Research on extremism has increasingly incorporated a gender perspective, revealing how the politics of extremism and gender fuel one another. Yet most evidence of the gendered politics of extremism is on far-right and Islamist non-state actors, neglecting other forms, including state-sanctioned extremism in which the state is complicit with the violent effects of extremism. This article investigates a type of state-sanctioned extremism, wherein nationalist movements, supported to varying degrees by governments, seek to “protect” Buddhism across Asia. Gendered motives, forms, and impacts of political extremism can be observed in Buddhist Protectionism movements, manifesting in societal conflict, hate speech and other acts of violence and intolerance against ethnic and religious minorities. We ask to what extent gender norms and structures affect the motives, forms, and impact of Buddhist extremism using an original dataset encompassing nationally representative surveys and qualitative research in selected communities in Thailand, Sri Lanka, and Myanmar. We find that extremist discourses and practices exist on a Buddhist Femonationalist Continuum across the three cases with misogyny and anti-Muslim threat narratives played up, both affirming the power of masculine hegemony and justifying the use of violence to control minority populations and women.