Generation Z's celibacy: For your own sake, choose abstinence.
"Abstinence" is a fashion
"I think sex is a bit like wine-—— there used to be an excessive charm, but when we re-embraced the simple, frugal lifestyle, Gen Z's attitude towards sex was also subsumed into this mentality." 」
Hormones in young people are fading.
When it comes to abstinence, most people think of old antiques that adhere to religious doctrines, but recently, celibacy has gradually become popular among young people in Europe and the United States, becoming a new fashion. On TikTok, more and more young people are sharing their experiences of celibacy and abstinence.
For yourself, don't make love
Carol, a 24-year-old from London, told Vice that she initially chose "abstinence" not out of her own volition, but because of low self-esteem. She explains: "I used to not have enough confidence to put myself in front of people or connect with others. ”
Later, this sentiment turned to caution about sex. Carol says she's grown from past insecurities, and after those immature emotions dissipated, she realized she just wanted to be with a man who could earn her trust, a man who identified with the path she'd traveled, respected her, and was proud of her.
Many times, such men are not easy to find. Therefore, similar to Carroll, there are many young people who choose to solve their sexual needs on their own without finding the ideal partner. A report in the Atlantic magazine mentioned that between the 1990s and 2014, the frequency of masturbation in Americans increased dramatically, with men masturbating doubling and women more than tripling. Correspondingly, sales of sex toys have also risen sharply.
The notion of "no will" is also reflected in another statistic. A statistic published in January 2021 shows that the number of "casual sexual acts" between non-long-term partnerships among young Americans aged 18 to 23 today is 14 percent less than in the same age group a decade ago.
Young people who share a celibacy attitude towards life at TikTok
In addition, to avoid excessive "desire" is also one of the most common causes of abstinence.
A 21-year-old boy from Manchester told Vice that he was an illustrator who had recently been struggling to improve his work and had decided to abstain from abusive thoughts such as chasing girls and falling in love from affecting his judgment.
Lucy, 20, also expressed the same view to Vice, she bluntly said that "sex is not as good as imagined", and it is better to think about how to make sex than to think about how to make yourself better.
Of course, there are also some young people who have lost interest in sex because of poor sexual experiences. A 22-year-old told Vice that she had been sexually assaulted two years earlier and has abstined since. Now that she had come out of the shadows, abstinence had become her way of life, and her friends supported her in doing so.
Rather than the previous choices of people because of religious beliefs or succumbing to external reasons, the reason why young people in Generation Z refuse to have sex is more direct: for their own sake.
Celibacy is no longer a shame
In fact, Gen Z's rejection and negativity towards sex is not particularly novel news. Previously, scholars and commentators who paid attention to this phenomenon often focused on the transformation and even oppression of individuals under changes in the social environment, and regarded the lack of sexual life of young people as a problem that needed to be solved.
Sexual recession crisis
In 2018, The Atlantic published a report that delves into the phenomenon of sexual decline among young Americans. At the time, the article's author, Kate Julian, saw the sexual recession as a crisis and summed up a long list of causes: heavy financial stress, psychological problems such as anxiety and depression, the time grab on streaming entertainment and video games, dating apps and digital soft pornography raising the threshold for sex, a large number of sex toys replacing real people, poor lifestyles, environmental pollution leading to imbalances in the body's hormone secretion, and so on.
A series of complaints point to the external environment, but Vice found in the interview that the "frigidity" phenomenon is not only caused by the innovation of Gen Z's self-perception.
In the 2000s, sex seemed to be the most important thing in everyone's mind, and if you reached a certain age and did not "lose yourself", you would be labeled a "loser". After that, how much sex a person has, and who they have sex with, the actual quality doesn't matter – sex, becomes a numbers game.
In this atmosphere, European and American societies have derived a culture of "virgin shame". Older virgins in young people are ridiculed, ridiculed, and even bullied for not being sexually attractive.
But now, Gen Z youth clearly no longer identify with this culture, preferring their own decisions.
Lucy said: "As the understanding of sexual issues such as the right to informed consent has become more and more deeper, many of us have often received no answers after assessing whether we really want to have sex with others.
Another interviewee, Charlie, also agreed with Lucy, who believes that with the awakening of the concept of "asexuality" in the public consciousness, contemporary young people are more and more receptive to differences in gender and sexual orientation, and further understand the rationality of celibacy, because sex itself is not necessary and inevitable.
Chloe Combi, author of Generation Z: Their Voices, Their Lives, further explains the evolution of this attitude. She believes that the popularity of celibacy is natural after sex is no longer seen as something to be boasted by young people: "I think sex is a bit like wine-—— once had an excessive charm, but when we re-advocated a simple, frugal lifestyle, Gen Z's attitude towards sex was also subsumed into this mentality. ”
"For young people, sex is absolutely unlabeled. They put themselves on many spectrums, and the issues of how their sexual abilities are, who they have sex with, gender identity, etc., don't need to be too entangled for them. ”
Celibacy has gone international – South Korea
Honjok is a Korean word for those who are willing to move alone. It is a new word that combines the words "hon" (lonely) and "jok" (tribe). The term went viral in 2017, and the Honjok lifestyle is considered a "major shift" in Korean traditional group-oriented society.
Honjok can be divided into Hon-bap, Hon-sul, and Hon-nol.
Hon-bap refers to the act of eating alone and feeling content to eat alone in a restaurant. Hon-sul refers to drinking alone in a bar without caring about the gaze of others. Hon-nol are people who do not feel "alone" in their "alone" behavior, who enjoy their own time and space in their leisure time.
Young South Koreans feel negative about their future, and young people face high unemployment, chronic low incomes and expensive housing. Young people are beginning to fight against these strict customs in a serious way – being single and seeking more "ego" time.
This change is also evident in consumer behavior. Currently in South Korea it is possible to apply for a credit card called "YOLO", which offers many offers for singles activities, and can read a magazine called Single to help singles be happy and proud of their choice.
YOLO is an abbreviation for "you only live once", meaning "you only live once" because you only live once, you should not live for others or for the future, you should live in the present. Jeon Mi-young, a professor of consumer science at Seoul National University, said in a television interview: "In the past, people were concerned with saving money and focusing on what other people thought about their consumption habits, but now consumption in South Korea is more emotional and pleasurable than rational." ”
According to government statistics, south Korea currently dominates single-family households, accounting for more than 27% of the total number of households as of 2015, comparable to the level of the United States. But for a country with the largest share of families of four 10 years ago, this is a particularly striking change.
Underneath the Honjok phenomenon, the work of South Korean photographers Nina Ahn and Hasisi Park focuses on the loneliness and isolation of young Koreans.
In an interview with CNN, Nina said: "In fact, my photos carry a sense of desolation, which means contemporary faces. ”
"Photography conveys a sense of 'giving up,'" Nina said in an interview with CNN, "We are a generation where working hard for a better future doesn't guarantee happiness, so why not spend more time on yourself?" ”
Another photographer in Seoul, Hasisi Park, also explores the isolation among young Koreans in her work. She often portrays her photographic subjects as powerless people in the great wilderness or society.
Hasisi, who owns a family and a child of about 3 years old, can also see the intimacy of her family life in her photos, and when asked why she still focuses on the loneliness of young people when she has a happy family, Hasisi told Curiosity Daily: "I see the crack in people's daily lives. When people are surrounded by other people, it can still be a lonely moment. ”
In addition to the character series, Hasisi also photographed a lot of nature, and nature is solemn in her shots. She still remembers the lonely moments she felt. On her personal website, there is a photo of a deckchair in the snow, presenting a somewhat absurd scene.
She told Curiosity Daily in an email: "When I was taking this picture I was in a very depressed mood, I was in a situation where I was 'locked' in the countryside and there was no one around. I saw a worn-out summer chair very strangely under an apple tree, so I sat there and took this picture. ”
Hasisi attributes Honjok's rise to the pressures of modern society, namely limited opportunities to communicate with others and a lack of time to dedicate themselves. But she respects the phenomenon itself.
Celibacy has become internationalized – Japan
In the earlier cultural ideology, The Japanese were very concerned about eating alone, and not having friends was absolutely taboo, and the phenomenon of "benjomeshi" appeared, which translates to "eating in the toilet". But many people now think that a person is now a normal thing.
Bartender Miki Tateishi works at a bar in Tokyo's Shinjuku district called "Hitori" (meaning "alone"), which is a cozy and welcoming bar designed for solo drinkers.
"Some people just want to be alone, others want to build a whole new group." Tateishi noted. She believes the bar's "exclusive guest only" policy can help guests who are turned away by the general group. The bar's laid-back and laid-back environment can accommodate more than a dozen people at the same time. Customers are free to chat with each other. Alcohol and small booths can also allow people to interact more naturally.
Miki Tateishi is a bartender at Hitori Bar
Tateishi used to be a regular here. "I think it's rare," she says, "the world is changing," said KaiSugiyama, 29, who works at a manufacturing company, "and I feel like Japan is more used to being in groups, so people want to be with others no matter what they do." The culture of acting alone is less popular here. ”
However, more and more industries are changing and are starting to adjust accordingly for those who want to be on their own. From dining and nightlife to travel, consumption options for individuals have sprung up in recent years. This phenomenon is known as the "ohitorisama" movement. People began to boldly choose one person to act, completely without fear of the eyes of others.
The power of being alone
"Ohitorisama" can be simply translated as "the gathering of one person". If you search for this entry on Instagram in Japan, you can find hundreds of thousands of photos, such as eating alone in a restaurant, the gate of a movie theater, a tent at a campsite, a travel photo highlighting "solo adventures", and so on.
In the last 18 months, more and more people have expressed their love for "ohitorisama" in the news and on social media.
"Single Japanese yakiniku" is also a new form of dining that has emerged in recent years. The usual Yakiniku features a group of people sitting at a table and roasting chicken, beef or pork together. But when it comes to single-person Yakiniku, you're the only one who eats both the yakiniku and the meat.
Even karaoke, a classic form of Japanese entertainment, is moving towards solitude. "The demand for single-person karaoke has increased considerably, and today it accounts for about 30 to 40 percent of karaoke consumers." Daiki Yamatani, sales manager at Tokyo-based single karaoke company 1 Kara, noted.
Karaoke can be found everywhere in Japan, usually a large building consisting of several floors, with rooms large and small, suitable for groups of different sizes.
But the need to sing alone is also increasing, so 1 Kara has replaced a room suitable for multi-person singing with a personal "recording studio" the size of a phone booth.
This kind of single karaoke has become increasingly popular in recent years
Social pressures
In many countries, it doesn't seem strange to be alone. Last December, for example, American actress Christina Hendricks posted a photo of herself attending a concert alone. British actress Emma Waters also recently said that she enjoys being single and "being your own partner".
Western newspapers publish guides to drinking and reading alone in bars. Many social media influencers also use solo travel as their career theme.
But in a country that promotes conformism and inclusion, solitude is no small matter. Japan has a population of about 125 million, but its land area is not as large as California, not to mention that four-fifths of it is mountainous and uninhabitable. In this country where land is scarce, people naturally attach great importance to the collective spirit.
"Japan is a small country, and everyone has to learn to live in harmony with others." Motoko Matsushita, senior adviser to Japan's largest economic research firm and the Nomura Research Institute in Tokyo, said. "So people are under a lot of peer pressure to move in droves."
Matsushita said that as social media becomes more popular, the number of followers you have on social media or the number of likes you get can also determine your value, which has led to further stigmatization of solitude and overwhelming peer pressure.
She pointed out that the rise of the ohitorisama phenomenon is a counterattack to this idea, and the culture of 24/7 communication has also played a role in contributing to this.
In the case of "eating in the toilet," Daisuke Tsuji, a sociologist at Osaka University, found that students who eat in toilet cubicles do not do so because they like to eat alone, but because they don't want their classmates to think they can't find someone to eat with.
However, Matsushita believes that this situation is changing, and the negative pressure on society to be alone has been alleviated. "'You have to get married and have children,' and so on, and so on, and so on."
Her 10,000-person study found that from 2015 to 2018, there was an increasing propensity for independence and "family flexibility." For example, fewer and fewer people think that people must get married and have children, and more and more people think that divorce can be achieved even with children. Among the married population, there is also a growing number of people who believe that secrecy with spouses is acceptable.
"Super Celibacy Society"
One of the reasons for these phenomena is that Japanese society is undergoing a demographic upheaval. The birth rate is falling, with just 864,000 births last year, the lowest since 1899 was recorded.
Census data shows that the number of single-person households is also climbing, from 25 percent in 1995 to 35 percent in 2015. Declining marriage rates, combined with Japan's ageing and increasing widowhood, have led to an increase in the number of people living alone.
In this new demographic context, consumer behavior and the services that businesses provide to cater to consumers are constantly changing.
"The purchasing power of people living alone cannot be underestimated today." KazuhisaArakawa, a researcher at Japan's largest advertising agency, Hakuhodo, noted. He has written several books on the economy of Japan's "super-celibatic society." He predicts that by 2040, half of the population over the age of 15 will live alone. "I don't think the market can continue to grow without paying attention to the needs of these single consumers."
"People think it's weird, but I like to ski alone." Erika Miura, 22, said.
Erika Miura, a 22-year-old IT practitioner in Tokyo, is a practitioner of ohituruisamaism. She said she was an "outlier" among her friends because she had a lot of things she just wanted to do on her own, such as skiing alone, watching movies alone, and singing alone. She said that one person can do things more freely, and there are many services available in Tokyo for the sole.
Kara's customer GoYamaguchi said that if you sing with your friends, you have to wait for your turn to sing. "And if I don't sing well, I feel ashamed. If I were the only one, I would be able to sing as I pleased. ”
Experts point out that the Ohitorisama movement has also provided new opportunities for members of the "traditional family". A 2018 study by Arakawa found that one-third of married people prefer to do something alone, such as occasionally traveling alone. Matsushita, who is already married and has children, agrees: "I also like to sing alone from time to time. ”
As for the elderly celibacy population, Matsushita notes that this group is "psychologically resistant" to others seeing themselves alone, especially women. But she believes that will change as younger generations continue to push boundaries, especially as the market realizes the importance of older single consumers.
"The World is Changing"
A study released last year by European International, a London-based market research firm, predicted that the number of single-person households worldwide would increase by 128% between 2000 and 2030.
"Not just Japan, but all countries will become 'super-celibate societies' in the future, consisting mainly of young people who do not want to get married, as well as elderly people who return to celibacy after widowhood." Arakawa noted. "It would be impractical to have an industry that is still focused solely on families."
Of course, in countries where people don't see people eating and drinking alone, the impact of the ohitorisama movement is not so pronounced. But in Japan, the burgeoning sport has become a hot topic.
Arakawa says he believes most people are independent in their bones. "We shouldn't simply and crudely divide people into 'people who can accept solitude' and 'people who can't accept solitude.'" "Most Japanese people are actually born to act alone," he said. He found that half of the people who attended concerts or festivals went alone, hoping to make new friends through shared hobbies.
Demographic changes, coupled with a more flexible approach to different lifestyles, allowed the ohitorisama phenomenon to flourish in Japan. “
Just 10 years ago, people would have laughed at the practice of 'eating in the toilet,'" Matsushita notes, "and now we have a lot of services for one person." People's mindset towards solitude has also become more positive. ”
In the Hitori bar mentioned at the beginning of the article, one after another customers come alone here to meet and socialize with others. Bartender Tateishi is all too familiar with this feeling, as she was a regular at the bar before she became an employee here.
"For people who used to love home only, if they can get out of the house and build a new group, they may become a person," she notes. ”