Hating Sabrina Carpenter in the name of feminism? Groundbreaking '_'

This one’s for the girlies xxx

You know the Sabrina Carpenter discourse is hella hypocritical, right?

The whole point of feminism is choice. The freedom to live how you want, speak how you want, dress how you want, fuck how you want.

Your ability to say you hate her new album cover? That is feminism. But so is her right to make it.

Maybe if we stopped worshipping artists like they’re infallible beings, you wouldn’t be so mad. She’s a freaky white girl. She’s been a freaky white girl. She was Eiffel Towering dancers and deep-throating mics on tour. This isn’t some shocking new turn — it’s consistent branding.

People citing “the current political climate,” or saying “if it was satire people would’ve got it,” or “this isn’t empowering”?

Disrespectfully, fuck off.

You put a woman on pedestal so high that every move she makes pushes her closer to the edge — and eventually, she falls off because you decided she no longer serves your ideals.

Feminism isn’t about making every woman palatable to your tastes. It’s about giving women the autonomy to define empowerment for themselves — even if that looks like a submissive pin-up stroking a man’s leg while he’s got a fistful of her hair.

Say, for argument’s sake, this wasn’t satire. Say you’ve never seen her “fuck that prick but I like riding that dick” brand of irony.

Then what you’ve got is a woman expressing a sexual preference: she enjoys being submissive. She likes being dominated.

And what — you want to shame her for that? Because it doesn’t align with your version of empowerment? That’s not feminism either. That’s just another form of control dressed up as critique.

And isn’t control exactly what feminism fights against?

The patriarchy policing our wallets, our bodies, our voices — everything from the hair on our legs to the decibels that leave our throats?

To paraphrase that one guy yelling about Britney on YouTube: LEAVE SABRINA ALONE.

I’ve seen the argument that white women choosing to sexualise themselves is peak white feminism — because they’re not eroticised in the same way women of colour are. They’re not cast as “exotic,” not seen as inherently sexual from the moment they exist in the way we are.

All women are sexualised from early on — but women of colour are hypersexualised. The stakes aren’t the same.

So yeah, white women don’t face the same consequences.

They are not subordinated to the same extent that we are.

To be a cis-het-white woman is to be the woman — the default, the ideal. The beauty standard.
To be pedestalised, protected, desired.
To be a man’s shadow — not his equal, but his reflection.
And that still grants her more safety, more power, more freedom than we’re ever afforded.

But I’m not projecting my experience onto Sabrina’s choices — because that’s not the conversation we’re having.

If you want to talk about how white women profit from sexualisation — while women of colour are punished for the same thing, or never catapult to superstardom when they do? Absolutely. Let’s have that conversation. Let’s talk about the white supremacist patriarchy that makes that disparity possible.

But that’s not what this is.

This is people shaming a woman in the name of feminism — for showing a different side of her sexuality (satire or not).

To me? I see a Sabrina Carpenter doing Sabrina Carpenter things and getting Sabrina Carpenter paid. I don’t see her romanticising misogyny or violence against women.

Is she profiting off patriarchal beauty standards? Yeah — and?

But calling it “pandering to the male gaze” is just slut-shaming with a 2025 filter. Sanitised language for the same old judgment. You think she’s a pick-me.

If Sabrina Carpenter was alternative, people would be praising her. “Look at her defying beauty standards and owning her sexuality.” If she did a 180 and went full modesty-core, you’d say, “oh great, the patriarchy got to her — this isn’t empowering either.” So... what is the right way?

There isn’t one.

Just women trying to control other women who don’t align with their personal flavour of feminism.

The Lolita photo? Weird. I didn’t like it. I don’t really believe in coincidences, so I’m pretty sure whoever styled that shoot drew from that scene — which again, weird. And I’m not a fan of the whole “look, I’m like a child in my bedroom with boyband posters on the wall... in lingerie” vibe (looking at her Skims shoot here). It’s straight out of the ’90s popstar playbook — a little boring, and honestly, outragey for outrage sake. But I can have my disapproving opinion on the work of another woman and not descend into ‘she’s breaking feminism’ rhetoric.

Also can we not pretend we don’t know what this is. Her marketing strategy rests on the laurels of rage bait — because its so easy as a woman to wind people up. And clearly, it’s working. Everyone’s talking about it. And Man Child just hit #1 on the Billboard #hot 100.

So how about we let this woman go about her business, collect her coin, and we do the same?

How about we stop doing the patriarchy’s dirty work — tearing down women just because their choices make you uncomfortable?

How about we address the cause, not the symptom?

Because the problem isn’t Sabrina Carpenter.

The problem is the patriarchy we live in — one that encourages binary thinking, making it easy for women to turn on each other, and subsequently, for you to believe you get to decide what empowerment looks like for every woman.

Pssst — that’s you being an agent of the patriarchy, sis. But so is your right as per feminism so go off I guess…

And let’s be real: some of the loudest voices pearl-clutching right now have probably watched porn ten times more hardcore than a man with a fistful of hair.

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