Get thee to a nunnery! Apparently it’s the hottest place to be. While we still very much live in a sex-saturated world, voluntary celibacy is having something of a moment. Evidence of this is everywhere. TikTok, for example, is full of videos of young people extolling the virtues of abstaining from sex. Meanwhile, a new Lithuanian romcom called Slow has brought asexuality to the big screen. In South Korea there is a viral “4B” movement, which gets its name from the four types of bi or “no”: bihon, no heterosexual marriage; bichulsan, no childbirth; biyeonae, no dating; and bisekseu, no heterosexual sexual relationships. In the US, generation Z comedian Hope Woodward has started a “boysober” trend, which involves straight young women eschewing dating. Multiple studies show that, around the world, more and more young people seem to be – quite happily – opting out of sex.
Thousands of words have been written about the great sex recession. It’s hardly some sort of underground trend. Nevertheless, Bumble, the dating app which once styled itself as a beacon of women’s empowerment because heterosexual women had to make the first move, appears to have missed the memo. A few weeks ago the company launched a global advertising campaign the point of which seemed to be to make casual sex great again. “A vow of celibacy is not the answer,” one billboard read. “Thou shalt not give up on dating and become a nun,” proclaimed another.
The campaign – which Fast Company described as “eyebrow-raising”, “controversial” and “tone-deaf” – did not land well. Some critics pointed out that celibacy can be a response to trauma. Others noted that abstaining from sex might be a smart move in a post-Roe US, where one accident could mean you are forced by repressive laws to give birth to a child you are not ready for and can’t possibly afford.
“In a world fighting for respect and autonomy over our bodies, it’s appalling to see a dating platform undermine women’s choices,” tweeted Jordan Emanuel, a former Playboy model who made headlines after taking a vow of celibacy for a year.
The actor Julia Fox was similarly unimpressed. “2.5 years of celibacy and never been better tbh,” she commented on a post about Bumble. Fox hasn’t talked much about her celibacy but last year she told Elle magazine that she just wanted to be left alone and was sick of men. “I feel like knowingly engaging in a heterosexual relationship, you are signing yourself up for an unhealthy dynamic,” she mused.
Long story short: Bumble did not read the room. After a lot of social media outrage, the company issued a grovelling apology on Instagram and announced it will remove the offending ads, donate to domestic violence charities, and generally be better.
Please don’t cancel me for saying this but that apology feels a little bit over the top. Perhaps my reserves have been exhausted by watching an unfolding genocide, but I had a hard time working up any outrage about the Bumble campaign. In fact, I could barely find it in me to muster up a feeble little “well that’s problematic”. The campaign may be uninspired, but getting het up over it feels unnecessary. Not every advertising billboard is supposed to be read as a serious indictment of your lifestyle – sometimes it’s just a stupid joke.
That said, the brouhaha over the “great Bumble fumble” (as the controversy is being termed), does point to a fascinating change in culture. Sex-positive feminism, which was all about unapologetically celebrating female sexuality, has been on the way out for a few years now, and this feels like its final death knell. To be fair, some sort of correction was probably due. Sex-positive feminism went from “hey, women shouldn’t feel ashamed about enjoying sex” to “it’s feminist to enjoy being choked while having lots of casual sex” alarmingly quickly. What was meant to liberate women turned into a repackaging of the patriarchy. “It feels like we were tricked into exploiting ourselves,” one twentysomething told BuzzFeed, summing up the general vibe. A new passion for celibacy among young women feels like a natural way of putting that chapter of feminism to bed.
• Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist.
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