Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande attend the "Wicked: For Good" European Premiere at Cineworld London Leicester Square on Nov. 10, 2025, in London, England.

Every time I see Ariana Grande on the red carpet or in interviews lately, I feel a mix of fear and anger. Not at her, her beautiful spirit, breathtaking voice or right to move through the world in the body she chooses. But at what she’s come to symbolise.

Extreme thinness is back, and it’s being packaged as aspiration. Grande and Cynthia Erivo are everywhere promoting Wicked in interviews, photo shoots, red carpet events. Their bodies and the ultra-thin bodies of other celebrities – small, smaller, smallest – are glamourised and showcased with the media positioning Grande as one the main figures to be celebrated.

Even though there has been some criticism, it’s been drowned out by the mega promotion machine that celebrates these figures, and plasters them everywhere with great fanfare.

And this is happening at the same moment weight-loss drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy have become omnipresent.

These drugs are now so widespread – and will be even more so with the soon to be released pill forms – and easily obtained that people are using them whether or not they medically qualify. Not for diabetes, not even for health problems ostensibly related to “obesity”.

But to chase the kind........

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