Sabrina Carpenter and the Embarrassing Truth of Dating Men

Summary

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Pop Culture Happy Hour: "Sabrina Carpenter and the Embarrassing Truth of Dating Men"

Original Air Date: January 8, 2026
Context: Crossover episode featuring an installment of NPR’s It’s Been a Minute with Brittany Luse and NPR Music editor Hazel Sills

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Episode Overview

In this special crossover episode, Pop Culture Happy Hour dives into the "embarrassing truth" of modern heterosexual dating through the lens of pop music. Host Brittany Luse teams up with NPR Music editor Hazel Sills to unpack the rise of "heteropessimism"—a cultural and lyrical phenomenon where young women pop stars candidly express fatigue, disappointment, and humor about dating men. The discussion explores generational shifts, how these themes manifest in pop hits from Sabrina Carpenter, Olivia Rodrigo, and Olivia Dean, and what this trend reveals about the broader landscape of love and gender roles in 2025.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Current Pop Moment: A Wave of Female Frustration

• Heteropessimism Defined:

  • Hazel Sills introduces the term “heteropessimism” — expressing embarrassment or exhaustion about being straight, especially via women's complaints about men in relationships ([01:29]).
  • Originally coined by Asa Saracen in 2019, it captures a cultural fatigue surrounding traditional heterosexual dynamics.

• Pop Music as a Reflection:

  • 2025’s most popular songs express a new kind of romantic pessimism, moving beyond the “men are trash” anthems of the late ‘90s/early '00s (Destiny’s Child, TLC, Whitney Houston) to a more nuanced critique focused on relationship inequities ([04:39]).
  • Example cited: Sabrina Carpenter’s “Man Child” and Olivia Dean’s “Man I Need” illustrate different but related complaints about men’s shortcomings in relationships ([03:22]).

Hazel Sills [01:29]:
"Heteropessimism is basically the phenomenon of, like, expressing embarrassment or fatigue about being a heterosexual."

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2. Comparing Past and Present: From “No Scrubs” to “Man Child”

• Then vs. Now:
  • Earlier hits like TLC’s “No Scrubs” and Destiny’s Child’s “Say My Name” featured confrontational “kiss-off” energy focused on specific behaviors (cheating, being “broke”).
  • Today’s songs lean into emotional labor, setting boundaries, and demanding more equal partnerships ([05:14]).

Hazel Sills [05:14]:
"There was kind of that, like, girl power streak... But I do think that this moment is different to me because... I hear women who are writing very specifically about, like, inequality in their relationships."

• Notable Example:
  • Summer Walker’s “No” shifts from rejecting specific flaws to demanding boundaries and refusing to perform outdated gender roles ([05:25]).

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3. The Influence of Music & Online Discourse

• Social Media Feedback Loop:
  • Many contemporary pop stars, like Sabrina Carpenter, write songs that double as “mini think pieces,” often mirroring conversations happening in online spaces and giving fans anthems for TikTok and social sharing ([11:14]).

Hazel Sills [11:15]:
"...there is, you know, a benefit to kind of, like, cashing in on this trend. It feels like a response to what women are talking about and what they care about right now."

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4. Different Shades of Heteropessimism: Carpenter, Rodrigo, Dean

• Sabrina Carpenter & Olivia Rodrigo:
  • Both artists embody a playful, sometimes biting approach—recounting frustration with men’s immaturity or lack of self-sufficiency (“boys can kick rocks”) ([12:27]).

Hazel Sills [12:27]:
"...Sabrina Carpenter is especially really good at this... always kind of skewering men in her music and telling them how stupid they are, how they're not living up to her expectations."

• Olivia Dean:
  • Offers a more sincere, earnest appeal for men to open up emotionally, echoing the same fundamental desire but in a gentler style ([13:32]).
  • The episode discusses the contrast between the two Olivias (Olivia Rodrigo’s pop-punk angst vs. Olivia Dean’s upbeat sincerity).

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5. What Do Women Want? Hope Amid Exasperation

• The conversation isn’t all doom and gloom. Many of these songs, while critical, ultimately express a hope for romantic connection and a plea for improvement (“here is what I need”) ([14:40]).

  • Even as Sabrina Carpenter jokes about "liking her men incompetent," there’s nuance about attraction and vulnerability in imperfection ([14:05]).

• Trend Continuation:

  • Hazel Sills doesn’t see heteropessimism leaving the charts anytime soon, predicting that as long as relationship inequities persist, the trend (and the music) will endure and possibly soften in tone ([15:06]).

Hazel Sills [15:06]:
"I don't see it letting up... Whenever men get better, this trend will end."

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6. Memorable Quotes & Moments

• Comparing Musical Generations:

  Brittany Luse [05:05]:
  "We got like, oh, he wasn't man enough."

• Meta-Observation on Pop Trends:

  Hazel Sills [11:15]:
  "...writing from their own experiences and they're having fun with it. But... it feels like a response to what women are talking about and what they care about right now."

• On Hope in Frustration:

  Hazel Sills [15:06]:
  "It's not like I want to be single forever. It's like I really want to make this work. Like, I want love, I want a relationship, but I have to do it in this weird world with these options."

• On the Future of Heteropessimism:

  Hazel Sills [15:06]:
  "As long as that's the reality, I think that this music is going to be relevant."

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Notable Timestamps

• [01:29]: Hazel Sills defines “heteropessimism”
• [05:05-05:25]: Comparing late ‘90s/early ‘00s R&B “kiss-off” anthems with today’s nuanced songs
• [11:15]: Discussion of social media and pop song synergy
• [12:27]: Differentiating the approaches of Carpenter, Rodrigo, and Dean
• [14:05]: Nuances in pop lyrics: even complaints can reveal desires
• [15:06]: Predictions for the future of this trend

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Conclusion

This episode serves as an essential time capsule of 2025’s gender discourse as filtered through pop music. It explores how today’s chart-topping young women have advanced the conversation beyond simple “girl power” anthems to deeper critiques and hopes for equality in love. The dynamic discussion between Brittany Luse and Hazel Sills is peppered with humor, pop culture history, and genuine insight, offering a thoughtful snapshot of where romance—and pop music—stand today.

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Transcript

[A]

This message comes from NPR sponsor Capella University. Interested in a quality online education. Capella is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission. A different future is closer than you think with Capella University. Learn [e-mail]. What's it like to date a man? Ask pop stars or your friends and you might hear it's a struggle. I'm Stephen Thompson. And today on NPR's Pop Culture Happy Hour are bringing you an episode of It's Been a Minute. Host Brittany Luce and NPR music editor Hazel Sills break down a phenomenon called heteropessimism. Here's Hazel and Brittany.

[B]

We are in a moment for pop music right now where there are so many young women making music that reflects how women are talking about dating these days, which is quite pessimistic. I think that the reception to some of the I Love My man so Much elements of the Taylor Swift album is evidence.

[C]

You know, I'm glad you brought up Taylor Swift.

[B]

You're glad I was like, I regretted that. No, go ahead.

[D]

Sorry.

[C]

If there's one thing you might take away from listening to some of the top songs on the charts lately, it's that the pop girlies are sick of men. And NPR music editor Hazel Sills told me that this trend has a name, heteropessimism.

[B]

Heteropessimism is basically the phenomenon of, like, expressing embarrassment or fatigue about being a heterosexual. It was also coined in 2019 by the writer Asa Saracen in an article for the New Inquiry. It often comes up, at least I see, in conversations from straight women around, you know, their feelings about being in a heterosexual relationship.

[C]

Is your most listened list in 2025 full of the pain that comes from dealing with dudes? Well, buckle up, y', all, because whether you're straight, queer or anything in between, we are here to complain with you. Hello. Hello. I'm Brittany Luce, and you're listening to It's Been A Minute from npr, a show about what's going on in culture and why it doesn't happen by acc. If you're an avid listener of this show, you know that we've been covering a range of stories about love, dating and sex for a while now, from redefining womanhood and questioning gender roles to unpacking masculinity and steamy hockey TV show Hookups. A lot of culture in 2025 has been about how we love who we love and how we talk about it. And today I want to dig into another trend that's been playing out on the pop music charts. Here's a snippet from Sabrina Carpenter's Man Child. And here's olivia deen's man I need.

[B]

Wonderful.

[C]

Okay, different vibes. But you could argue that these ideas ranging from men are trash and men need to do better to please come through for me, please step up are cut from a similar cloth. And these different approaches coincide with a pretty significant shift in women's mindsets when it comes to romantic love. For instance, earlier this year, I saw so much chatter about a Wall Street Journal article titled are women Giving up on Marriage? We even discussed it on this very show. It was basically about how more women are choosing to be single. So I had to know, how has this strain of heteropessimism made its way into the top 40? And what does it say about where heterosexual women are broadly with romance? Editor for NPR Music, Hazel Sills, thank.

[B]

You for having me.

[C]

Is here to break it all down for us. I wonder what makes this moment different from sort of previous iterations of men are trash, even just thinking one example off the top of my head, like, not to sound like a really annoying millennial and, and rather like hyperbolic about it, but, like, there are specific Destiny's Child lyrics that are burdened to my brain.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

You know.

[B]

No, yeah, no, it's, it's interesting. So you bring up Destiny's Child. I think that this moment is sort of similar to the past, but also different. So when I hear this group of young women singing about relationships, I am reminded of that, like, late 90s, early 2000s era of R and B, when we got like, we got like, say my name. We got no scrubs. We got, it's not right, but it's okay.

[C]

We got like, oh, he wasn't man enough.

[B]

Yes. Yes. Sorry. I'm like screaming. I'm like, no.

[C]

That's the proper reaction to that song.

[B]

I'm like, yes. And because there was kind of that, like, girl power streak, you know, in the late 90s where you had these women who were, you know, writing these just amazingly brutal kiss off songs to these guys who were just like, cheating on them or they were broke and, you know, they weren't, they weren't quality, they weren't stepping up. But I do think that this moment is different to me because when I hear these songs, I don't hear, you're dead to me because you cheated on me. You're, you're not cool because you're broke. Like, I hear women who are writing very specifically about, like, inequality in their relationships. So there's another song that came out this year by the R B artist Summer Walker called no. And I think this is a very, very highly underrated song. No matter what you feel about her album finally over it, I think this song is, is really good, but song she's basically like, I'm not going to slave over, you know, the stove to make dinner for you, and I'm not going to deprioritize myself in this relationship. Like, you need to get used to hearing the word no. Like, that is not a song where she's like, we're breaking up. That is a song where she's like, things, boundaries. Yeah. Things need to change. And I so I think that this moment is different because I think, you know, we are in this moment right now where women are more aware than ever of those inequities in their relationships. Like you guys did an episode earlier this year about, you know, women not getting married. Why aren't they getting married? And it's because, you know, women are more educated these days. Like, sometimes they're more financially well off than their male partners in the dating pool. And so I think we're in this moment where women are, you know, more choosier about their partners and are sort of becoming radicalized to what a healthy relationship looks like. It feels like a moment in pop music where women have really internalized all of this rhetoric and conversation about, you know, what gender roles should be in a heterosexual relationship and what labor should be, emotional or otherwise. And yeah, it's, it's, it's making its way up the charts. It's like in our pop hits coming up. To me, it really does feel like a turning point in this trend and into a like, well, here is what I need.

[C]

More with Hazel after the break.

[D]

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[D]

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[C]

I'm glad you brought up that song no by Summer Walker because it's, if I'm not mistaken, either samples or it has an interpolation of yes, yes by Beyonce, which the song was like, first time I said no, it's like I never said yes is how the lyric goes in that song. It's a much more traditional song. I think it's more about like not wanting to move forward physically in a relationship, which when you talk about no by Summer Walker, it feels like it really does feel like not just a. There's not just a thematic sort of building upon that previous moment of girl power and sort of like, you know, pushing back on the men from like 25 years ago. But it also is like a very like literal. It's like building upon it musically, very literally.

[B]

Yeah, it's like who Doesn't Love, you know, a great song about how boys are trash. Like, it's a classic. But I think a lot of these women, they're almost writing like mini think pieces in a way in these songs. Like, I just, I think that they are very aware of the online discourse. You know, Sabrina Carpenter is very savvy at this as well, where it's like if we're talking about, you know, this kind of tre online and in in culture are, you know, complaining about how their boyfriend is so annoying, then it is in their best interest, right, to record a song, you know, that women can then, you know, pick up kind of like as their own anthem and like overlay it on their TikTok videos.

[D]

Right.

[B]

I do think these women are, you know, writing from their own experiences and they're having fun with it. But I do think that there is, you know, a benefit to kind of like, cashing in on this trend. Like, it's like, it feels like a response to what women are talking about and what they care about right now.

[C]

In an article for NPR Music, you actually compare the pop musings of starlets like Sabrina Carpenter and Olivia Rodrigo with Olivia Dean, who, just to keep things straight, because I know we introduced two Olivia's to. Olivia Dean is a Afro Caribbean British song, stress, who we actually have had on this show before. Thank you very much. And she kind of makes sort of pop that feels a little upbeat and nice and easy and is very much about love. And Olivia Rodrigo, who makes. Who's, like, a bit younger American and makes music that is so reminiscent for me of, like, the. The sort of stuff that I liked when. The kind of pop punk that was really popular when I was in middle school or high school. But. Yeah. What makes Sabrina Carpenter and Olivia Rodrigo's sort of shade of heteropessimism different or kind of related to Olivia Deans?

[B]

Yeah, I think, like, you know, Sabrina Carpenter and Olivia Rodrigo, they're sort of operating from the stance of, like, boys can kick rocks. Like, it's very, like, it's very like, Sabrina Carpenter is especially really good at this. Whether you love her or hate her, she is always kind of skewering men in her music and telling them how stupid they are, how they're not living up to her expectations. She is a huge hit this year called Manchild, which is basically, you know, the message of it is like, she's telling a guy, why can you not do anything yourself? Like, why do I have to do everything for you? Why do I have to always pick up after you? Olivia Dean's song is really fascinating to me because especially coming out in the same year as a song like Man Child, they're kind of expressing at their core the same request, which is like, can you step up to the plate? Like, can you be the man that I need you to be? And Olivia Dean is doing it with this real kind of earnesty and, like, sweetness. And she.

[C]

Yeah, there's real sincerity.

[B]

Yeah, she's. She's like, can you please, like, open up to me? Like, can you please be, you know, the person that I need in a relationship? And so it really is like, those two songs for me this year are like, two very fascinating sides of the same coin.

[C]

We hear a lot about what these singers don't like. Right. Or what they feel like their partners are lacking. To put it a little bit more Softly, as some songwriters have been doing. What have they said that they do, like, in their partners?

[B]

When Sabrina Carpenter sings in Manchild about how, you know, a guy can't do anything right for her, she also has a line in that song where she's like, I like my men all incompetent. Which kind of complicates that song. Right. You know, I think Olivia Rodrigo's song from a few years ago, get Him Back, that's a song about all the things she doesn't like about a guy, but it's also kind of like she kind of does like a little bit of it.

[C]

Yeah. I mean, it's like that to the title. It's like, does she want to get him back as in, like, give him his just desserts or does she want to get him back as in, like, get him back into her life? Yeah.

[B]

Yeah. And I think, like, the Olivia Dean song Man I Need is probably, you know, to me, it really does feel like a turning point in this trend and into a like, well, here is what I need. And she needs her partner to open up to her. She needs intimacy. She is saying the things that she needs.

[C]

One last question. How do you see this trend continuing or. Or do you see it letting up in any way?

[B]

I. I don't see it letting up. I feel like it's going to continue, but I think it's until conditions improve. Well, you're. Yeah. To answer your question, whenever men get better, this trend will end. No, I think it'll continue, but I think it will continue to transform. I think that maybe it's gonna change and be a little bit softer, you know, because the thing about so much of these songs, it's like, it's not like I want to be single forever. It's like I really want to make this work. Like, I want love, I want a relationship, but I have to do it in this weird world with these options. And so I see it continuing because, you know, as you said, heterosexual relationships, still not perfect, still a lot of work to be done outside of music. And so as long as that's the reality, like, I think that this music is going to be relevant.

[C]

Wow, Hazel, I have learned so much in this conversation. Thank you so much for coming on and talking with us about this. This has been a joy.

[B]

Thank you for having me.

[C]

That was NPR music editor Hazel Sills. Her article While the Pop Girl Skewer Boys, Olivia Deen's Man I Need Has Hope is on the NPR website right now. This episode of it's been a minute was produced by Alexis Williams. This episode was edited by Aaron Edwards. Our supervising producer is Barton Girdwood. Our executive producer is Verilyn Williams. Our VP of programming is Yolanda Sanguini. All right, that's all for this episode of It's Been a Minute. From npr, I'm Brittany Luce. Talk soon.

[B]

Foreign.

[A]

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[B]

We're excited to share that. In celebration of her 50th anniversary hosting FRESH AIR, Terry Gross will be a guest on the Late show with Stephen Colbert. Tune in on Thursday, January 8th on CBS.