Much has been made of the bickering chemistry between Adam Levine and Christina Aguilera on 'The Voice,' but according to Levine, it's all just "messing around" -- in fact, he went out of his way to defend Aguilera from rude remarks during a press event on Friday (Oct. 26).

Asked about the way Aguilera's expanded girth has made her a target for snarky comments about her appearance over the last several years, Levine responded, "People shouldn’t say those kind of things because, f--- you. It’s like, come on guys, grow up. The one thing about the culture right now -- celebrity culture particularly -- that is so ugly is [that] people feel like they can just say nasty things about other people... she gets a lot of it. It p---es me off. Of course I have her back, of course I defend her."

Continued Levine, "Everyone’s so obsessed with trying to end bullying and ‘It Gets Better’ and this whole thing. Meanwhile, on one hand they’re saying that, and then doing things like that -- that’s bullying."

Levine also discussed 'The Voice' in general, admitting that its failure to make a huge star out of Season 1 winner Javier Colon is a drawback for the show. "I think eventually, 'The Voice' is gonna have to launch somebody into the stratosphere for the show to continue to be taken seriously...It would be really nice to have somebody emerge from the show and become what we all want them to become," he conceded. "I think that we can, in fact, I’m sure that we can do it. I think that we’re gonna have to just retweak how we bridge that gap. Honestly we haven’t done it yet."

Watch the Adam Levine 'One More Night' Video

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