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Many doctors, university researchers and study groups are finding that the increase in skin cancer over the past 50-60 years is most likely linked to the USE of sunscreen.
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I'd really like to see a source on that one too, because it sounds like (no offense meant) absolutely garbage. They used to say that the people who covered themselves in gold would get gold poisoning or something ridiculous because our skin wasn't used to being covered. That turned out to be superstition, just like the above.
If you can argue that we've got thousands of years of evolution allowing our skin to resist the sun, then you've got to say we'd have just as much evolution (selective pressure in this case) allowing us to resist chemicals on our skin.
Dark skin was selected for because it protected us against direct sun in equitorial regions, but unless you're black you can see why you aren't optimal for being protected against the sun.
White skin is NOT good at blocking excess sunrays, no matter how much blind faith you put in evolution.
Evolution doesn't "pick" what's necessarily best, only that which survives (and reproduces).
Truly, black skin is most desirable everywhere -- however, in areas with low Vitamin D in the diet (UV causes Vitamin D production in our subdermal skin layers), white skin began to be selected for.
That doesn't mean it's better to be white-skinned, only that those with black skin were dying of rickets-related pregnancy complications. Ever wondered why people further from the equator are typically lighter skinned? We need Vitamin D. The only pre-technological "dark skinned" populations above the equator are those such as Eskimos -- they get a large suplement of Vitamin C because of their diet -- seal blubber contains a ton.
So no, thousands of years of evolution did not give us white folks the "optimal" skin protection, and we DO need sunscreen. And unless you can show me real research I'm going to assume the "sunscreen is a bad chemical" theory is quack science.