Billie Eilish on Self-Pleasure: ‘People Should Be Jerking It, Man’

On Wednesday, Rolling Stone unveiled its latest cover star, and it’s…Billie Eilish, just in time for the release of her next album, Hit Me Hard and Soft!

In a particularly revelatory profile, Eilish got candid about everything from breaking hermitic habits (“I’m afraid of people, I’m afraid of the world…But with that all in mind, I have been choosing to do the thing that scares me more. I am biting the bullet and existing in the world for once.”) to frequenting a certain fast-food burrito chain in lieu of having a private chef (“I’m not bougie like that. And also, fucking Chipotle is fire.”). However, my personal favorite part of the story arrived when the singer-songwriter was asked about her favorite topic: “Sex,” Eilish definitively told the magazine. “I basically talk about sex any time I possibly can.” Clearly, she’s come quite far from this bizarre moment in time.

“People are so uncomfortable talking about it, and weirded out when women are very comfortable in their sexuality and communicative in it,” Eilish explained, confiding that she’s a big fan of self-pleasure. “I think it’s such a frowned-upon thing to talk about, and I think that should change. You asked me what I do to decompress? That shit can really, really save you sometimes, just saying. Can’t recommend it more, to be real.”

“I should have a Ph.D. in masturbation,” she added. “TMI, but self-pleasure is an enormous, enormous part of my life, and a huge, huge help for me. People should be jerking it, man. I can’t stress it enough, as somebody with extreme body issues and dysmorphia that I’ve had my entire life.” Petition to get “People Should Be Jerking It, Man” its own merch line. I’m talking hoodies, magnets, carabiners, shot glasses. The works! Hell, make it a whole adult toy brand.

Eilish didn’t stop there, though. She proceeded to tell the magazine that she likes to masturbate in front of a mirror. Why? “Partly because it’s hot, but it also makes me have such a raw, deep connection to myself and my body, and have a love for my body that I have not really ever had,” she said. “I got to say, looking at yourself in the mirror and thinking ‘I look really good right now’ is so helpful. You can manufacture the situation you’re in to make sure you look good. You can make the light super dim, you can be in a specific outfit or in a specific position that’s more flattering. I have learned that looking at myself and watching myself feel pleasure has been an extreme help in loving myself and accepting myself, and feeling empowered and comfortable.” Honestly? There’s next-to-no space in my spank bank for my own reflection but someday, maybe!

Later, when Eilish was prompted about a track off her forthcoming album, “Lunch,” which sees her lusting for the kind of box that Momtok isn’t spending hours packing for their kids, she left little confusion about who she’s openly pursuing these days.

“That song was actually part of what helped me become who I am, to be real,” Eilish said. “I’ve been in love with girls for my whole life, but I just didn’t understand—until, last year, I realized I wanted my face in a vagina.” I mean, yeah. Wanting your face in a vagina is pretty much the last stop before lesbianism. However, Eilish justifiably lamented that her sexuality is even a topic of public discourse at all—specifically citing the Variety interview where she was effectively outed.

“Who fucking cares?” she said. “The whole world suddenly decided who I was, and I didn’t get to say anything or control any of it. Nobody should be pressured into being one thing or the other, and I think that there’s a lot of wanting labels all over the place. Dude, I’ve known people that don’t know their sexuality, or feel comfortable with it, until they’re in their forties, fifties, sixties.”

“It takes a while to find yourself, and I think it’s really unfair, the way that the internet bullies you into talking about who you are and what you are,” Eilish added. As a later-in-life bisexual whose TikTok algorithm is currently being served very little but Paige Bueckers thirst edits, I couldn’t agree more! Shoutout to Eilish for speaking so elegantly on everyone’s right to determine their own sexuality on their own time and terms.