Sabrina Carpenter is a pop star of the people. A girlie who just gets it. She’s a talented, trendy, 5-foot-0 treat. But most importantly, that little Polly Pocket is horny AF, and for that, she is my hero. She shamelessly mimes sex positions on her Short N’ Sweet tour during “Juno,” (“Have you ever tried this one?”) with audience members excitedly awaiting which way she’ll spread her legs or thrust her hips. Her deliciously dirty “Nonsense” outros know no bounds (she once rhymed “endorphins” with “rearrange my organs,” so basically, she’s our generation’s Shakespeare). And she doesn’t shy away from expressing herself through her lyrics, my personal favorite being, “Where art thou? Why not uponeth me?” (which also serves as my go-to pick up line on Hinge, btw).
Some might think Sabrina’s sexy side is a flirty little gimmick. Others might find it crass or inappropriate for young listeners—just ask the angry Instagram commenters calling her otherworldly VMA performance, “Disturbing on so many levels!!” and asserting, “This is not art, it’s porn.” But to me, Sabrina is doing something absolutely critical: showing that female sexuality and desire is normal, healthy, and worthy of attention in mainstream pop culture, all while women’s rights to their own bodies are being policed and regulated more than ever before.
Of course, Sabrina is hardly the first horny girl to sing about sex in a way that resonates with women. Take Doja Cat, who had people on TikTok proudly proclaiming “I feel like fucking something!” Or Rihanna, who undoubtedly spawned many sexual awakenings with her steamy single “S&M” in 2011. And let us not forget the “WAP” era, when Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion normalized—no, celebrated—vaginal secretions. But 2024 was undoubtedly the Summer of Sabrina, and there’s no denying that as temperatures heated up, so did her career. She released a new album, embarked on a world tour, and allegedly contributed to the indictment of NYC mayor Eric Adams—so basically, she was everywhere.
2024 was also an election year—specifically, one in which 10 U.S. states voted to enshrine the right to abortion in their constitutions. In which women all over the country have suffered the consequences of the overturning of Roe v. Wade, while simultaneously trying to grapple with the fact that a convicted felon ran for and won a second presidential term (with ample support). In a time when I’ve felt a lack of ownership over my literal reproductive organs—and frankly, orgasms—Sabrina’s loud libido serves as a critical reminder that our sexuality is ours to both control and celebrate.
There’s another, not-so-secret reason why horny pop girls mean so much to me: I, too, am horny AF, and I’ve been this way for as long as I can remember. I was the kid grinding on pillows and erasing incriminating search history from my family’s communal laptop, and these days, I still burn through vibrator batteries faster than you can say “clitoral suction technology.” While I’ve learned to love and embrace this ultra-sexual side of myself, it wasn’t always fun and orgasms.
As a young girl, feeling this horny didn’t feel good. In fact, it was actually terrifying. As early as when I was 10 years old, I found myself entering a repeated cycle of shame and embarrassment: Find a sexy YouTube video that sparked fanny flutters, masturbate without even knowing what that was, and be greeted with shame and guilt immediately after, concluding that I was a bad child who deserved to be punished.
By the time I was in fifth grade, I’d graduated from Usher music videos to actual full-fledged porn. But the immense guilt became too much to bear, and one night, I spent hours weeping to my parents, hinting that I’d been “doing something bad” but unable to reveal what it was. They said they loved me and that whatever it was, it was okay. But I was never truly able to shake the feeling that those desires, those strange feelings in my stomach, somehow made me bad and different.
Truthfully, I think that’s why I became a sex writer—to try and make sure that no young girl, no woman, feels like her sexual desires are wrong or shameful and to amplify the same message Sabrina does when she belts “I’m so fucking horny!” onstage. In doing so, she’s showing listeners that sexuality is a good thing and that it doesn’t diminish one’s talent or femininity or artistry. And she rose to superstardom when I needed to hear that message the most. After chatting with psychologist and certified sex therapist Dr. Kate Balestrieri, it became clear to me that the benefits of Sabrina’s radical sex positivity are even deeper and more widespread than I could have imagined.
“When our culture shames a very natural part of the human experience, we end up with a lot of problems around sexuality for people of all genders,” Balestrieri explains. “So by normalizing the experience of horniness, it allows adolescents and young women to start asking themselves questions about what they like and gives them permission to be more informed, which overall increases their sexual health, safety, and pleasure.”
This domino effect is no joke: Openly celebrating female pleasure can empower women to take sex into their own hands, leading to better boundaries and clearer communication and consent. When it comes to gender equality, this kind of progress is groundbreaking. Especially when you look at how society has been mercilessly shaming female artists for their expressions of sexuality for decades.
Take Janet Jackson, whose sexually-charged songwriting resulted in uncomfortable conversations with interviewers who felt entitled to details about her personal sex life in the early 2000s. Or Britney Spears, whose sexual style, lyrics and choreography led to constant invasive questions from reporters about everything from her breasts (as a teenager!) to her virginity. At the same time, male artists who sang about the same things (often more explicitly) received a radically different reception. And even though societal acceptance of sexuality has come a long way in the past 20 years, being loud and proud about our sexuality is more important now than ever before. Representation from artists like Janet, Britney, and Sabrina alike can help push our society past the shame that’s long made female sexuality—something the next administration seeks to control—a taboo subject.
“Creating permissions around sexuality stabilizes this dynamic where everybody gets to say yes or no, everybody can be sexual in a way that feels empowering for them,” Balestrieri says, “and that means that sexuality is not used as a weapon in the way that it often is when we restrict it.”
Sabrina’s pop tunes may feel lighthearted on the surface, but whether she knows it or not, her unapologetic horniness has made me feel proud to be a sexual woman. So consider this my formal thank-you—for giving me permission to be proud of my sexuality, despite a political climate that wants us to be anything but. For representing those of us who identify as Charlotte Risings and Samantha Suns—the girls who have a spicy spirit that yearns to be unleashed. And most of all, thank you on behalf of my 10-year-old self, who would have loved to grow up to the soundtrack of Short N’ Sweet.
…but on second thought, maybe it’s for the best that I didn’t. If my prepubescent-self had heard “Bed Chem,” I never would have put down that pillow.
