Chloë Bailey is still patiently responding to the backlash to her very brief Swarm sex scene

Nobody wins with sex scene discourse. Increased squeamishness and decreased media literacy has made depicting intimacy on screen an even more difficult task. While behind-the-scenes sets are trying to make these scenes safer, the audience is debating whether the scenes are “necessary” and speculating whether they’re witnessing actual sex between two actors. (Seriously.) So it is with Swarm, which featured a provocative scene from Chloë Bailey that sent fans into a complete fluster.

“You want to know the great thing about removing Twitter from your phone? Anything negative I did not see!” Bailey said on The Tamron Hall Show. “In turn, I was just proud of the work I did as an actress. Let me tell you something that just boosted my confidence as an actress so much. A little earlier today, I saw the incredible Taraji P. Henson and the first thing she said was like, ‘You were incredible in Swarm and she was like, ‘Keep going!’ And that just meant so much to me.”

It must take some work for Bailey to be able to brush off the backlash, as in the past she’s expressed her frustration with fans’ inability to accept her expressing her sexuality. As her pop star persona evolves (she just released her first solo album, In Pieces), she acknowledged that people are “not used to seeing me in that light.” Reflecting on her experiences as a child star (appearing in The Fighting Temptations) and following her career as a duo with sister Halle Bailey, she told rapper Latto on 777 Radio, “They’ve grown up with my sister and I since we had our little short baby locks on YouTube and everything. But it’s like, this has been me. When I perform, that’s when I feel the most confident and the most sexy. It’s nothing contrived or forced about it. That’s just passion coming out.”

Now, she tells ET Canada she was “laughing” about the Swarm reactions. “ I am really proud of my performance in that show and being on set with such incredible actors like Damson [Idris] and Dominique [Fishback] and being directed by Donald Glover and being on set with the likes of Malia Obama and Janine [Nabers] and everybody,” she said. Fan reactions to her doing more adult material as a performer and actor “doesn’t frustrate me anymore because I have so many other things to think about than to waste my time thinking how people perceive me. You know, before it used to bother me, but now I’m like, I got so much to worry about.”

“That was really the first time I felt comfortable being raw and open,” Bailey added on Tamron Hall. “Why I love Marissa and resonated with her is because on the outside, she’s this huge ball of sunshine. She’s so like positive and she in turn was dealing with her own personal issues so you really never know what people are going through and I felt honored to play her and to share her.” She reiterated, “I think people are so used to seeing me so done up and ‘Hi! Hey!’ It’s always different to see me in that light but that’s what acting is all about.”