u/tinylittlefishy

I become increasingly irritated every time I see these comments. Not just because I doubt their accuracy, but also because of how ridiculous they sound in general. Don’t get me wrong, I understand that healing is a process with an apparent ”before” and “after.” But those states aren’t explicitly carved into somebody’s timeline, rather I think they are smoothly blended into it. Even after making lots of progress in healing from the troubles of your past, their colors might still make an appearance in your future. In short, healing is not an exact process. So it irritates me when people comment like it is. ”She’s healed! 🥹” like it’s the timer on your air fryer going off when your food is done? Like there was a progress bar on it? (I think there are some healing processes that have their version of a ”progress bar” on it, e.g. weeks spent in a rehabilitation program. But I don’t think that applies here.) Very annoying

I was somehow unaware that a lot of people strongly disliked the Positions album. How could you hate that album? There were a few songs on it that I wasn't crazy about, but besides that, it was a wonderful mix of beautiful love songs and some of her most FUN melodies to sing along to. I understand that people have a lot of expectations with each new album and it's easy to feel disappointed as a result of that. Of course, we want the new thing to sound like the last thing we were in love with. It was toned down and more surface-level compared to Sweetener, but in such a good way. Its colors were still unique and abundant. (On the note of colors, I think the dusty sage green for the cover was such a perfect choice. It just feels so right for what the album conveyed, just like how the saturated cover of Sweetener conveyed what it was supposed to.) Positions felt exactly how it was meant to at that point in her life. Fun, thriving, coasting, and content. So I'm just SHOCKED (and mad lol) to hear that people "hated" it.

It’s been difficult to determine whether or not Ariana is truly struggling with the elephant in the room for multiple reasons:

1. Pictures that she or her team posts are controlled. They can be edited, taken at intentional angles, etc. So we do not know for sure what she looks like recently. 
2. We (or most of us?) are not qualified professionals in psychology, physical health, or anything to do with this situation. Yes, things might look concerning to us, but without any exact numbers or knowledge, we just can’t say anything technically diagnostic.
3. We do not know her personally. No matter how much we observe or conclude, we can’t say *exactly* what might be going on in her life, in her body, nor in her mind.

So as much as I would like to SAY that “I think she might need help for reasons ABCXYZ,” we don’t have much concrete evidence to prove that. 

However. 

After seeing a picture from her opening night of tour (therefore eliminating the uncertainty of point no. 1), I am willing to entertain a thought I had a while back. As a fan since 2013 who has never seen a full concert of hers, I hoped things would get better and that I could finally enjoy her show this summer. I wanted to reason with the three points above, and I did for a while. But with the ounce of confidence that all these new, unedited posts provide my concern for her, it feels wrong to enable a tour that might be severely draining what little seems to be left of her. (And I don’t mean just physically. I mean of her heart as well.)

With this, I wonder how likely it would be that we give up seeing Ariana this year to encourage her to take whatever rest she might need or merely want. It is most likely that our tickets are just picked up by the next fan if we sell them (not sure how we would do this logistically), but I wonder if it would make a loud enough statement to her that so many MAJOR fans were willing to sacrifice their opportunity to see her out of (logically valid) concern for her wellbeing. Even if I don’t have a thesis proving our suspicion that she needs help correct, I would rather bet on it than support something that has a slight chance of causing her serious damage. I do not need to see Ariana if it means that it might hurt her further.

Also, if we somehow found a way to not attend the concert AND hurt the pockets of her executives/people in charge, I think we would really see change. The people in charge of her do not care about her wellbeing as long as she is making them money.

Do you think this idea has any traction? Is my reasoning weak or incomplete? I really want to hear your thoughts. Thank you so much if you read of all of this.

TL;DR: I am willing to bet that Ariana would benefit more from resting instead of touring. I am deeply worried that touring will cause her severe physical damage after seeing evidence of her current physical state. So much so that I—a major fan since 2013 who has never been to a full concert of hers—would give up my ticket to see her this summer. In doing so, could we somehow find a way to withhold that money from her executives? That is our major leverage. How many people do you think would agree to this? Can we gather enough people to actually grab her attention?

None of this is to punish her or shame her, but to say “We love you too much to watch this continue and we will enforce change if you don’t.” Almost like an intervention. 🤔