A short instructional clip about “sending your eyes” and standing in an X‑shaped pose made an unknown Chinese influencer into a national punchline — and a multimillion‑yuan entrepreneur. The woman known by the handle behind the “black‑and‑white” persona built a branded academy around “sexual intelligence” (性商), selling tiered courses, immersive retreats and bespoke coaching before her main verified account was shut down on January 22.
Her patter was simple: intimacy, confidence and social power could be taught step‑by‑step. Videos demonstrating provocative gestures went viral; imitators and even celebrities joined the trend. At the same time critics lampooned the techniques and shared stories of marriages strained rather than saved by the exercises — yet demand did not abate.
The commercial operation was sophisticated. A 999‑yuan online class page listed 5,690 enrollments, low‑cost teasers sat alongside 2,999‑yuan weekend “immersion” camps, 4,980‑yuan training sessions and bespoke mentor packages priced up to 88,000 yuan. Publicly available figures and industry estimates put the influencer’s total revenue from paid courses at more than 24 million yuan (roughly US$3–3.5m), with cumulative participant numbers in the tens of thousands and a social following of about 200,000.
What the promoters called “sexual intelligence” was framed as broader than bedroom technique: it was marketed as a comprehensive ability to manage desire, selfhood, relationships and social rules. The curriculum blended erotic choreography and staging with theatrical course titles, immersive photo‑opportunities and even business lessons promising ways to monetise the persona — a hybrid of adult entertainment, lifestyle coaching and knowledge‑paid self‑help.
That hybrid explains both the business appeal and the ethical alarm. The programme converted intimate, subjective relations into discrete, marketable formulae — the same logic that underpins “get‑rich‑quick” masterminds and charisma coaches. Testimonials, staged scenarios and sensorial spaces did the work of persuasion; the more private the promise, the easier it was to insist there was a single, purchasable solution.
The phenomenon is not unique. Over the past few years China’s knowledge‑payment ecosystem has spawned a string of polarising figures selling social or emotional mastery, from “big woman” monetisation tactics to matchmaking academies promising foreign husbands. Male‑oriented emotional mentors and “money tactics” sellers have run parallel operations, demonstrating that monetised advice that exploits insecurity cuts across gender lines.
The fallout is now moving beyond ridicule. Platforms face renewed pressure to police sexualised content, the line between empowerment and exploitation is under scrutiny, and consumers who traded cash for therapy‑scented courses may find little legal recourse when outcomes disappoint. Enforcement could push such businesses underground into private messaging channels and paywalled communities, where oversight is far weaker and consumer protection harder to enforce.
This case is a microcosm of a wider tension in China’s digital economy: rapid innovation in monetising attention outpaces both regulatory frameworks and public literacy about commercialised intimacy. For participants it offers a seductive shortcut to confidence or cash; for regulators and platforms it presents a test of how to protect vulnerable users without stifling legitimate coaching and sexual‑health education.