​​Divine Femininity: A Quest for Healing or Revamped Misogyny?

December 3rd, 2022

This is a community of female creators who preach that celibacy is the new and much-needed counterforce to hookup culture. 

Like many others in my generation, I have spent the last few years on TikTok. And undeniably, this platform has ushered in a new era of trend-setting. Not only do book and film recommendations diffuse rapidly throughout youth culture, but TikTok is also becoming a hub for lifestyle and self-improvement tips. The terms ‘manifestation’ and ‘law of attraction’, for example, have become trendy buzzwords on the app and I’ve personally seen dozens of TikTok users claim they transformed their lives by channeling their energy into tapping into their 'divinity'.

This new-age digital wave of spirituality has revealed itself to me in several ways. One such manifestation is in the emergence of ‘divinely feminine’ women, which gave birth to the term ‘Celibacy TikTok’. Essentially, this is a community of female creators who preach that celibacy is the new and much-needed counterforce to hookup culture. It isn’t uncommon that I open the app and am flooded with users saying things like:

“Being celibate has been a spiritual awakening in itself for me. I embody the divine feminine and treat my body as a temple.”

The notion behind this trivialized idea of the ‘divine feminine’ is the belief that having any form of sexual interaction with men is a drain on your energy. Specifically, I see the concepts of ‘energy sharing’ and ‘soul ties’ thrown into the mix frequently when TikTok creators describe what they believe to be the consequences of casual sex. To me, the core principle of this new digital movement appears to be the idea that having sex casually or with multiple different partners depletes your divine feminine energy and creates ‘soul ties’ with people who are not deserving of it. 

Their solution is to remain celibate and abstain from sexual relations altogether. However, I see this idea of preserving your divine femininity as eerily similar to the concept of ‘purity culture’, which exists in the evangelical movement to encourage a biblical perspective on purity. For the most part, purity culture is based on strict binary gender expectations of women as being innocent, pure, and chaste until a man manages to ‘get’ her. However, although the current trivialized form of divine femininity is veiled behind a shroud of ‘spirituality’ and ‘liberation’, I clearly see these core purity ideas still being exacerbated. It feels as though this cyberspace concept of the sanctified woman essentially couples the terms ‘divinity’ and ‘femininity’ directly with abstinence.

Unfortunately, the result is a collective shaming of the women who choose to partake in hookup culture or simply don’t decide to abstain.

They are perpetuating the illusion that those who choose not to remain abstinent in an effort to ‘heal their energy’ and ‘tune into their diving femininity’ are being made to seem impure

While I recognize that the aim might have been to oppose the patriarchy and the institutions that uphold it by encouraging abstinence, it is clear that the objective of empowerment was not met. The initial idea may have been for women to band together to heal from negative sexual experiences and choose their sexual partners more wisely, yet this goal was lost in translation, and instead, female sexuality was demonized altogether.When I see posts of women saying their body is a temple purely because they abstain, I can’t help but think they are perpetuating the illusion that those who choose not to remain abstinent in an effort to ‘heal their energy’ and ‘tune into their diving femininity’ are being made to seem impure. I think the notion that there is one way to be divinely feminine, and that in order to be labeled as such, women must restrict their sexuality entirely is outdated and dangerous. This idea in itself also continues to feed the sexist belief that women do not possess the self-governance or agency to decide whom they wish to be sexual with. While I believe it is unbelievably important to encourage young women to be mindful and cautious when choosing sexual partners for their own safety and well-being, a new era of purity culture is not the way forward.

If the ultimate aim is for women to be empowered in their independent, informed decision-making capabilities regarding sex, there can be no divide between 'good' and 'bad' women, nor 'good' and 'bad' sexuality.