The New Yorker:

Why the South Korean feminist movement, which calls for a boycott of men, is gaining traction among American women.

By E. Tammy Kim

Last week, here in Seoul, I was trying to digest the aftermath of the election when I began to notice that my American peers were looking this way, in search of guidance from South Korea. On TikTok, X, and Instagram, women of all ages were committing themselves to some version of South Korea’s 4B movement, each “B” (the prefix 비 or bi) indicating a negation or disavowal: no marriage, no kids, no sex, no dating, all defined in heterosexual terms. “Good luck getting laid, especially in Florida! Because me and my girlies are participating in the 4B movement,” one American TikToker said. “Why exactly are you going to keep becoming subservient to a nation that doesn’t literally care about you?” another asked, backgrounded by an article about the fertility rate in South Korea. A piece in Vanity Fair was headlined “maga Has a Penis Obsession. 4B Feminism Is a Logical Response.”

A “Lysistrata”-style political sex strike in the U.S. is unlikely to take off. But there hasn’t really been one in South Korea, either. I wouldn’t describe 4B as a movement or an ideology as much as a feeling, a name for what many women are doing (or not doing), intentionally or not. The country has one of the world’s lowest fertility rates, and the marriage rate has fallen by forty per cent in the past decade. Many straight women, twentysomething through middle age, have given up on the layers of bullshit that come with dating and reproduction: sexist dudes, in-law drama, holiday rituals, dead-end job prospects. There’s also the untenable cost of family housing and childhood education in Seoul and other major cities. 4B is catchy and provocative, but it’s also way too slight to help us through this moment of crisis.

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