Billie Eilish [O’Connell] Turned twenty on December 18, 2021. She is an American singer and songwriter. She first gained public attention in 2015 with her debut single “Ocean Eyes“, which was subsequently released by Darkroom, a subsidiary of Interscope Records. The song was written and produced by her brother, Finneas O’Connell, with whom she frequently collaborates on music and in live shows. Her debut extended play, Don’t Smile at Me (2017), was successful and charted within the top 15 in the US, UK, Canada, and Australia.
Eilish and her brother Finneas were homeschooled by their parents to spend time with them and give them the freedom to pursue their interests. Her mom taught Eilish and Finneas the basics of songwriting. Eilish said her brother and mother inspired her to get into music. Their parents encouraged the siblings to express themselves and explore whatever they wanted, including art, dancing, and acting. Eilish also performed at talent shows and joined the Los Angeles Children’s Chorus at age eight. At 6, she started playing the ukulele. She wrote her first “real” song at age 11 for her mother’s songwriting class.
In 2015, 13-year-old Eilish began working on songs with her brother Finneas, who had been writing and producing for several years and had his own band. The first songs they recorded together were called “She’s Broken” and “Fingers Crossed”.
On January 14, 2020, Eilish was announced as performer of the title track for the 25th installment in the James Bond film franchise, No Time to Die, written and produced with her brother. With this announcement, Eilish became the youngest artist to write and perform a James Bond theme song. Shortly after, it became the second Bond theme song to top the British official charts and the first Bond theme performed by a female artist to do so. It was also Eilish’s first number-one single in the UK.
At the 62nd Grammy Awards, she became the youngest person and first woman to win the four main Grammy categories – Best New Artist, Record of the Year, Song of the Year, and Album of the Year – in the same year. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Eilish and her brother performed for both iHeart Media’s Living Room Concert for America, and Global Citizen’s Together at Home concert series. Both virtual concerts were an effort to raise awareness and funds towards fighting the disease.
Much of the media attention surrounding Eilish has revolved around her fashion style, which consists primarily of baggy, oversized clothing. In 2017, she stated that she likes dressing out of her comfort zone to feel like she grabs the attention of everyone around her. She tries to be “really different from a lot of people” and dresses opposite to what others wear. Aiming to “look memorable”, in 2019, she stated: “Over time it’s kind of become a thing, ‘Billie Eilish, the creepy, weird, scary girl with the green hair”.
In May 2019, Eilish appeared in a Calvin Klein advertisement, where she mentioned that she dresses in baggy clothes to prevent people from judging her body. In a March 2020 live show in Miami, as part of the Where Do We Go? Tour, she premiered Not My Responsibility, a short film which addresses her experiences of body shaming.
March 2020, Eilish encouraged fans online to register to vote for the 2020 US presidential election. In August she performed at the 2020 Democratic National Convention announcing her endorsement of Joe Biden’s presidential campaign.
I find it interesting watching as she transforms from an asexual green haired shapeless teen into a now sexualized female adult. Who knows where this goes? Remember Britney Spears was in the Mickey Mouse club as an all-American girl. This week the media exploded about her addiction to porn on Howard Stern.
Billie Eilish is wise beyond her years. At the age of only 20, the singer recently told Howard Stern that pornography “destroyed my brain.” She was only 11 when she started watching explicit videos and then, she said, “It got to a point where I couldn’t watch anything else unless it was violent. I didn’t think it was attractive.”
Eleven is the average age, according to some surveys, at which children encounter porn for this first time. And as Eilish explained, it has a real impact on the way young people understand and behave in relationships. She told Stern: “I was a virgin. I had never done anything. And so, it led to problems. … The first few times I had sex, I was not saying no to things that were not good. It was because I thought that’s what I was supposed to be attracted to.”
Billie Eilish revealed in a recent interview that she started watching pornography at a young age, something she regrets because it “destroyed my brain.” “As a woman, I think porn is a disgrace. I used to watch a lot of porn, to be honest. I started watching porn when I was like 11,” Eilish continued on the “Howard Stern Show.” “I think it really destroyed my brain and I feel incredibly devastated that I was exposed to so much porn.”
Eilish, now turning 20, said she began watching porn because she wanted to feel like “one of the guys.” She said she believes watching violent pornography caused her to suffer from sleep paralysis and night terrors. She also said it distorted her view of sex.
“The first few times I, you know, had sex, I was not saying no to things that were not good. It was because I thought that’s what I was supposed to be attracted to. “Women’s bodies don’t look like that. We don’t climax like that,” she added. “I’m so angry that porn is so loved, and I’m so angry at myself for thinking that it was OK.” Porn is referred to in Eilish’s song “Male Fantasy” on her newest album “Happier Than Ever.”
I for one was glad she put some light on her experience with porn and didn’t need to romance or normalize it. She is the voice of a new coming of age generation. It was a straight shot across the bow. I’m also sad that this young woman now has those images in her sexual DNA as an embedded template of what sex looks like. That wispy voiced androgynous [partly male and partly female in appearance; of indeterminate sex] teen I first saw a few years ago had a shame producing secret hiding in plain sight. Today she doesn’t have to be a prisoner to her past ever again. YOU GO GIRL! And HAPPY BIRTHDAY BILLIE!
If you’re struggling with sexual secrets, alone, scared that your world will come undone if it ever came to the light of day or your just feeling the weight and shame of it all, know that you are not alone and there is help. Contact me here at No More Secrets (NMS) and remember MISERY IS OPTIONAL!
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