What South Korea’s ‘Queen of 4B’ Wants Americans to Know
Ji Yeon, who also goes by her American name Canti, is a 27-year-old YouTuber and a graduate student in media and gender studies based in Seoul. American women might know her as the “Queen of 4B,” referring to the South Korean movement aimed at creating a world without men. 4B — shorthand for four Korean words that all start with bi-, or “no”: bisekseu (no sex), biyeonae (no dating), bihon (no marriage), and bichulsan (no childbearing) with men — is both an ideological stance and a lifestyle, and its ideas went viral in the U.S. in the weeks following the reelection of Donald Trump. Ji Yeon has been practicing 4B since 2018, which has since given her, she says, a true sense of liberation. “I realized, ‘Oh, I can just be myself. I don’t have to conform to what society deems acceptable.’” Since April of this year, she has been corresponding with and hosting social-media ask-me-anythings about the movement with mostly American audiences. Last week, we had a long talk about 4B’s rise in America and the power of global feminist solidarity.
Why do you think that women in the U.S. are now looking to 4B as an inspiration?
When 4B started in Korea, the situation here was really harsh. Women were being illegally filmed by their boyfriends in digital sex crimes, men were filming the women and their families, there were all those illegal sex videos out there and men watching them, and women were dying from intimate-partner violence. And the government was doing nothing. We experienced great loss and great chaos. That is why 4B became a hit, because there is no system or government to protect women from experiencing violence in their personal relationships. So we have to protect ourselves, and we have to turn to each other to make us safe from men. And I think that’s the same with women who are in the U.S. — they’re experiencing that same thing, because the government of Trump is not making women feel safe. President Trump is a misogynist, so the female citizens in the U.S. feel that they are not being protected by the government, who are supposed to treat them as equal human beings.
Before the election, there was the meme that went viral: Would you rather be alone in the woods with a man or a bear? It could be called misandrist, but that was the kind of vibe that fits in with 4B. People say that 4B women hate men, and we have a dark joke that, yes, we do actually hate men. And so when the man-versus-bear meme went viral, then women found their way back to 4B since the sentiment fit in perfectly with our outlook.
When did you first start talking with Americans about 4B directly?
In the spring of this year, I was just scrolling on YouTube and saw a Korean American woman being interviewed about 4B, but she didn’t have everything straight. For example, she couldn’t explain the flow or history of the 4B movement, or why these women are participating in it. The roots of the movement trace back to the Hyehwa Station protests in 2018, but they didn’t seem to know that. For example, they would bring up the comfort-women issue, which is completely unrelated to the birth of 4B. I jumped into the comments and said that I could say more about the Korean 4B movement, and so I wound up participating. People asked me, for example, what is the movement, and is it for people in the West? They think that 4B is a Korean cultural thing, so that means people in the West should not participate.
What happened after that?
I started doing livestreams on TikTok and commenting on TikTok and Discord. I also joined a WhatsApp group. I heard from people all over the West, the U.K., Australia. I speak English, but I always had my translator open right in front of me on a big screen. I shared my email address, and people wrote me emails.
What kind of things were you hearing from women? What sorts of questions did you get from Americans who were finding you?
They would often ask me about whether this kind of person is able to participate in 4B or that kind of person can participate in 4B. But I thought that 4B has its own cultural thing in each country. So divorced women, single moms — they were wondering if they are able to participate in 4B, if they’ve ever had a kid, for example. In Korea, there aren’t a lot of single moms, and there are a lot more people who have never been married and do not have kids. But in America, there’s a lot more diversity in family types. So I told them, you can do 4B however you like, anyone can participate, but in Korea, we do it this way. I want the western 4B to be an independent movement itself, and I wanted to respect the democracy within those movements, so I won’t speak that much about what 4B in the West should be, because it’s American culture.
What did you and Americans interested in 4B gain from your dialogue?
It gave me a feeling of great solidarity. For example, I had been targeted by Korean misogynists who mocked me and bullied me online by sarcastically calling me the “King of 4B.” But the American women I met took it literally and turned it into a compliment — they called me the “Queen of 4B.”
And for them, I was a burst of energy. I was able to make them believe in what they’re doing, because they were getting called so many names, and they were bullied so much for speaking up for 4B. And so I was a kind of lucky charm for them.
It felt so great to be connected with women around the world, feeling that I am not separate in Korea, but we are all connected together, fighting against our daily lives. I felt like I was at home in my soul.
South Korea has a president who ran on an anti-feminist platform, and it looks like he is now on the way out. Do you think 4B or feminism played any role in that?
The current events don’t have to do with 4B directly, but 4B did help create a culture of feminism in Korea. The majority of people participating in the protests now are women in their 20s and 30s; they are leading the protests. As more women became interested in feminism and political participation, they also had the language to speak about politics, and they knew how to engage in activism.
Yet despite the prominence of women in the protests, even the opposition party, the Democratic Party, doesn’t talk about that. They just say that “people,” not “women,” in their 20s and 30s are protesting. But fewer men in their 20s and 30s are participating in the protest. So that is obvious misogyny.
Do you have any last message to someone who’s thinking about 4B in the U.S. or wants to learn more about it?
Some U.S. feminists have said that they have to be politically correct; I think they are a little more careful not to offend. In Korea, a feminist is not politically correct — being politically incorrect is the point. I hope 4B women in the U.S. will step out into the world more and raise their voices. We get bullied just by joining the 4B movement, but in order to overcome and dismantle the system that allows people to bully us, it’s essential to speak up. I hope people can find more courage. There are women who openly talk about the 4B movement, reveal their faces, run YouTube channels in Korea. I hope simply knowing that these women are out there, actively engaging, can be a source of strength for others.
Personally, my mother is a victim of domestic violence, and that was one of the reasons I started to do 4B — because I wanted my mom to divorce my father and feel safe. And the reason I’m doing 4B now is to show women who are experiencing violence from men to say that they can also live a wonderful life as an independent woman. And I want to say that I, a person here in Korea, am supporting you.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
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