Brian Lairn on WNYC, and now we'll wrap up today's show with a story about women's rights from abroad here in Women's History Month, including a call-in, if we happen to have any women listening

from South Korea or of Korean descent, on the so-called 4B movement to not have children

and otherwise limit heterosexual involvement with men in that patriarchal society.

If you have experience with this yourself or with someone you know, 212-433, WNYC,

for everyone else, have you come across headlines about South Korea's declining birth rate?

The country has held the title of having the lowest fertility rate in the world, but recent

statistics have shown it plummeting even further. In 2022, as has been reported, the average number of babies, a South Korean woman, is expected to give birth to during her lifetime, fell to 0.72 from 0.78 the year before, and projections estimate that this will fall even further to

0.68 in 2024, according to Al Jazeera. In other words, women in South Korea are having, on

average, fewer than one child, which means many are having none. In the capital city of Seoul, the decline is

especially concentrated, apparently, with a reported fertility rate of 0.55, roughly one child per

two women. At this rate, the country's population may be cut in half by 2100, and South Koreans as an ethnicity would cease to exist

in 700 years if that trajectory actually continued. So why is this happening? Well, a massive

South Korean women have chosen this path in a country that exports visions of handsome, chivalric men through the production

of K-pop and K-dramas. Many women are opting out of relationships with men entirely participating

in what they've dubbed the 4B, number four, letter B, 4B movement. They argue that Korean patriarchy is so pervasive that the

only way to escape is to, quote, eliminate the risks that come from heterosexual, marriage,

or dating. That's a quote from The Cut, part of New York Magazine. So let's look into the

conditions for women in South Korea that have led to such a radical choice for so many.

Joining me now is Anna Louise Sussman, freelance journalist covering gender, economics, health, and reproduction.

She's written a number of articles on South Korea's 4B movement in publications like The Atlantic and The Cut.

Also with us is Mira Che, Sociology PhD candidate at Yale, researching heterosexual refusal in South Korea.

Anna, Mira, thank you so much for joining us.

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