her music ever did? Mainstream media have now taken an
interest in her. MediaTakeOut, Ebony magazine, The Chutch
and now UK's Daily Mail. If I were Dencia, I won't feel any
type of way about the headline...they are helping her sell her
market for free. lol. Find the full text of Daily Mail's article
on Dencia after the cut...
Daily Mail Report
A Nigerian and Cameroonian pop star who launched a skin
cream called Whitenicious has defended her product after
critics branded it an 'abomination' for promoting skin-
bleaching.
In an interview with Ebony, Dencia claims that the skincare
cream is intended to remove dark spots, and that it is out of
her control if customers use it to whiten their entire skin.
Defending her own drastically altered appearance since she
started using Whitenicious, the singer asserts: 'I was never that
dark in real life... And guess what? I don't even care because
[critics] are bringing me business.'
According to the product website, Whitenicious - which bears
the slogan, 'Say goodbye to pigmentation and spots forever' -
effectively lightens skin in just seven days.
Skin bleaching is a growing trend in Dencia's native West
Africa, and critics are angered that it appears she is promoting
it with her product.
Specifically, the pop star has been criticized for using her own
changing skin tone as a marketing technique. Pictures of
Dencia taken in 2011 show her with much darker
pigmentation compared to the Whitenicious campaign where
she appears several shades lighter.
'When you take that picture and you put a picture of Dencia
darker, this is what you're telling people - the product really
works. And guess what? People really want to buy it. It's what
it is. I don't really care,' the singer admitted.
Still, she refutes the idea that she is glorifying lighter skin,
claiming it is for removing dark spots only and that she came
up with the name because it's symbolic for 'fresh beginnings'
and 'purification'.
She then elaborates by saying: 'Look at all the Africans that
are successful in the world. They are as Black as Alek Wek.
And if I was as Black as Alek Wek, I would never ever use
anything on my skin.'
Ultimately, Dencia admits than Whitenicious can indeed be
used to bleach skin, but that most women wouldn't use it this
way because of its luxury price point.
'I don't see anybody spending all that money to bleach their
entire skin,' she says of her product, which costs $60 for a
small pot and $160 for a large one. 'I don't see that
happening.'
Without skipping a beat, though, she proceeds to contradict
herself by asserting that if a customer were to bleach her
entire skin, it would be beyond her control.
Finally, when Dencia is warned that skin-lightening cream has
been proven to cause cancer, she counters: 'But guess what?
The air you breathe outside causes you cancer. Everything in
the world causes cancer.'
When Dencia launched Whitenicious in January and saw it
sell out within 24 hours, critics took to Twitter to voice their
outrage that she would promote a phenomenon that has come
to symbolize self-hatred among dark-skinned women.
One person posted a tweet directed at her, writing: 'This
#whitenicious cream of yours is an abomination and creating
more insecurities among women all over the world.'
And another said: 'When Martin Luther King, Jr. said, "I have
a dream…" The dream was not to become white.'
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