Azealia Banks defends the use of skin lightening products

'Black women should be allowed to do whatever the f*** they want without having their blackness questioned or challenged,' Banks wrote on Facebook

Azealia Banks (Getty)

Azealia Banks has defended the use of skin lightening products, equating it to wearing a weave or getting a nose job.

In a Facebook Live video posted on Friday, Banks addressed questions about the use of skin lightening products which she says fans have been asking about.

In the 20 minute video, the 25-year-old categorised skin lightening products to include anything that “removes layers of skin or pigment”, including chemical peels. The rapper also explained she has used the products herself to get rid of scarring and marks on her knees and elbows.

Describing it as a “woman’s right” to choose what products they want to use, she said: “Its a deeper conversation into a woman’s right to choose, a woman’s choice,” she said, “With being a black woman, at least for me, I can forget to be a woman and I just get really bent up on blackness and all of these unwritten rules that come with being black. You kind of forget to give yourself a break sometimes […] blackness in today’s age is so paradoxical, it's so many different things.”

Banks argued using these products is no different to getting a nose job or wearing a weave.

“What’s the difference between wearing a weave and changing my skin colour? No one was upset when I was wearing a 30inch weave and tearing out my edges [...] you guys loved it. I don’t understand what the difference is.”

Banks, who has been outspoken on issues affecting black people several times in the past also dismissed the suggestion that, by using a product which lightens her skin, her messages of self-empowerment have been "negated", calling it “petty”.

“For so many people to say ‘Oh you wanting to lighten your skin’, to say it negates anything I've said about the current situation of blackness in America is ignorant and just stupid. What do body modifications have to do with somebody’s level of intellect? The two don’t correlate [...] and I think it's petty, I think it's very contradictory,” she said to the camera.

However, the video has attracted criticism from fans who have accused Banks of not being a positive role model for young black women by using a product which lightens the skin.

“It’s [skin lightening] a form of culture assimilation, of self-hate, of everything. You are a role model to young black women who have dark skin,” one Facebook user said. Another wrote: “We are simply asking you to acknowledge the consequences it may have on your fans who looked up to you as a dark-skinned woman.”

Banks continued to defend herself amid the comments writing: “Black women should be allowed to do whatever the f*** they want without having their blackness questioned or challenged.”

She also wrote a number of further status updates where she continued to brand the criticism as “petty”.

“What we need is a clear plan and to stop getting hung up on the petty s**t that doesn’t matter. Me having an Afro puff or dark skin is not going to stop a police officer from gunning down innocent civilians,” she wrote. “THE TWO SIMPLY DO NOT CORRELATE”.

A representative for Banks did not immediately respond to a request for comment.