Once acclimated to strong love and praise from her fans, famous popstar Ariana Grande has now come to know controversy and division—with her newest boyfriend being at the center of it all.
Grande is no stranger to quick, romantic flings and serious, intimate relationships. Having dated big stars such as Mac Miller and Big Sean, she is attuned to the public finding out about her romantic life sooner or later. Typically, excitement and shock are the reactions elicited from her fans—a new era of love for Grande; however, when fans found out about her most recent boyfriend, musical actor Ethan Slator, they geared more toward distaste than to excitement.
The reaction, however, was not as a result of Ethan Slator having done anything particularly offensive but rather from the fact that a few months prior his newborn son had just been born—the child that he had just had with his high school sweetheart wife Lilly Jay.
It had been seen prior to the announcement that Grande and Ethan Slator were together; Grande had been seen liking posts of Slator’s announcing “Happy Mothers’ Day” to his then-wife and mother to his child and that she had been seen even holding Slator’s baby. From this speculations had grown that Grande and Ethan Slator had cheated with one another on Ethan’s then-wife.
As soon as fans caught wind that Grande could have been cheating, they soon turned against her, claiming that she was not a “girl’s girl,” meaning that her actions did not uplift the female community. And, looking into her past relationships, people speculated that she may have even been a serial cheater, with her instantly jumping from relationship to relationship without a known break in between.
To these allegations, Ariana Grande made no comment; that was, until, now. On Jan. 12, Ariana Grande released her newest single, “Yes, and?” It was a loud and clear response to all the rumors people had circulating about her—most evidently about her dating history. In it, she tells people to back off whoever she is dating and that people shouldn’t care about who she is dating, stating, “Your business is yours and mine is mine.”
While the statement of the song stands loud and proud on its own, the reactions to it remain mixed—and dividing. While Grande’s hardcore fans have praised her for standing her ground and having made a song that they love, others claim that Grande is out of touch. They say that she has made other songs, such as “break up with your girlfriend, i’m bored,” that, on top of this one, glorify her being the other woman in the relationship. Some critique the general sound of the song, comparing it to that of something one might hear in a mall.
Whether or not her response to the criticism may have been the correct way to go about things, the future has yet to determine whether these homewrecker allegations were worth it or something detrimental to her career.
