Another day, another case of a skin lightening incident with a celebrity The latest one to fall victim is India Arie. The soul singer recently released the cover art for her new single “Cocoa Butter.” As you can see India is looking not only lighter but a bit unlike herself. (Though her legs and dress are fabulous!)

Folks started questioning her appearance on the cover and according to TMZ a “source close to India” explained India’s thoughts about the photo.

India says she did not ask that her skin be lightened. It was just a product of extreme lighting and the angle at which she was standing.

While I don’t think she asked to be lightened, she did approve the photo. Which is a bit interesting. Though, I really don’t know if it’s a problem. At this point, people should understand that there are tons of lights that go into producing professional photos.

What do you make of India’s photo? Should she have approved it?

And by the way check out the single. Despite the cover, the song has a nice message and sounds like the India we know and love. Check it out and let us know what you think.

Source: Instagram

Instagram has gotten many a celeb in trouble, but usually it’s not over something as seemingly innocent as a photo app filter. Enter Dawn Richard who, for the last 24 hours, has been fighting off rumors she’s been lightening her skin and got a nose job after she posted some pics to her Instagram account that, honestly, look absolutely nothing like her.

The photo above was just one of the suspect pics uploaded by the former Bad Boy singer who has been outspoken about the industry pressure on brown girls. Last summer in an interview with Carlton Jordan, she said:

I always say I represent for the brown girls because when you think of a sex symbol and a huge artist, most of the time it isn’t the brown, darker girl. And I’m not dark or even a chocolate girl, but there should be more because there is no color to greatness.

Everybody has their own story…I just know what my journey has been so I only speak on it from what I know and I do know it was a difficult road being this color and having the edge that I have— short hair, the body—it’s different. It isn’t your idea of pretty for people and it’s uncomfortable for them and I like it.

Some of Dawn’s Instagram followers seemed to be getting the message that Dawn’s looks were starting to become uncomfortable for her too, because it wasn’t long after her uploads starting posting that she was hit with comments like:

deanellw: Dawnnnnn what did u do to your face? Please do not tell me u are lightening it up.. When will people understand that black is beautiful … You are so beautiful

hissoulmate7 @deanellw: When black media stops promoting the whole light skin is the right skin mentality. We can sing beautiful dark skin all day but black media is obsessed with redbone yellabone. I have read comments in the past that dawn can sing but she is too darkskin. Im sure she heard enough of this bulls**t that she decided to thin her nose and lighten her skin. It’s sad but that’s reality in the industry

Shutting all of that down, Dawn explained to her following that the real culprit here was Instagram filtering and not self-hatred, responding to the commenters with:

dawnrichard @hissoulmate7: yo it’s a filter lol. Why are y’all doing the most lol. 
dawnrichard @deanellw: no babe just pressed the filter button like every other human that has Instagram
dawnrichard: I’m saying tho. If I really got work. I would have went for my tits First Those need help more than anything lol 

Well it’s good to see she’s taking the backlash all in stride, although her reaction was a bit more snarky on Twitter, with her posting:

Behahahahaha.. Filter is the new bleach. I mean it’s cheaper tho I guess … Photoshop does wonders and seems to start Isht too.

— Dawn Richard / NEON (@DawnRichard) March 20, 2013

Guess I need to bleach my music too.. — Dawn Richard / NEON (@DawnRichard) March 20, 2013

She might wanna slow up on that IG filter though and stick with the natural pics she’s used to — not even so much for the fact that she looks light and bright, but more so that she’s nearly unrecognizable. Check out some more of the pics she posted on the next few pages. What do you think about this pic drama?

Source: BBC

From Eurweb

If you thought the skin-lightening thing that was all the rage a few years ago among blacks in the Caribbean was a fad, wait’ll you see what’s happening in Africa. In particular, South Africa.

When we think of South Africa, we can’t help but the think of Nelson Mandela and black people who are proud to be … black! But would you believe that for some black South Africans there is such a thing as being too black.

A recent study by the University of Cape Town hints that one woman in three in South Africa bleaches her skin. The reasons for this are as varied as the cultures in the country but most people say they use skin-lighteners because they want “white skin,” reports the BBC.
Read more on the report on EurWeb.

WENN

Celebrities have all the money and power in the world to change anything about themselves that they please. From hair styles to hair color and their bodies, it’s not uncommon for Hollywood stars to change themselves in some fashion. Another fad within the celebrity circle is skin bleaching and believe it or not, there are black celebs who seem to have hopped on the bandwagon. Here are 14 black celebrities who have admitted to or have been accused of lightening their skin.

Source:outandaboutafrica.blogspot.com

Just when it seems like black women around the globe are succumbing to the light skin, long silky straight hair don’t care phenom, a woman like Ajuma Nasenyana comes along. Known for her dark skin, short hair, and high cheekbones, Ajuma is the norm when it comes to beauty among black women in her country, which is she can’t stand the fact that every where she looks there are billboards, magazine ads, pamphlets, and TV spots encouraging Kenyan women to lighten their skin via bleaching and straighten their hair.

Brande Victorian is the news and operations editor for madamenoire.com. Follow her on twitter @Be_Vic.

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Source: http://freshlikedougie.com

This photo, this photo right here, is what can happen to you when you have the wrong people in your corner. Good friends who keep it real, no matter what, can be hard to come by. That fact becomes even more apparent once you get a little money in your pocket. Kim is never at a loss for friends when she’s beefing; but when it comes to her image, these same people who go so hard for her, either disappear or lie directly to her face. Good friends don’t let friends get so much plastic surgery they look like a ghostly shadow of their former selves. Really, she looks more like “the cat lady” than she does the brown girl we used to rock to back in the day.

It’s just all wrong. As if the plastic surgery and skin lightening weren’t enough. The picture goes from bad to freaky when you realize someone has literally airbrushed her knees out. When you’re trying to make a significant comeback, chances are you’re going to need your knee caps. One could almost believe that a die-hard Nicki Minaj fan has gone undercover and suggested every last one of Kim’s surgery screw-ups, fashion faux pas and wack wigs over the last decade. What else could explain it? Who approved this image?

As much as this post could be about clowning Lil Kim’s album cover, it’s deeper than that.  Looking at this image honestly makes me sad. It’s clear that Lil Kim has never been happy with her appearance. Most of us would change a thing or two if we had the resources but the severity of the changes she’s made over the years point to a greater problem. I would love to know what’s going on with her, one because I’m nosy and two because I believe I was a therapist in another life.

Since I don’t know Kim and I don’t know what’s going on with her I can only wonder why she didn’t stop. Why didn’t she stop getting surgery after the first couple of nose jobs? Why did she continue to lighten her skin? It’s not like she was ever an ugly woman. I mean, the woman built a lucrative career off of being a thugged out sex symbol. In this life, and especially when you’re in the entertainment industry, it’s absolutely imperative that you love yourself. And as the pseudo therapist that I am, I have to wonder if Lil Kim feels that self love when she looks in the mirror. Judging from her transformations over the past few years, it’s hard to argue the affirmative.

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by Selam Aster

You may have seen a victim at some point. A person with an ash-colored coat of film over their face with skin so depleted of a healthy glow that it appears to be starving for nutrients. But a dermotologist wouldn’t help her cause, only self-esteem would. That’s because she’s conditioned herself to look this way, by lathering on skin bleaching cream in hopes that she will be reborn as a lighter-skinned Black woman.

The Associated Press recently looked into why and how more and more people in Jamaica’s slums are using skin bleaching cream to “lighten” their complexions. Skin lightening is nothing new, especially in third world countries in Africa and also in India, which boasts the biggest marketplace for these dangerous creams. According to the AP, “hardcore bleachers use illegal ointments smuggled into the Caribbean country that contain toxins like mercury, a metal that blocks production of melanin, which give skin its color, but can also be toxic.”

Although the Jamaican government has launched campaigns to communicate the dangers of skin lightening, officials don’t know how much of an impact they will have considering that a 2007 campaign called “Don’t Kill the Skin” did nothing to slow the craze.”

While darker people lighten, lighter people tan, also causing damage to their skin. These acts essentially represents the yin and yang  of beauty ideals in the world but what does this say about the course of evolution? Does it manifest a race to create one race, which is neither black nor white, but in the middle? From a theoretical perspective, it seems that it does. We are wired to see differences, although many of us don’t want to admit that we pre-judge in this day and age. The biological answer to fostering less prejudice would be to have less obvious differences between us, especially in terms of appearance.

While we lament the self-esteem issues that drive us to change our color or alter our features, it is important to note what these acts imply in the the grand scheme of things. It doesn’t make it any more acceptable but it does help us to better understand the complex nature of identity.