ABSTRACT
In 2017, Judith Butler was attacked by ultraconservative demonstrators during an academic visit to São Paulo, Brazil. Those demonstrations were part of an anti-gender agenda and in the name of idealized ideas of (gendered and stable) childhood. In this chapter, Child as method is used as an analytical lens to understand how ideas of childhood are used to oppose gender recognition rights. It is shown that those ideas are weaponized against gender-nonconforming rights, promoting injury and misrecognition, and challenging the field of children’s rights. However, Butler’s theoretical framework on gender, recognition, and democracy supports a claim for nonviolent action and self-determination – individual and collective – including on gender and childhood.
