Last week DaniLeigh sparked outrage for posting snippets of a new song called “Yellow Bone” to social media. See above for the gist of the song snippets and accompanying videos, but even without watching or listening most people can gather that the predominant issue of colorism is what fans and critics were disappointed about. DaniLeigh’s fellow musician, Chika, pointed out how careless Dani’s initial apology tweets were, saying she should know more about the subject and why her “haters” response wouldn’t sit well with a Black audience.
Well, today DaniLeigh did feel the need to make a second apology for the unreleased song and her reaction to criticism, except it’s unlikely this one will go over much better. In the apology she brought up how she’s dating DaBaby, who she calls a “chocolate man” and also references her “dark-skinned friends.” As even The New York Times itself has covered the “I have black friends” myth as a deflection tactic to excuse racist behavior, that is another thing she definitely could’ve researched first before deciding to publicly say.
She also notes that “brown skin women flaunt their skin all the time in music” following that observation up with “why can’t I talk about mine?” Again, this seems to miss the point that women with darker skin are disproportionately attacked and mistreated for it, making the reclamation a political act, whereas the term “yellow bone” does on some level promote colorism, by nature. It’s a good step that Dani wants to acknowledge her actions hurt people, hopefully she can educate herself on some of these matters next time before speaking on them further. Check out her apology video below, and the transcript of it below.
“Hey guys, it’s DaniLeigh. I just wanted to address what’s going on with me right now. I think it’s super important, because I definitely feel super misunderstood. My song ‘Yellow bone is what he want,’ I think people twisted it into thinking, like, I’m trying to bash another woman, another skin tone, that was never my intention. I wasn’t brought up like that, I never looked at my skin as a privilege. I never looked at me as ‘I’m better than somebody because of my skin tone.’
I see brown skin women flaunt their skin all the time in music, why can’t I talk about mine? If you look at me, I’m light-skinned, I’m a yellow bone. In my opinion, that’s just what I am. So, it wasn’t something that I looked at so deeply. Which, I can see why people will take it deeply, so I understand and I’m sorry that I wasn’t sensitive to the topic when I wrote my comment ‘why are you guys taking so personal?’ Because, it can be a personal thing to certain people, because colorist is a real thing so I do get it. But I’m not that. I’m not a colorist. I’m not a racist. I date a whole chocolate man. I have beautiful dark-skinned friends.
Skin isn’t something I even see, it’s not something that I look at. I don’t live for the internet because people don’t know me. So that’s why I thought it was important to speak on, because you don’t know me, it’s like, let me tell you guys what I meant by this. Hopefully you guys can watch it with a open heart, a genuine mind, and try to get past it. I’m sorry, again, if I offended people — who are truly offended — I’m sorry. I’m going to just keep grinding, keep doing me, keep posting me. I hope everybody has a great Sunday. It’s all love.”