4B Movement / 6B4T Movement

About

The 4B Movement is a fringe radical feminist movement which originated in South Korea in the late 2010s. Proponents of the movement refuse to date men and have sex with them, get married, and have children. The movement, which size in Korea was estimated to be at about 4,000 members, is a protest against South Korean patriarchic society, with its members regarding South Korean men "irredeemable" and striving to change society the role of women in it rather than changing men. In 2024, following the Republican candidate Donald Trump winning the 2024 United States presidential election, the movement experienced a spike in interest in the country, with some women sounding calls to popularize the movement in the United States.

An later version of the movement, referred to as 6B4T, also includes abstaining from consumption of sexist products and supporting fellow women who practice the movement, with 4T referring to rejecting beauty standards, hypertextualization of women in otaku culture, religion, and idol culture.

History

The 4B ("Four Nos") movement formed among radical South Korean feminists in 2019, emerging in Korean feminist circles on X / Twitter around 2017 to 2018.^[1][2][3] The movement is inspired by earlier feminist movements in South Korea, most notably the South Korean "Escape the Corset" movement which urges women to liberate themselves from sexual, bodily, social and psychological oppression. The 2016 feminist novel Kim Ji-young, Born 1982 by Cho Nam-Joo has also been cited as source of inspiration for the movement.

The name of the 4B movement stands for "four nos": bihon, bichulsan, biyeonae, bisekseu ("not married", "no childbirth", "no romance", "no sex"). The members of the movement seek to express their protest against South Korea's society, which they view as patriarchal, by choosing to refuse traditional gender roles and limiting their engagement with men and, including abstaining from having romantic or sexual relationships with men. Instead of changing men, which members of 4B movement view as "irredeemable",' the movement aims to change the society and the power women hold in it.^[4]

On June 2nd, 2020, South Korean researchers Jieun Lee and Euisol Jeong published^[1] "The 4B movement: envisioning a feminist future with/in a non-reproductive future in Korea", the earliest scientific study of the movement.

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