I get what you're saying, but I think one can look at the history and draw a line of influence from Butler to her followers, especially people like Wilchins and Feinberg, who were not only reading gender theory but were participating in things like the Camp Trans protest of MichFest and writing books about gender that were easier to understand.

As a comparable example, I was aware of Critical Race Theory as developed by Derrick Bell and Kimberlé Crenshaw. Now, I doubt a lot of people have actually read Bell's or Crenshaw's work, but you see people nevertheless believing received versions of those ideas and acting on them.