Hey, everyone, it's musics' Anthony Fantano. You have clicked on what should be a very interesting topic. Coming out of the world of pop music and concerning one of the biggest and buzziest pop stars of today, Ms. Sabrina Carpenter.

She has been recording and writing music for quite a while now, but really since she had "Espresso" pop off commercially in the way that she has, her growth and her momentum has just been with the super successful album that followed the release of that single, the even more successful tour, all of the media opportunities and the like. And Sabrina is striking while the iron is hot and is giving us another album cycle sooner rather than later.

This past weekend, she kicked things off with a brand new single titled "Manchild", and she then followed that single up this week with the release of the album cover for this new record. The album is titled Man's Best Friend, and this is what the album cover looks like.

Maybe some of you wouldn't believe it, but this album cover has actually struck up quite the discourse online. "Is it degrading? What is Sabrina doing?" I mean, if there's one phrase I can use to sum up this cover and the reaction many people are having to it right now, it's probably Rorschach test. It's just an image that could potentially mean a bunch of different things, and everyone is coming at it quite aggressively with their own wild view and interpretation of it and just reacting so strongly with that perception.

Whether we want them to or not, many of the major culture war topics of today revolve around sex, gender politics, and relationships. So, anything that digs into sexuality, as a lot of Sabrina Carpenter's content typically does, is going to rub some people the wrong way. And this has been going on with Sabrina for a while now, whether it's within the content of her songs or all of the recent funny little Juno poses that have been getting clipped and going viral across social media from her performances.

And while sex is absolutely nothing new in pop music, that is obvious, Sabrina does explore it and perform it within her art in a way that comes across genuine to the extent that she does come across at least a bit like a horny little goblin. Which I mean, in this modern era of define yourself and do whatever you feel like is true to you feminism, it seems in line with what women should feel empowered to do if they so choose. If Sabrina wants to show off in a somewhat salacious way that she's into being a bit submissive in a sexual context, that is her right, and I don't see why she should be denied that or harassed for it or hated for it.

And yet the most surface-level reads of this cover and Sabrina's current era, artistically, it goes like this: "Superstar, more like porn star. Her whole career revolves around sex now." And also posts like this have been going even more viral, "It's not normal for the new generation of pop girls to do things like this. It's neither sexy nor cool. It's just disgusting and objectifying women."

This Olivia Rodrigo image doesn't even read as sexual. I feel like you need to be demented to see it as such. Because first off, there's nothing sexy about the picture. That is, unless maaybe you find vomit enticing. There's not an alluring or even flirty look on Olivia's face in the picture. She's quite dead-eyed and her mouth is open again as if she's puking. Then you have all the stars and the Guts logo coming out of her mouth, and you have the hand behind her holding her hair. Yes, but that's being done as if she's puking. You've never been at a party where someone's been sick or you've never seen a girl or maybe you as a man have never held a girl's hair as they're having to puke in the toilet? As someone who has had to hold someone's hair before as they were puking, it is not a sexual act.

And then there's the Sabrina image, which, yes, does have a sexual connotation to But the thing is also, it's Sabrina's choice to do this. It's her album cover. Believe it or not, in the midst of this discourse, there are some people who have been moronically bringing up Madonna saying like, "Oh, Madonna would never degrade herself for a man. She would never be on her knees for a man. She would never do that." Look at these pictures of her with guys all dressed in leather, and she's sitting on top of them like their chairs.

There's literally pictures of Madonna in a submissive context within her whole sex book that she did back in the day, which, again, is something that I feel like if a pop star did now, some of these people would just be flipping shit about.

That again brings me back to the Rorschach test point and how fragmented our society is currently when it comes to a whole host of social issues, but especially stuff around sex. Because you have some people who are hyper radical and concerned conservative. You have some people who are hyper just inexperienced and afraid, and maybe insecure around these issues. And you have some people who are just hyper progressive on these topics and feel like Sabrina is not taking it far enough.

Because here's the other side of the coin of this debate, people saying stuff like, "She constantly does Disney channel versions of the stuff stars like Madonna used to do, but they still generate discourse as if they're daring, crazy, controversial, problematic, whatever, another sign of the lifelessness of this pop era." I wouldn't go as far as to say that, honestly.

I actually think this current era of pop music is quite interesting and entertaining. And while Sabrina is not my favorite, there are a lot of tracks from her that I like and enjoy. And I think that with an album cover like this, she's doing her best to navigate the fact that she wants to do something that explores sexuality in some way.

But again, given that lack of monoculture, where exactly the envelopes are to push on such a topic aren't exactly super obvious. I think a cover like this does what it can to assess that broad array of perspectives on this topic, split the difference between where everybody is at, and then find exactly the point that is going to be pushing it far enough to where it gets reactions, but not so far that she seems like she's completely out of her mind.

Given the way the discourse has been shaping up around this cover so far, I would say Sabrina and her collaborators nailed that pinpoint pretty accurately. I think over the past 10 years, we've been seeing more people who today are maybe a bit more sheltered and conservative, socially, at least.

And that is not something that is Sabrina's fault or is within Sabrina's control. I mean, what I can at least commend here is that, at least in her own way, Sabrina is sensing that's happening on some level, and again, finding where exactly that point to push is so that you actually get a reaction and you challenge people's perceptions of sexuality.

I think she's obviously finding ways to challenge it, not only for people who might have just broadly conservative views, but for people who might have a bit of a twisted view of feminism, thanks to the internet. And in this knee-jerk fashion read, any woman presenting herself in a sexual fashion, especially within pop music, as her objectifying herself or degrading herself in some way.

In some horrendous cases, this even comes along with some sexual shaming and body shaming, too. "I'm supposed to believe she's not pandering to men when she promotes unreasonable beauty standards that she doesn't even meet along with her countless other offenses?" Okay, first, what other offenses? And secondly, how is Sabrina simultaneously promoting unrealistic beauty standards but also not meeting them by just presenting herself physically to the world in the way that she just looks?

And then there's this accusation that Sabrina is blatantly pandering to men in this disgusting way with her work and with the way she's presenting herself. Which, again, given how socially conservative and sexually conservative a lot of people, and especially dudes, seemingly are these days, for the most part a lot of guys I see on the internet react to Sabrina Carpenter saying, "She's a whore. Why would a woman who used to be on the Disney channel present herself to the world sexually in any way whatsoever?" I don't know, maybe because she's an adult now and adults have sex. She's frigging 26. She's pushing 30. Let her do sex stuff.

I also love this take as well, which was in reaction to the pretty salacious Rolling Stone cover Sabrina just did, which came along with an interview, too, where she actually addresses how obsessed people are with the way she incorporates sex into her work. "

It's always so funny when people complain. They're like, 'All she does is sing about this.' But those are the songs that you've made popular. Clearly, you love sex." - Sabrina Carpenter

Which is true. Not all of Sabrina's songs are directly about sex or have in your face sexual themes. I mean, literally her new song, "Manchild", isn't exactly a sexy cut. In fact, I feel like that song is more representative of what many of her tracks are about, complaining about a relationship dynamic where she's getting the short end of the stick because the guy she's with is either immature or stupid on some level.

And what's hilarious to me is that she keeps, at least creatively, subjecting herself to these relationship dynamics over and over and over. Even on the bridge of the track, in my opinion, she hits us with a bit of cope, saying, "Oh, I like my boys playing hard to get, and I like my man all incompetent / I swear they choose me, and I'm not choosing them." What does that even mean? What the hell are you saying? They're choosing you, but also you're volunteering to be in these relationships, and you're complaining about being treated this way constantly, yet you're also admitting that you like your men stupid. In my opinion, if there's anything to point out as annoying about Sabrina's writing at this point, it's this dynamic.

"Sabrina outright admitting that sex sells, and that's why she does it. She's not trying to make a commentary. She's not doing it for so-called empowerment. It's money, notoriety. She doesn't care if it's controversial." Okay, first off, she didn't say that. That's not what she said. She said she makes songs about a range of different topics, and it just so happens to be the most sexual ones and bits that people are the most obsessed with.

And finally, I think I'll give my own read of this whole message or presentation Sabrina is doing here, one that I hope you guys see as maybe being a little bit more nuanced and understanding of what an album cover like this signifies. I think it kind of makes sense within the creative rubric that Sabrina Carpenter has been presenting us with the past year plus or so, because to willingly involve yourself in any sexual dynamic with somebody where you are playing a submissive role, that typically involves a lot of trust and communication and understanding, which when you look at a lot of Sabrina's writing around relationship dynamics, are clearly aspects of her romantic involvements that are lacking or just not there.

In a way, with this cover, she could be communicating that a relationship dynamic or a sexual dynamic where she might feel safe engaging in this behavior because she actually can trust the partner that she's doing it with might actually be what she is communicating, wanting, and desiring on some level with this cover.

And there is also, keep in mind, a juxtaposition going on here with, yes, again, the cover and the hair pulling and the title Man's Best Friend, like, "Oh, look at me, I'm being treated like a dog. And yet, simultaneously, I'm going to kick my album cycle off with a song that's just outright hating on guys for being completely inept klutzes on a song that on some level does read more like a bumper sticker than an in-depth personal experience. But what are you going to do?"

Though I doubt, even with all of that explanation, it'll make much sense to the more sexually puritanical adults who are reacting to this cover like, "It's the worst thing they've ever seen. Oh, no. The sky is falling." Yeah, we live in a sexually repressive age. And while Sabrina Carpenter isn't doing it the boldest or the craziest here on this cover, I can at least comment that she's pushing against it in her own way.

Those are my throughts. Let me know yours in the comments. I'm sure you will.

Anthony Fantano. Sabrina Carpenter. Forever.