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Serena Williams Responds To Accusations She's Bleaching Her Skin

Originally posted on The Spun | By Matt Hladik | Last updated Dec 3, 2024 10:55 AM ET

Serena Williams knows that when you're as famous as she is, sometimes people are going to say less than flattering things about you.

That doesn't mean that Williams isn't going to address some outside comments though, like she did in an Instagram Live on Monday. Recently, a video of Williams at an event for her daughter went viral, with some people making note of what seemed like a change in her skin tone. More than a few of these folks accused the tennis legend of bleaching her skin.

On Instagram Live yesterday, Williams was sharing video of her skincare and makeup routine. In the middle of it, she addressed the skin bleaching allegations.

"And no, for you haters out there, I do not bleach my skin," Williams said in the clip. "There is a thing called sunlight and in that sunlight you get different colors, and if I'm not posting and recorrecting my pictures and posting from my daughter's...She had a school play that I was volunteering on and had stage makeup on.

"Yes, I'm calling you out on this because it's ridiculous that everyone's like 'Oh, she bleaches skin.' I am a dark Black woman and I love who I am and love how I look, and that's just not my thing."

Serena Williams at The 2024 ESPY Awards held at the Dolby Theatre on July 11, 2024 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Gilbert Flores/Variety via Getty Images)Gilbert Flores/Getty Images

Williams went on to say she takes no issue with people who do choose to bleach their skin if it makes them happy; she just isn't one of them.

We're actually glad that Williams was able to touch on this topic, because in the last two months, she has had much more pressing matters to deal with. First, in October, the 23-time Grand Slam champion underwent surgery to remove a mass from her neck, which thankfully turned out to be a benign cyst.

Then, on Thanksgiving, Williams' husband Alexis Ohanian posted photos of himself on social media after having surgery to remove half of his thyroid.

"After tracking some suspicious nodules on my thyroid for the last 4 years, I recently got half of it surgically removed," Ohanian said. "I wasn’t gonna take any chances; the surgery was smooth and I’m extra grateful this Thanksgiving because I got the call this morning that my now-removed-half-of-thyroid was indeed full of some gnarly nodules that were very likely to become cancerous."

[ TMZ Sports ]

This article first appeared on The Spun and was syndicated with permission.

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