To be honest, I got to hear of South Korea’s extreme feminism movement—4B—only recently. It is a radical form of feminism, formed in the crucible of toxic patriarchy with all the attendant violence and misogyny, punishing beauty standards and yawning pay gaps, which advocates the four Bis (Bi means no, in Korean), which are biyeonae (no dating with men), bisekseu (no sex with men), bichulsan (no children with men), and bihon (no marriage with men).
Born in the late 2010s on the internet, 4B spread and spawned a similar movement in China, called the 6B4T, which expands the four nos to include a boycott on all sexist products and also a boycott on ‘married donkeys’, or married women, who do not follow these principles.
It also rejects strict beauty standards, anime culture, the culture of fangirling on film, sport, music or other idols, and even religion.
4B is having a hot moment globally because a section of female Americans, disheartened and disgusted with the election results and the accompanying toxic flexing online, have announced that they have decided to have nothing whatsoever to do with men (or the women who are donkeyish enough to marry and co-parent with them). To me, none of this is something that Bridget Jones and her circle of singleton buds would not have come up with on one of their drunken, late-night rant about entire male species in general and ‘smug-marrieds’ in particular.
It is something my (single) daughter and her (married-to-a-drunkard, living-and-raising-a-child-with-her-mummy) cleaning lady would have come up with on a drunken Mumbai night in their balcony, as well.
But they would all have probably woken up the next morning, forgotten all their earnest besties-before-testes vows, and gone right back to being ‘mad about some boy’ or the other. That is just our hormones and the undeniable joy of physical attraction.
I am guessing the American women who are calling for 4B are having a similar vent-and-rant fest. And I can totally understand the frustration of women lumped with an out-and-proud misogynist like Donald Trump as their commander-in-chief, but at the end of the day, we live in a world half-full of men, and three-fourths full of men and women who are in relationships.
Boycotting them all can never be a viable, long-term solution. But in the short-term, oh yes. Women banding together to create pressure groups that help us get better compensation in the workplace, better films, healthier popular culture, and less responsibilities at home, yes. Single women supporting other single women instead of considering them ‘competition’ for the teeny-tiny pool of decent men out there, oh yes. Single, independent women calling out married ones who are putting up with disrespect and violence against themselves or their children, certainly. Women refusing to have sex or date entitled men with obnoxious political views, yes, yes, yes. What’s off the table, if we want the good of all womankind, is giving up on men altogether, which is what 4B advocates. Because giving up on men means giving up on our chance to negotiate more respect for women inside marriages, as well as model these new, more-respectful relationships to a new generation.
We are not incels, ladies—sad haters who gather online to whine about how no woman will sleep with them, and emerge into the real world sometimes to randomly shoot a few women dead. So whatever else we do, please let us not create a schism between women who are in relationships and women who are not. This will only weaken all womankind.
editor@theweek.in