China bans ‘sexual mentor’ for women — but more are popping up
A viral clip of Zhou Yuan, a Chinese “sexual mentor” for women, has shed light on a booming industry that empowers women to use their sexuality to attract men. Lianhe Zaobao’s China Desk takes a look at society’s and authority’s reactions to these grey-zone content.
Internet celebrity Zhou Yuan — China’s self-proclaimed “godmother of sexual intelligence” — has recently gone viral with catchy lines like “give them the look” and “make an X with your body”, as her videos spark a wave of parodies. Her “seductive eye contact” courses and “charming woman” classes have reportedly attracted tens of thousands of students, earning her over 24 million RMB (US$3.45 million) in income.
‘Cultivating’ women’s charm and confidence
Some netizens quipped that Zhou’s alluring gaze has become a harvesting machine, while others questioned whether she is turning “female charm” into a tool for pleasing men.
Now, amid the controversy, her social media account “Heibaidian Zhou” (黑白颠周, lit. black and white reversed Zhou Yuan) has been banned, and several of her other accounts have been set to private.
The nearly 50-year-old Zhou previously maintained accounts on platforms such as Douyin and RedNote (or Xiaohongshu), with close to 200,000 followers. Her posts largely promoted “charm cultivation” classes for women, with some content pushing the boundaries in terms of sexual suggestiveness.
Across these accounts, she has attached a slew of labels to herself: founder of the “Heibaidian Sexual Intelligence Academy” (黑白颠性商学苑), China’s “No. 1” in sexual intelligence, a “45+” female entrepreneur, a benchmark figure in China’s “sexual charisma system”, and even arty sounding titles such as “founder of a sexual culture art museum”.
According to the academy’s official account, the “sexual intelligence” programme began in 2018 and claims to be China’s first educational platform for women’s sexual intelligence, cultivating confidence that radiates from the soul to the body.
Take the 999-RMB “all-round upgrade camp”, for instance: it covers various relationship issues and “bedroom fun” techniques, and the official store page shows that 5,000 to 6,000 people have taken it.
Courses priced as high as 88,000 RMB
Aside from in-person classes, Zhou also offers online courses, which range from 9.9 RMB, 99 RMB and 999 RMB to several thousand RMB. There are also advanced, personalised, mentor-tailored programmes priced as high as 88,000 RMB.
Take the 999-RMB “all-round upgrade camp”, for instance: it covers various relationship issues and “bedroom fun” techniques, and the official store page shows that 5,000 to 6,000 people have taken it.
The flagship in-person products are a two-day overnight camp priced at 2,999 RMB and a three-day overnight camp priced at 4,980 RMB, serving women only. Instructors are said to hold nationally recognised credentials such as psychological counsellor and reproductive health counsellor.
Staff members revealed that in-person events are extremely popular: there may be more than ten sessions a month, spanning cities such as Changsha, Xiamen, Tianjin, Xi’an and Nanjing, and appointments must be made at least ten days in advance.
A look at her course catalogue reveals a dizzying array of titles such as Fox-Style Seduction Arts and Emotional Anchoring: Subtle Flirting Methods, as well as even more “hands-on” offerings like Radiant Eyes Seduction Dial: The Pupil Hourglass and Geisha Gaze Enchantment: Visual Magnetic Fields. Some netizens have misread her courses as “training to be a mistress” or “how to please men”. The “X-shaped look back” is said to teach women how to “hook men”, or even mocked as “studies in seduction”.
Yet Zhou frames all this under “Sexual Intelligence: A Required Course for a Woman”, emphasising that “in intimate relationships, we can please ourselves”.
Media reports say many students are middle-aged housewives facing marital crises, including women abandoned by ex-husbands who ran off with their money. Some younger women reportedly hope the classes will help them better understand their partners and “save” their relationships.
Beyond teaching, Zhou Yuan’s business footprint also extends to sex products, beauty and medical aesthetics, and coaching on entrepreneurship and wealth. Her online store sells lingerie, sex toys, contraception products, and more; many previously inexpensive items have seen prices spike after being labelled “the same as mentor’s”.
How big is her business? According to corporate information database Tianyancha, she is associated with eight companies, five of which are currently active, with operations spanning education consulting, sex-product manufacturing and medical device sales.
State media: ‘a subversion of values’
As the backlash grew, multiple state-affiliated media outlets published criticisms. China Women’s News — run by the All-China Women’s Federation — wrote in a commentary that Zhou Yuan’s courses claim to be about “self-improvement” but in fact amount to self-debasement, calling them a “subversion of values”. The piece argued that the content hovers in a grey zone between vulgar, suggestive “borderline content” and pseudo “relationship counselling”, and urged online platforms show responsibility and strengthen review mechanisms.
With women’s confidence, independence and self-realisation increasingly seen as shared social goals, society should remain lucid about such “unorthodox training”, and stay alert to their illusions and traps. — a commentary by China Women’s News run by the All-China Women’s Federation
The commentary added that female charm has never needed a “godmother” to define it, nor should it be narrowed into a performance aimed at pleasing others. With women’s confidence, independence and self-realisation increasingly seen as shared social goals, society should remain lucid about such “unorthodox training”, and stay alert to their illusions and traps.
Jimu News also criticised Zhou for twisting ordinary interactions between men and women into “power games”, turning “female charm” into a commodity for sale. It warned that the popularity of such clips is far from harmless, as it reinforces harmful gender stereotypes and runs counter to modern ideals of equality and respect.
The article further argued that this kind of rhetoric fosters antagonism and division, misleading some women into viewing men as objects to “conquer” and other women as “competitors” in the marriage market. It also channels traffic into money-grabbing schemes, pollutes the online ecosystem, and may breed illegal activities such as fraud and pyramid schemes.
Tip of the iceberg
Red Star News cautioned in a commentary that the “sexual intelligence godmother” phenomenon may only be the tip of the iceberg in a grey zone created by a lack of sex education. While modern sexual attitudes are more mature and open, many people still feel shame around sexual topics. Expanding sexual knowledge, fostering gender-equal interactions, and jointly building healthy intimate relationships remain “required courses” that society still needs to make up.
In fact, Zhou’s is not an isolated case. According to The Paper, “mentors” and courses that use “female growth” and “charm enhancement” as bait are common across platforms such as Douyin, WeChat channels and RedNote. Practitioners have formed a full industrial chain: drawing traffic through online videos, selling courses, marketing intimate-area products, and even recommending intimate surgeries.
For example, a WeChat account purportedly for an “adult healing therapist” offers services under the banner of a “nationally registered sexual health consultant”, funnelling users into in-person classes. Its flagship “I Am a Seductive Goddess: Three Days Passion Awakening Overnight Camp” seems to advocate “enhancing female charm”, but is filled with borderline pornographic content and vulgar innuendo. The course poster explicitly advertises teaching “age suspension techniques” and “36 bedroom moves”. It claims an original price of 19,800 RMB, with a limited-time discount down to 3,980 RMB.
A self-proclaimed “mentor” in the same industry disclosed that her offerings come in large and small class sizes: larger classes are cheaper, around 1,000 RMB, while smaller classes approach 10,000 RMB.
A self-proclaimed “mentor” in the same industry disclosed that her offerings come in large and small class sizes: larger classes are cheaper, around 1,000 RMB, while smaller classes approach 10,000 RMB. Students range widely in age, from women in their 20s to their 50s. The core of the curriculum, she said, is teaching women how to “lock down a man”, while also recommending medical and aesthetic procedures.
Besides in-person classes, many influencers have also seized the opportunity to sell related products. One Douyin creator, “Barbie Knight” (芭比骑士), has crafted a “Barbie mentor” persona and runs “sexual intelligence” and “female charm” training programmes. The account bio lists these courses and claims to “share women’s growth wisdom and help sisters regain a happy life”.
In response to such “disorder”, in August 2025 the Chinese authorities issued a notice on regulating medical popular-science content by self-media, requiring platforms to remove illegal and non-compliant information that uses sexual health knowledge as a pretext to spread “edgy” content bordering on pornography. It also prohibits unqualified accounts from producing and publishing professional medical popular-science content.
Meanwhile, the negative-behaviour list for internet celebrity accounts explicitly defines as violations the spreading of “soft porn”, sexual innuendo, and vulgar content by pushing boundaries or through coded language.
Yet today, other “Zhou Yuans” keep resurfacing — often explosively — showing that this market remains sizeable, and reflecting a gap in adult relationship and emotional education.
Another commentary in The Paper put it this way: “Wannabe ‘Zhou Yuans’ did not appear out of thin air. At its core, this is still a commercial game jointly driven by traffic, algorithms and profit. When netizens ask who on earth is taking these classes, the answer is clear: women who are swept up in anxiety, deceived by slick talk, and fall into the trap.”
This also highlights the mixed state of women’s consciousness in today’s society: while many loudly champion women’s independence in office buildings, others are repeatedly drawn into marriage and romance by their emotional anxiety and value confusion.
Rather than just condemning Zhou’s “Heibaidian” brand of rhetoric, perhaps all parties should also reflect more deeply on why the “looks” offered by “Zhou Yuans” remain so irresistible.
This article was first published in Lianhe Zaobao as “中国“性商教母”眼神勾了谁？”.
