Billie Eilish: Watching porn from the age of 11 destroyed my brain
POP superstar Billie Eilish has revealed how watching pornography from the age of 11 ‘destroyed my brain’.
The Grammy Award winner said she had nightmares after being exposed to violent and ‘abusive’ content, and now feels ‘incredibly devastated’ about the experience.
Miss Eilish said it had a huge impact when she began dating, adding she hadn’t always ‘said no to things’ she should have.
In a candid interview with a US radio show, the Tough Guy singer explained that she started watching porn to be ‘one of the guys’, but now views it as a ‘disgrace’.
Miss Eilish, who turns 20 on Saturday, spent a large part of her teenage years growing up in public after scoring her first hit in 2015 aged 13.
She told radio host Howard Stern: ‘I started watching porn when I was like 11 and I didn’t understand why it was a bad thing. I thought that was how you learned to have sex.
‘I was watching abusive porn [when] I was like 14. I was an advocate and thought I was one of the guys. I would talk about it and thought I was cool for not having a problem with it. I think it really destroyed my brain and I feel incredibly devastated that I was exposed to so much.’
Miss Eilish said she eventually reached a point where she didn’t find sex appealing unless it was ‘violent’.
She added: ‘I was a virgin, I had never done anything so it led to problems where the first few times I had sex I was not saying no to things that were not good and it’s because I thought that that was what I was supposed to be attracted to. I’m so angry that porn is so loved and I’m so angry at myself for thinking that it was OK and... it’s how so many people think they’re supposed to learn.
‘It’s how so many men think they’re supposed to be and because in porn there’s no consent there’s a huge problem...
‘Yeah it’s not super hot if someone is like, “can I do this?” But it’s really important.’
Miss Eilish’s comments on Sirius XM come months after a controversial photo shoot for Vogue in which she ditched her trademark baggy outfits and striped green hair for a blonde bob and lingerie. She told the magazine that she had always preferred to wear loose clothing so people couldn’t discuss her figure but wanted to try ‘something new’.
In her wide-ranging interview with Stern, she also revealed that she had been unwell for two months after catching Covid in August and ‘would have died’ had she not been vaccinated.
Saying that she still has sideeffects from the virus, Miss Eilish – who was homeschooled in Los Angeles with her brother Finneas, now her songwriting partner – added: ‘The vaccine is f ****** amazing. It also saved Finneas from getting it, it saved my parents from getting it, it saved my friends from getting it.
‘I want it to be clear it is because of the vaccine I’m fine. I think if I weren’t vaccinated I would have died because it was that bad.’
Her comments come as MPs in Britain face calls to introduce legal duties for online porn sites so children cannot access them.
Parents should talk to children as young as nine about the dangers of online porn, the Children’s Commissioner has urged. Dame Rachel de Souza said youngsters need to know about adult content before they have a smartphone and said parents should create a ‘judgmentfree’ culture to avoid a ‘crisis’.
‘Incredibly devastated’