While primarily a South Korean movement, 4B gained traction in the United States after Donald Trump ’s recent re-election, with a surge of interest on social media and in Google searches. Many American women, disappointed by the election results, are engaging in 4B conversations, citing Trump’s controversial stance on “abortion rights” as a reason for concern. “Young women don’t want to be intimate with men who don’t fight for women’s rights,” Michaela Thomas, a 21-year-old artist from Georgia told the Washington Post.
“Young men expect sex, but they also want us to not be able to have access to abortion. They can’t have both.” Fringe 4B also known as 4B movement is an extreme radical feminism movement in South Korea which started in 2017- 2018 partly basing on Me Too and Escape the Corset.
These campaigns let women free from the traditional beauty norms and gender expectations for women, and told women that they should stop wearing makeup, cut off short hair, and give up the dresses usually considered appropriate for women. The 4B movement carries these ideas further by demanding that women avoid all forms of contact with men: romantic, sexual, and familial. ALSO READ| Meghan Markle ‘might want to leave America’ as she ‘really viscerally disliked’ Donald Trump, expert says What are the 4Bs? “4B” stands for four Korean phrases beginning with “bi,” which means “no” in English: bihon (no marriage), bichulsan (no childbirth), biyeonae .
