Sabrina Carpenter is a pop singer who first started off in January 2013 on Disney's 'Girl Meets World'. from then, she had been more open with her love for music and had even been making music from 2009 (12 years old).
Her first song release was a song called 'Can't Blame a Girl for Trying'. But it wasn't as popular as her releases today.
Sabrina Carpenter has always been in some sort of fame. Whether its for her acting career or her music. But one moment that brought her to fame most effectively was in a negative light.
In 2021, there was tension between Sabrina Carpenter fans and Olivia Rodrigo fans as Sabrina began to date Joshua Basset, Olivia's ex. She began to get a lot of hate in the media and being called names like 'sl-t' and 'homewrecker'. With this amount of hate circulating the media, people who didn't even know/ hear of Sabrina had default thoughts and feelings about her just because of this reputation.
Although Sabrina did nothing wrong - she was just dating a boy she liked and Olivia was rightfully upset about her break up. In her song 'drivers license', she calls out the situation, with the lyric 'you're probably with that blonde girl'. Her audience immediately made the links and assumed it was about Sabrina.
Olivia had no poor intentions by mentioning Sabrina's appearance, instead she was just making her song feel more personal to the situation she's in. But her fans caused the tension and since Olivia's release of her album 'SOUR', which is all about the love triangle, her fans have been spreading hate about Sabrina to the rest of the media.
The situation escalated even more when Sabrina responded to Olivia with her song 'Skin', which is basically telling Olivia to move on and maybe they could be friends if they don't let the media make them hate each other. But again, the media hated this even more and said it was 'mean girl' of Sabrina to release a song like that straight after Olivia and Joshua's break up.
In an interview at the Late Late Show with James Corden, Sabrina addressed the song and its meaning to her.
"I genuinely was coming from a place as a 21-year-old that is navigating her feelings and was going through a lot in my personal life," Carpenter shared. "The reoccurring theme was I was allowing people to get under my skin. So I wrote from that place of knowing that there was so many different experiences that will continue to happen to me in my life where I kind of have to remind myself that people can only get to you if you allow them to and you give them that access to."
This didn't change anything, people continued to call her a 'homewrecker' refusing to see her side of the story. And Olivia Rodrigo didn't send any hate toward Sabrina, so it was purely the media turning against her just out of sympathy for Olivia.
the article below discusses this in more depth.
Because of the media's default view on her, she wanted to show herself in a way she wanted the media to see her. She made a song called 'because i liked a boy' which is a reflection on the situation. This is her point of view and what she went through. tThis is a representation of her that she wanted the media to see.
However, in some ways, it could be argued that this isn't a representation of Sabrina's actual self, instead just the one she created to change the media ideas and beliefs on her. She wants the media to see her more than 'the girl who dated Olivia Rodigo's ex' and instead as a person with feelings who has clearly been effected by their comments. Even after releasing her song 'Skin' that is basically telling everyone she doesn't care what they say about her, this song is proof that it does effect her whether she wants it to or not.
This representation of her is vulnerable but brave. She's clearly vulnerable in her emotion, but brave to speak out to such a huge amount of people who hate her by default.
The music video consists of many close up shots that emphasise her feelings. And the video itself being set in a circus shows how she feels to have been made a fool out of and been put on display for people to laugh at. People in circuses are often laughed at but are talented people, and she feels like that. Her facial expressions are very natural and serious as she wants the audience to take her seriously. However, this representation could be altered as the director would get a say in how they want Sabrina to act, so this may be a different representation of her from what has previously been created in the media, but it still isn't a valid representation fo her as a person (as supported by her recent album Short n' Sweet'.
Even the choreography isn't her choice, she may approve of it, but it isn't something she has personally picked and is significant to her as a person.
Audience's may see this music video or listen to the song and have a different view on Sabrina after it. It is capable of changing point of view's. but some people see this as attention seeking - which continuously feeds into the default negative attitudes towards Sabrina. It is mostly stubborn audience's who refuse to like someone who has upset their (possibly) favourite artist Olivia Rodrigo.
So, even though this music video shows more of Sabrina that the media doesn't focus on, it is still being actively ignored because of the audience's set preferred readings on Sabrina as a product of the media/ controversy with Olivia.
Recently, Sabrina released an album - as i mentioned previously - called 'Short n' Sweet'.
Short n' Sweet is a more accurate representation of who Sabrina is. Since this kind of humour and explicit style is rare in the industry, it shows how this is more personal to her - she isn't copying off anyone so this is clearly a much more personal choice of hers. Since she released 'Espresso' her audience grew majorly as the love for the song spread throught the media, her audience growing at a rapid pace. People love this side of Sabrina and she has been in a lot of articles and interviews because of this change in character. She has always had an explicit side but this album is the most in depth she has gone with her humour. A lot of Olivia Rodrigo fans have shifted their ideologies and decided to give Sabrina a chance because of this album so her overall negative representation in the media of her being a 'homewrecker' has disappeared and no longer dominated the default representation of her.
Society is very based on fandoms and celebrity culture. People are now very defensive over celebrities they love and arguments/ controversies are much more common within the media/ social media because of fans feeling angered by negative representations of a celebrity they love. The press and paparazzi are fueling these controversies by taking photos of these celebrities and putting false headlines to gain click's from curious and concerned fans. Papaprazzi is another form of stalking, for some reason it is normalised in the media for a person with a camera to follow celebrities (people) anywhere they go - even just shopping! then they will post the photos with shocking headlines and alter the way the celebrity is seen. not only paparazzi, but the article producers are even worse. the unconfirmed stories they share about celebrities personal lives can effect them mentally and physically.
In an interview, Sabrina stated: "So many people probably have dealt with the situation of being labeled something that they’re not. It’s frustrating because you want to do something about it. But then if you do something, people are mad; if you don’t do something, people are mad."
Celebrities are constantly placed into uncomfortable situations, when fans will cause tension between one celebrity and another and then they feel they have to act on it. But then if they do act on it (like Sabrina did with 'Skin') they are at risk of gaining even more hate and the audience's possible misinterpretation.
the whole situation between Olivia and Sabrina was caused by angered fans protecting their favourite artists from face-threatening acts by the press. and this reflects the society we are in as it proves how the media is driven by fans of celebrities and their thoughts and feelings. We are in a very pop-culture driven society and situations like this one can reinforce the negative ways in which we view a celebrity - even ones we don't know. Because when controversies like this trend in articles and on social media, and we know nothing other than Sabrina being labelled a 'homewrecker' and a 'mean girl', we have no choice but to (by default) dislike Sabrina.
Comments