic that defines the anti-gender movement. This builds on her latest theoretical move: understanding gender as a phantasm — an imagined construct that nonetheless exerts real power over individuals. Within this framework, gender is not a fixed truth but a projection that is treated as if it invades or “penetrates” the body through exposure to various gender theories. Yet in reality, feminist and queer pedagogies emphasize consent, autonomy, and critical engagement. True educators, grounded in these ethics, do not impose rigid doctrines on students; rather, they encourage self-reflexivity. Ironically, it is the anti-gender movement that imposes its normative views without consent, violating the very autonomy it claims to defend by coercing individuals to conform to a fixed and often punitive understanding of gender.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis is mentioned multiple times by Butler as a central figure in the anti-gender movement. In Florida, statewide policies have banned classroom instruction on sex and gender under the guise of combating so-called “woke gender ideology.” However, these bans inflict real and irreparable harm, directly contradicting DeSantis’ professed aim of protecting children. Butler cites data from The Trevor Project, which shows that…

“… denying children access to materials that allow them to understand the gender spectrum … produces an isolation and stigmatization for queer and trans kids, a condition historically associated with depression and suicide. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 104)

The anti-gender movement claims to help children but only serve to produce an isolation for the children already at risk.

Butler continues:

… It is the life of the body into which the state not enters without free consent, and for the purposes of restricting the very powers of consent. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 105)

For the anti-gender movement, what matters more than the LGBTQ+ individuals current being harmed is the life that has not yet been born — the fetus. In this framework, the rights of the fetus also serve to outweigh those of the person whose body it inhabits. Butler points out that this movement has never truly been invested in the principle of consent because its policies force individuals — including survivors of sexual assault — to carry pregnancies to term, regardless of their wishes. This moral rigidity is rooted in a vision of religious purity, grounded in beliefs about immutable sex and gender, and the notion of a soul known by God even before birth.

Butler moves to discuss the similarities between the attacks on what is termed “critical race theory” and gender.

What is imagined is a kind of pedagogy that is interested only in making white people feel bad or telling young people to be gay or trans. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 109)

Unfortunately, both critical race theory and gender studies are frequently attacked and misrepresented. Many people assume these fields are designed to “make white people feel guilty” or to encourage young people to change their sexuality or gender identity. However, the term critical is key. These areas of study are not about imposing beliefs or identities, but about cultivating critical thinking — encouraging students to question, analyze, and better understand the complexity surrounding race and gender. Butler writes:

Critique is neither denunciation or absolute opposition: it is an inquiry into the conditions of possibility of certain concepts that have either been taken for granted without justification or that have become invested with meanings that establish them as overdetermined. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 109)

To critique something is not to attack it. Rather, critique involves questioning established premises and conclusions, and potentially offering new ones in their place. It is a process of intellectual engagement, not destruction. Many concepts — particularly those related to gender — are too often taken for granted and left unexamined. Yet there should be no fear in subjecting these ideas to scrutiny. If the anti-gender movement truly believes its views are correct, then those beliefs should be able to withstand critical examination. The unwillingness to engage in such interrogation suggests not strength, but fragility.

Butler concludes this chapter by discussing the concept of “wokeness”:

“Woke ideology” now contains both “CRT” and “gender ideology,” and the attack on “woke” is animated by a psychosocial fantasy that the loss of patriarchal, heteronormative, and white supremacist social orders is an unbearable one, tantamount to social death and, at times, physical danger. (Who’s Afraid of Gender?, 110–111)

The anti-gender movement has proven remarkably effective in collapsing a wide range of critical perspectives — whether from critical race theory, gender studies, or critiques of capitalism — into a single, pejorative label: “woke.” This term is deployed as if it names a kind of ideological contagion, one that threatens to dismantle patriarchal, heteronormative, and white supremacist social structures. The strategy of pathologizing “wokeness” (which is really just “awareness”) is proving to be increasingly harmful.