Over the summer, a lot of people collectively lost their minds over a Sabrina Carpenter album cover that showed her on all fours, looking straight into the camera and gently touching an anonymous man’s thigh while he grabbed a fistful of her hair. People were quick to call the Man’s Best Friend cover demeaning, regressive, and a brutal blow to the project of feminism. I thought it was fun, but what do I know? After previously saying that the image’s haters “need to get out more,” Carpenter has one last word on the matter.

In a new Variety profile, the singer spoke at length about the cover and people’s reaction to it. For the first time since the controversy, Carpenter explained exactly what she was going for. “You can be so in control and so not in control at the same time,”

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