What is the 4B movement? Why some women are boycotting men after Trump's election victory
For some women in the US, the 2024 election served as an interview about the future of their reproductive rights, the victory of Donald Trump put that freedom at risk.
They say that Trump – who was found guilty of sexually harassing the magazine writer E. Jean Carroll also bragged about how she was able to “kill” Roe v. Wade during his last presidency – and the government he represents could lead to organized attacks. for their physical independence.
Now, many women say they are turning to 4B, a South Korean women's rights organization that boycotts men, as a way to put work back into their bodies.
Conversations about movement have become increasingly popular on social networking sites such as TikTok and Instagram. After President Trump's victory, internet searches for the movement topped Google across the US
“I think if we stop doing these acts of love and pursuing sex with men, that will tell them, 'Hey, our bodies don't need controversy,'” said Misa, a 22-year-old TikTok and Twitch streamer from the US.
“Women have decided that they are not going to continue running for power, but they are going to find ways to hold their own,” said Nadia Brown, chair of women's and gender studies at Georgetown University.
Here's what you need to know about the move.
What is the 4B movement?
4B is a limited niche and mostly online movement that started in South Korea in the late 2010s. The four B's represent bihon, bichulsan, they are again bisekseuwhich means rejecting marriage, childbirth, love and sex with men, according to a peer-reviewed paper in the Journal of Gender Studies by researchers at Seoul-based Yonsei University.
(CBC News reached out to one of the paper's authors, Jieun Lee, an assistant professor at Yonsei, for comment, but did not hear back by the time of publication.)
South Korea, like many countries around the world, has become increasingly gender-segregated in recent years. Young voters are divided by gender for the first time in their last presidential election in 2022, choosing Yoon Suk Yeol, who has blamed feminism for the country's low birth rate. Yoon also promised to end her gender equality ministry, which activists have called state-sponsored anti-feminism.
Several incidents of high-profile gender-based violence and digital sex crimes have also contributed to the issue. In 2016, a man killed a young woman because “women kept ignoring him.” This incident caused a stir when the police did not charge the suspect with hate crime.
Organizations like Human Rights Watch have something else criticism South Korea's “pervasive and systemic discrimination against women and girls” cites worst gender pay gap: Women to be paid 31.2 percent less than men by 2022, according to the Korea Times.
The country also has one of the lowest fertility rates in the world, and politicians have offered many financial incentives to couples who have children.
However, in addition to the high cost of living and the extremely competitive workforce, many women feel that they will not receive equal support from their spouses in managing the home, and they pursue other ways of life.
Almost a decade of these various factors may have led to the rise of movements like 4B, although its true popularity is unclear. Critics call it reactionary, excluding women and transgender women who are married or have children.
Why is it gaining US power now?
In the hours after Trump's victory, young American women began posting support for 4B online.
“There are many men who like and enjoy sex from women but they don't really like who we are…. We don't see them as just sexual objects,” said one TikTok user.
During his previous presidency, Trump appointed three United States Supreme Court justices who formed the dissenting majority that overturned federal abortion rights in 2022. In this recent election campaign, Trump said he would “do it”protect women“and assure them that they will not “think about abortion.”
Voters in Missouri paved the way for one repeal of the US abortion ban, one of seven victories for abortion rights advocates, while Florida, Nebraska and South Dakota defeated similar constitutional amendments.
Brown said that women who used their legal access to power by voting to no avail, will now use “very informal” means to try to retain power.
Misa said she supports the movement by not getting involved in romance with men: “I think women are tired of making their bodies politicized and controversial.”
What does celibacy have to do with femininity?
Abstinence has long been used as a form of protest for women.
Suffragettes attempted to gain celibate political rights by “using men's desires for women to perform sexual acts, domestic duties and, most importantly, maternal duties,” according to the Politics of Women's Suffrage.
Some Black women similarly abstained from sex when Black men were given the right to vote in America, Brown said, to try to persuade them to use their votes to support Black communities and not keep women submissive.
It is similar to the protests we are seeing now, he said.
“You can see that this president and others will react to things like sex strikes because they are motivated to see women using a very narrow lens that leads to their sexual gratification.”
'Many incidents of sexual violence'
In the days following Trump's victory, women reported an increase in online hate and misogynistic comments.
Nick Fuentes, a self-described incel identified by the Southern Poverty Law Center as white nationalist, wrote on X: “Your body, my choice.
Trump “not facing the real consequences” of being found guilty of sexual assault, “and not obstructing the course of their work convinces some people that, 'Well, this is not a consequence,'” said Shana MacDonald, of O'Donovan. Chair in Communications at the University of Waterloo, researching feminist media and online hate.
“We have this set of brave minds going out into the world and setting a set of standards for how we treat women that will have a negative impact on the next generation of women.”
As abortion rights amendments continue to fail in many states, Brown fears there could be “more incidents of sexual violence” and that the options available to women are becoming increasingly limited.
“There are small policies that work to make victims of sexual abuse whole,” he said.
“The worst thing is to create a class of women who use their agency but will be abused even more.”
