Sabrina Carpenter's Album Cover Row: Man's Best Friend and Feminist's Worst Enemy

Sabrina first revealed the album cover's artwork on 11th June in an Instagram post, where she was seen on her hands and knees in a black minidress with a man grabbing her hair. Ever since, she has faced immense backlash from both conservatives and feminists alike. Now, the popstar is no stranger to criticism - embracing your sexuality after being a Disney star for PG-13 audiences is no easy task - but whether the album's artwork was made in good taste is debatable.

Glasgow Women's Aid, a charity that supports victims of domestic abuse, was amongst the first to criticise, stating that the image was "regressive" and "promotes an element of violence and control". Although many fans have defended Sabrina and claimed the album cover was merely "satire", Heather Binning of Women's Rights Network has iterated that violence against women should never be used as "satire" as it "grooms girls to believe that it is a fun, casual, sexy thing to submit to men's sexual (sometimes sexually violent) desires".

Many feminists have also gone online to express their discontent with Man's Best Friend's imagery. Sakeenah on Instagram explained why there's been such an outrage, "The culture is shifting - feminists are decentring men and we're starting to realise that objectification of the female body actually wasn't serving us so much as we had previously convinced ourselves that maybe it was."

She states that in the aftermath of the pro-hookup culture wave of feminism, it is expected of female celebrities to be outrageously sexual and objectify themselves. In doing so, Sabrina is arguably sticking to the status quo and pandering to the male gaze, which is more conservative than radical or liberating, especially at a time when women's bodily autonomy is slowly diminishing.

On 25th June, Sabrina released an alternative B&W cover where she can be seen holding onto the arm of a man, jokingly stating that the cover was "approved by God". In an interview with CBS Mornings, the pop star defended her choice of artwork, “Between me and my friends and my family and the people that I always share my music and my art with first, it just wasn’t even a conversation… It was just, like, it’s perfect for what the album is, and what it represents.”

"Y'all need to get out more," she remarked.

Sabrina interprets the cover as “being in on the control, being in on your lack of control, and when you want to be in control." Whether you agree or disagree with her, one thing's for sure: the debate over her album cover has definitely turned Man's Best Friend into the talk of the town, and any publicity is good publicity.