There is a sense of tragic irony to the fact that Ariana Grande was singing an encore of her hit song "Dangerous Woman" at her Manchester Arena performance before her world tour was sabotaged by a terrorist attack that killed 22 of her fans - the youngest of which was 8 year old Saffie Rose Roussos. While ISIS has claimed responsibility for the attack, the bomber's true intentions for targeting her concert remains unknown. The underlying decision might have been guided by convenience or coincidence. Or, more insidiously, by an ideological motivation to violently undermine the values and beliefs that Grande has come to champion since leaving her Nickelodeon days far behind her.
While critics have noted the relative lack of her conviction behind her powerhouse vocals, Grande's messages of female sexual empowerment and individual agency in her latest work are crystal clear. The music videos and innuendo-laced lyrics that accompany her slew of recent hits - "Dangerous Woman", "Into You", "Side to Side" and "Everyday" - participate in a coherent narrative that sees her embracing her burgeoning sexuality without shame, inhibition or self-doubt. At moments where the provocation might be deemed excessive for a fresh-faced 23 year old with a fervent fanbase of young girls, Grande lets her guest rappers (e.g. Nicki Minaj) or guest actors (in the "Everyday" music video) hit the sex positive message home. The singer who once claimed that see she did not see herself "ever becoming a sex symbol" has clearly changed her mind, but she also retains hints of innocence: the bunny ears accompany the new dominatrix attire, while her dance choreography on stage remains playful.
Grande has also used her formidable voice outside the stage and the recording studio, backing up her ethos of female empowerment by taking on negative and objectifying comments from fans, an ex-boyfriend, and even Bette Midler. Her latest tour featured a brief video clip (played during costume changes) that featured images of herself in relatively provocative poses, superimposed with adjectives that only made her messaging more explicit: “wild,” “free,” “soulful,” “raw,” “divine,” “gentle,” “ferocious,” “sexual,” “sensual”, “not asking for it,” “FEMALE.”
The deadly attack on the atmosphere of fun, joy, uninhibition and self-acceptance that Grande hopes to create with her performances abruptly created an opposing force that surpasses the gravity of the sexist comments and under-estimation that she has faced in the past. The Atlantic's Sophie Gilbert observed that the attack goes beyond the usual terrorist imperatives of inducing fear among the public: "It reminds girls and young women that there will always be people who hate them simply because they were born female". Time's Charlotte Alter echoed this conclusion, arguing that the bombing amounted to "an attack on girlhood [...] a blow delivered at a moment of budding independence, to young girls taking their first, carefree steps toward becoming empowered women".
Grande probably expected the brickbats, backlash, online trolling and slight moral panic that followed her new image, but she probably did not foresee the possibility of her fans becoming sitting ducks for extremist violence. Ideas are only really dangerous when there are real lives at stake, and not just pop stardom, chart rankings and ticket sales. Until June 7, when her tour resumes in Paris, her show-stopping singing voice will not be heard. When she takes to the stage again, there will undoubtedly be an added symbolic burden on her shoulders: the greatest obstacle for the young singer to overcome thus far in her promising career.
