“No sex with men, no giving birth, no dating men, no marriage with men” – these are the four mantras of the 4B feminist movement. 4B is shorthand for four words that start with “bi”, which means “no” in Korean. Therefore “no” to any form of intimate relationships with men.

This movement focused on women’s agency, which originated in South Korea in the early 2010s, is now spreading across the world, particularly in the US. The movement is based on the belief that men are inherently dangerous and women should avoid any type of relationship with them. 

The 4B movement became popular as an act of resistance after the senseless murder of a young woman by a man in a train station toilet in Seoul in 2016. Following that, multiple examples of neglect towards women’s rights contributed to the growth of the 4B movement in the country. 

For example, the pink birth map of South Korea produced by the government in 2016 spread outrage, with women criticising it for reducing them to reproductive tools. The map showed the number of women of reproductive age in every district, but due to its controversy it is now banned.

There are different opinions about the 4B movement. It has been heavily criticised for being too radical, but it has also been praised for empowering women and showing them that they don’t need a man beside them to succeed. So why is this controversial movement spreading in the US now?

The reality for women in the US is that the country ranks 34th on the scale of intentional femicide (gender-based killing of women), at a rate of 2.6 killings per 100,000 women. It is not only deaths that are concerning: 18% of women face gender-based discrimination in healthcare, while 20% have the same problem in education. 

The movement suddenly found its footing in the US after Donald Trump won the presidency last November. Women and girls went on social media to express the reasons why they are joining the movement. It also has been provoked by online behaviour – for example, by the white supremacist social media personality Nick Fuentes, who posted “Your body, my choice” after Trump’s victory, to refer to women.

Other pressing issues are motivating women to join the movement, as they feel unsafe and downgraded. 

Last year’s TikTok trend “Man or bear?” has gained popularity: it is a hypothesis that asks women whether they would prefer to find a bear or a man in the woods when walking alone. The responses are overwhelmingly in favour of the bear. 

On the viral video, which that has amassed 2.2 million views, women commented: “men don’t understand that we’re not picking the bear because we think we’d survive”; “bear sees a threat, man sees an opportunity” and “at the end of the day women can trust a bear to be a bear, but can’t trust a human man to be humane.” 

Experts say that the popularity of the 4B movement is not surprising. “Almost 80 million US Americans voted to re-elect a man who has criminal convictions, ranging from sexual assault to fraud,” said Clementine Macer and Dr Sophie King-Hill from the UK’s University of Birmingham in their study on the 4B movement in the US. They added that this shows that “misogyny is still a pressing and urgent issue”. 

After the re-election of Trump, “women started thinking about how the government and the state and the men are failing them,” says Meera Choi, a PhD candidate in the department of sociology at Yale University in an interview for NBC News. 

Hawon Jung, a journalist and author of Flowers of Fire: The Inside Story of South Korea’s Feminist Movement and What It Means for Women’s Rights Worldwide explained that the whole social context that gave rise to the movement in the two countries is very different. The original 4B movement is centred primarily around rejecting the institution of marriage, since in conservative South Korea dating is usually considered a prelude to marriage. 

However, Jung understands the reasons why 4B is also catching on in the US. “The interest among American women in the 4B movement and what it stands for seems to indicate the growing sense of anger and hopelessness women feel about the patriarchal force in their society – a key factor that paved the way for the 4B movement in South Korea to begin with,” she said.