Christina Aguilera felt ‘empowered’ by ‘Dirrty’ despite facing ‘quite a bit of backlash’

Christina Aguilera didn’t let the haters get her down early in her career.

When the singer recently reflected on her 2002 hit song “Dirrty,” she revealed that she felt “empowered” by her new, more mature, risqué image, despite facing a lot of criticism for it at the time.

“I remember, just releasing my Stripped album, I faced quite a bit of backlash with my song ‘Dirrty,'” Aguilera said during a panel at the Bare It All event on Monday, where she was promoting her sexual wellness brand, Playground. “And for me, I felt incredibly empowered [by] owning my body and expressing myself the way I wanted to and not fitting this weird label-driven, pop bubble manufacturer, robotic thing that I knew I wasn’t.”

Aguilera added that it was “very interesting” to “hear other people’s views” on why she “shouldn’t be doing that” and “why I didn’t have a right to my own voice on my own body.”

That’s when she became inspired to further explore why people felt the need to comment on her image.

“What is the conversation?” she said. “What’s happening in your life, or lack of, that we find so hard to just be open about letting women experience their bodies for themselves? And then came this onslaught of information. As you get older, I have a daughter now, so it’s really important for me to make sure she is informed, that she’s not afraid to ask the questions and the why’s.”

Aguilera released “Dirrty” on September 3, 2002, as the lead single from her fourth studio album, Stripped. The track, which also featured rapper Redman, was the singer’s rebellion against not having creative control over her music or image for her first three albums.

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“The label wanted to push the cookie-cutter, almost virginal kind of imagery that wasn’t me,” Aguilera said at the time. “I really wanted to squirm away from that, because I really thought it was really fake and superficial and untrue of what I was about.”

Over the years, the Grammy-winner has spoken out many times against critics she feels have fixated on her body and sexuality throughout her entire career.

“I have a maturity now where I just don’t give a f— about your opinion,” she said last year. “I’m not going to take it on. It must be your responsibility to take up your space. Other people’s opinions of me are not my business.”