Ariana Grande, body image and the culture that teaches us we are not enough
Ariana Grande has asked people not to comment on her body.
I agree.
I have always believed that commenting on people’s bodies – positively or negatively – is problematic. It reinforces the idea that bodies are something we are entitled to observe, evaluate and discuss.
Even comments intended as compliments can be loaded. “You look amazing.” “Have you lost weight?” “You’re so tiny.” They may be well meant, but they still make the body the story.
Many of my clients know this experience. They dread seeing people after losing weight because they don’t want the comments. They dread seeing people after gaining weight because they fear judgement. Some feel uncomfortable when nobody says anything because they’re left wondering whether people have noticed but aren’t saying anything.
Our bodies become something we imagine other people are watching.
So no, I don’t think Ariana Grande’s body should become a public health lesson. We don’t know what is happening in her life, her health or her relationship with her body. We shouldn’t diagnose her or pretend we know things we cannot know.
But I do think there is a conversation worth having.
Because Ariana Grande is not only an individual woman. She is also one of the most recognisable celebrities in the world. Her public image is part of our culture.
Her body is not public property.
Her image is something different.
Celebrity images are created, curated and circulated. They involve artists, stylists, photographers, creative directors, management, marketing and media. They become part of the messages we absorb about beauty, success, desirability and whose bodies are valued.
Public figures both reflect culture and are active participants in creating it.
We understand this in almost every other area of public life.
We question brands when their advertising reinforces racism or sexism. We challenge companies when they promote harmful stereotypes. We discuss musicians whose lyrics are misogynistic. We analyse films, television and social media because we understand that what people create influences the culture we all live in.
The conversation becomes more complicated when the subject is a woman’s body, because women’s bodies have been scrutinised, judged and controlled for centuries. Examining cultural messages must never become another excuse for policing women’s bodies.
But respecting someone’s autonomy does not mean pretending that public images have no cultural influence.
Ariana Grande is a person. She deserves privacy, compassion and dignity. She is also a public figure whose image reaches millions of people and helps shape the culture around body image, whether intentionally or not.
We’ve known this for a long time
One of the things that strikes me about this conversation is how familiar it feels.
Karen Carpenter died in 1983 from complications related to anorexia nervosa. Her death brought far greater public awareness to an illness that had often been misunderstood.
But her death did not reveal a problem nobody knew about.
People had been challenging narrow beauty standards, dieting culture and the pressure placed on women’s bodies for decades. Naomi Wolf’s The Beauty Myth, published in 1990, articulated what many feminists had already been arguing: that beauty standards are not superficial. They are political.
Since then, the evidence has continued to grow. We understand more about eating disorders, weight stigma, body image and the impact of media. Scientists, researchers, clinicians and people with lived experience have continued to speak up about the harms..
And yet remarkably little has changed.
That reminds me of climate change.
For decades, scientists have warned us where we are heading. The evidence has become stronger, not weaker. Yet we have failed to restructure the systems creating the problem.
Body image follows a similar pattern.
We know the harm caused by weight stigma. We know the damage caused by relentless appearance-based judgement.
And yet the industries built on body dissatisfaction continue to thrive.
Insecurity sells.
A person who believes, in every cell of their body, that they are enough is much harder to sell to.
Entire industries depend on the idea that there is always something about ourselves that needs fixing: our weight, our skin, our hair, our age, our energy, our appearance.
Thinness is just one way body dissatisfaction is sold.
The real product is body dissatisfaction.
The shrinking world
This conversation is also happening at a particular time in our culture.
Many of my clients have commented that it feels as though everyone around them is shrinking.
The arrival of GLP-1 medications has changed the landscape. Significant weight loss has become more visible en masse. These medications have entered a culture that has spent decades equating thinness with health, discipline, desirability and worth.
When a society is already so invested in thinness, a rapid increase in visible weight loss can shift the Overton window. Bodies that were previously considered ordinary can start to feel unacceptable again. For anyone trying to make peace with their body, that matters.
The challenge is learning to accept ourselves in an environment that profits from convincing us we are not acceptable.
Where does that leave us?
Perhaps the most useful question is not whether Ariana Grande’s body should be discussed but rather why bodies have come to carry so much meaning in the first place.
Why do we continue to associate appearance with discipline, attractiveness, morality and worth?
Why do we live in a culture where so much money, energy and attention is invested in making people feel that they are not enough?
We need to be able to talk about the systems that harm people without turning the people harmed by those systems into objects of analysis. Because people are not the problem – the systems that teach us to measure human worth through appearance are.
Years ago I asked a question that I keep coming back to.
What would happen to the world economy if people believed, in every cell of their body, that they were enough?
I still think it’s one of the most important questions we can ask.
Because culture is not something that simply happens to us.
It is something we create, reinforce and challenge.
Every time we refuse to reduce ourselves or someone else to a body… every time we question the messages we are being sold… every time we stop treating appearance as a measure of human worth… we participate in creating a different culture.
Perhaps that’s where change begins.
Hi, I'm Vania.
I'm passionate about helping you break free from the exhausting cycle of yo-yo dieting, body shame, overeating, bingeing, and emotional eating.
For decades, I was at war with my body and food. It wasn't until I found an approach which didn't involve strict rules, diets and a focus on weight, that my relationship with food and my body transformed into one of ease and peace. There’s a lightness in living when food no longer holds power over your thoughts. If you're seeking that kind of freedom — where food becomes simple and life feels full — I’d love to walk that journey with you.
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