Billie says watching porn as a teenager 'destroyed' her brain

Billie Eilish has opened up about how she suffered nightmares after being exposed to “abusive” porn when she was 11, which she says “destroyed” her brain and impacted her future sexual experiences.

Speaking on SiriusXM, the singer-songwriter explained how watching porn at a young age clouded his understanding of consent, leading him later to “not say no to things that weren't right ” when she started having sex. “I didn’t understand why it was a bad thing – I thought that was how you learned to have sex,” Billie admitted.

Speaking to host Howard Stern, the 19-year-old said she thinks there's a “real problem” when it comes to how porn handles consent and how it impacts broader on society. “I thought that's what I was attracted to,” she emphasized, noting how the porn she watched was “violent” and did not accurately represent women's bodies or their sexual experiences.

But Billie isn't the only one with her opinion on porn. Body confidence and sex positivity influencer Jess Megan agrees, telling Cosmopolitan UK that “pornography has presented sex in a terrible light for women” and “normalized a lot of the trauma and abuse that women suffered.

“I don't hold pornography entirely responsible,” Jess continues, “it's up to the individual to communicate and get full, enthusiastic consent. But when we have teenagers and men spitting on and choking girls /women without asking, they “Actually, they just copy what they saw. Women are beings in their own right, not lights of human flesh designed for men. “

Like Billie, Jess worries about how pornography can push young viewers to do things they're not comfortable with. “I've noticed on TikTok that there has been a clear vilification of 'vanilla' sex, calling it boring,” she points out, explaining how it adds a “layer of shame for teenage girls who don't may not really enjoy rough sex, but are also very impressionable and don't want to be seen as boring in bed.”

“Shame of this nature leads women to inadvertently become complicit in their own dehumanization,” adds the influencer.

As for whether or not pornography should be canceled altogether, Jess says it's not necessary, but that we as a society need to have a better understanding of everything that sex encompasses. “I believe there is room for healthy, ethical pornography,” she said, “but I fear we are being inundated with images of sex as non-mutual transactions. The woman is there to look good, submit, and make no noise unless it is to communicate total euphoria.

She continued: “We need to start teaching adolescents (of all genders) not only about periods, pregnancy and STIs, but also about sexual pleasure, enthusiastic consent and why pornography is, very often, not the reflection of the true sex.”

This is such an important discussion for all of us, so kudos to Billie for opening the floor.

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