There’s nothing more predictable than death, taxes, and a certain subsection of the internet freaking out over the possibility that some people, somewhere, might be having sex. Case in point: the recent discourse over Sabrina Carpenter miming a certain sex position during a recent Paris show.
The furor started after a pop-culture entertainment account called Buzzing Pop tweeted a photo showing a grinning Carpenter bent over between two male dancers, their hands clasped in a tentlike formation — a clear reference to the “Eiffel Tower” sex position. (Millennials who attended a lot of sweet 16s in the early aughts may be more familiar with the Eiffel Tower under another name — the London Bridge, a reference to Fergie’s 2006 song.)
Sabrina Carpenter shows off new “Juno” position at night 2 of her Paris show. pic.twitter.com/j4YOD7XtUi
— Buzzing Pop (@BuzzingPop) March 17, 2025
The caption for the tweet claimed that Carpenter was debuting the choreography for her single “Juno” — which is possible, considering “Juno” is a very horny song (as exemplified by the lyric “I’m so fucking horny”). Carpenter miming an MMF threesome onstage isn’t remotely at odds with her tongue-in-cheek sex-kitten persona. And yet, some people found it shocking that the artist who wrote “Couldn’t Make It Any Harder” would do such a thing.
“Hard to say if she has any talent when all she does is contort herself into degrading sexual poses & rely on a 12 y/os creativity for cheap innuendos,” wrote one X user. They added that Carpenter pretending to get Eiffel Tower’d was “glorifying an institution built on our dehumanization.” “This is why I hate choice feminism,” another user wrote. “Because it leads to degrading and sexist stuff like this.” (To which I would respond: Girl, you would’ve hated the “Dangerous Woman” tour.)
Hard to say if she has any talent when all she does is contort herself into degrading sexual poses & rely on a 12 y/os creativity for cheap innuendos. Ofc, the song references a movie about teenage pregnancy cuz how else do you climb the ranks of a degenerate, pedophilic industry https://t.co/744aaSUowo
— muzzie star (@antioediipus) March 18, 2025
THAT position in particular is inherently degrading. The whole point of it is a woman being used for mens pleasure, there’s no way to look at this as a positive thing and it’s certainly not “intimate” https://t.co/2FQtGpN7hY
— 𝒸𝓁𝒶𝒾𝓇𝑒 🌙🪽 (@lovergirlreiss) March 19, 2025
This is not the first time people have reacted this way to Carpenter. During the first leg of her tour last year, some fans flipped out over her ad-libbed “Nonsense” outros, in which she made up NSFW lyrics based on what city she was performing in. (Just one example: “He’s so big I felt it in my kidney. Screamed so loud they heard it here in Sydney.”) The concern, supposedly, was that Carpenter’s past as a Disney Channel star meant that there could potentially be some children in the audience, though Carpenter herself is 25 years old and any parent remotely familiar with her music would know that being libidinous and silly is kind of her whole thing.
In an interview with Cosmopolitan last spring, Carpenter gave a thoughtful and measured response to the critiques that she was too sexy — frankly, more so than her critics deserve. “I feel like I’ve learned a lot more about sexuality through writing [the outros] than people think,” she said. “People think I’m just obnoxiously horny when in reality, writing them comes from the ability to not be fearful of your sexuality.”
Would you tell the wind to stop blowing, or the sun to stop being hot, or Fran Lebowitz to stop being curmudgeonly? Leave Sabrina alone.
