Willow Smith: I love and accept my family for their humanness

By Mike Bedigan, PA Los Angeles Correspondent

Willow Smith says she loves her family for “being human” but that because of their high-profile status in the media their fallibility “sometimes isn’t accepted”.

The musician said that the now infamous incident at this year’s Oscars ceremony – in which her father Will Smith slapped comedian Chris Rock onstage – has not derailed her own creativity.

It comes shortly after Smith apologised again to Rock in his first public statement in three months.

In a five-minute video posted on Instagram, the actor answered a series of questions from social media about the incident on March 27, during which he took to the stage following a joke Rock made about Jada Pinkett Smith’s alopecia.

Willow touched on the issue during an interview with US media outlet Billboard about her upcoming album Coping Mechanism.

“I see my whole family as being human, and I love and accept them for all their humanness,” she said.

“Because of the position that we’re in, our humanness sometimes isn’t accepted, and we’re expected to act in a way that isn’t conducive to a healthy human life and isn’t conducive to being honest.”

She added that the media fallout following the Oscars incident did not “rock me as much as my own internal demons”.

Her father was banned from all Academy events or programmes for 10 years following his “unprecedented” behaviour.

Two days on from the incident, he issued a public apology to Rock and the Oscars production team, saying he reacted “emotionally” to the joke and that “violence in all its forms is poisonous and destructive”.

Pinkett Smith also called for a “season of healing” on her own social media post.