The other day a satirical site called NewsNerd posted some foolishness on their openly satirical site about naturals having lower self esteem in comparison to women with processed hair.
For a site that publishes articles claiming that Laverne Fox has been cast to play Beyonce in a biopic, we didn’t think that anyone would fall for their newest tomfoolery.
Yet since then we have received emails from you ladies to write a post discussing the topic. Plus we have seen lengthy discussions on Facebook started by innocent individuals caught up in this whirlwind of a lie.
Forgive me but I will have to waste your time for a couple of seconds with the following snippet from their post:
The most common natural hairstyle is an afro, which many black women consider an undesirable look. The hair is many times matted and coarse, and is not considered appropriate for a business environment. Many employers consider the look untidy, and ban individuals from wearing this style.
According to the study by Bountiful Hair, natural hair being viewed as a messy look is causing many women, who wear their hair in that manner, to feel inadequate and less desirable as their counterparts. Those feelings of inadequacy causes women with natural hair to lash out at women with treated or straightened hair, and in turn lowers their self-esteem.
Of the 3,000 women who participated in the study, 2,500 said they did not feel as pretty as women with straightened hair. Pilar Ciara Jones, who says she participated in the study, stated, “some days I just don’t know what to do with these naps — and on those days I just avoid the mirror altogether.”
The “study” that the article is based on was false and just a way to get people a little bit riled up and of course lead to tons of traffic to their site. #slick #clickbait
In an attempt to honor some of the email requests we thought for a moment about how we could have the discussion without lending any authenticity to the article, it’s not easy.
But we did realize one thing. When somebody hits us (women, naturals) a bit sideways with some crazy mess we go hard! Even if this was satirical the discussions were amazing, we had women coming out the woodwork with stories of the exact opposite of what the site or fake study proposed.
Naturals are so confident, so creative, so sexy, so artsy and so appreciative of how far we have come in our individual and collective journeys. Of all the negative stories we have at least 50 positive ones to share.
The lesson here is that even if you were fooled, because I was red in the face when I read it too, something very positive has come out of it.
Share your stories in a discussion below, has your confidence grown since becoming natural?
I LOVE MY HAIR!!!
My hair is powerful, and I love my naturalness!!! Low what??? Lol
You basically said what I was thinking lol
I don’t know you personally, but I could hear your words!
What? Shut up lol
Natural hair women have the highest self esteem because we are accepting and love of who we really truly are. Be able to cut out hair just to take us back to our roots take confidence and courage. Why on earth would we have low self esteem about something we love so much. Please cut it out!
It SAID that it was satire.
With my natural hair, It reminded me that The Most High does not make mistakes. I have never felt soo complete and so beautiful 🙂
Lies
Every time I look at my nappy hair I want to kill myself. Not!!
That’s not really what low self-esteem is.
Well thank you for correcting me.
Love my hair and look gorgeous and HELL NAW I DON’T HAVE LOW SELF ESTEEM, SORRY
That was done to get a reaction out of y’all. Their plan seemed to work.
Um, empowering! So screw that!
Very powerful. I love my natural hair.
Good I love my hair. I’ve never had low self esteem! I’m a strong black sister!
I can actually believe this because “yes”the sales of relaxers have gone down, but the sales of hair extensions have gone up! Most of it might be for ” protective” hairstyles, but I know several women who said they could not have gone natural without extensions/ weave! There are a lot of women out there who are just not ready to wear their hair natural… I myself have had a hard time feeling beautiful with natural hair, especially when the natural hair that they advertise on TV …which is the loose curly hair is not the type that I have! So it can become difficult…I can definitely see how it could affect your self esteem!
How can you truly love yourself if you don’t love how you came into this world?
My hair has been relaxed for as long as I can remember… So it was never about truly loving yourself …it was about finding yourself! Going back to hair that you know nothing about doesn’t happen overnight, it takes time and it’s a process. First it’s acceptance of what you have your head especially when you realize that it is not with you see on tv! Then its about embracing what you have and learning to love it! It’s a journey! No two people and no two hair is alike… the journey is different!
My hair is relaxed and I truly love myself and I truly love my hair being manageable. My hair is more healthy than some natural sisters that I know. We all came into this world not wearing deodorant or makeup but does that mean since we wear them we don’t love ourselves? That’s such an ignorant statement.
If you hate certain parts on your body cleary means you don’t truly love yourself. You love certain parts and others you hate. It’s just wierd to say i love myself but I hate my legs and arms…
It’s not about hair type. It’s about loving yourself as God made you.
Aitya Moore….loving yourself as God made you is easiest when you’ve been raised that way! Unfortunately most black girls are raised with parents who relax their hair and yes it is over the hair type! It’s hard to “love yourself as God made you” when you’re being told at a very young age , that your hair is bad or nappy. Like I mentioned earlier…as a adult returning natural….it becomes about finding yourself! I didn’t even know what my natural hair looked like until I was in my twenties! You have to find your true self first and accept and embrace it, before you can love it!
That link sounds stupid,Im in transition and I’m living it.at first it was hard trying to find styles and products but it got better.
Didn’t even read it due to the title.
Perhaps you should. The more you read the more you know. You can’t have an opinion on something you haven’t read.
It was a FAKE article on a satire site Tina. Why read a fake article?
Partly true some women are not content ..so ever competing. .having hair crush ..really such study should not matter when you’re content
Lol. The girls on the photo are beautiful and they certainly don’t look like they have low self esteem. I love my natural hair
Great!!!…. then i permed it but I’m only relaxing once every 4-6 months meaning only 2-3 relaxers a year. I didn’t relax because of self-esteem issues cause i always had it styled some type of way. I relaxed because of when i wear my sew ins i would sweat out my edges all the time and i had to press it daily and that was more damaging to me than just relaxing and not having to basically burn my hair everyday. #BEAUTIFULWITHORWITHOUTARELAXER
I have to disagree. The way I see it, women who go natural are more confident because they’re not afraid to go against what society says is beautiful.
I Agree with you that do not make sense to me.(the article) I think it is the opposite.
isn’t that statement a bit of a contradiction though?
you have more confidence because you are natural because you’re going against “what society considers beautiful”
when in reality you shouldn’t care what society thinks.
natural or not, you shouldn’t care what society thinks and just care about what you like and think. There is no beauty standard, unless you don’t have much confidence
so having natural hair should not make you more confident, if anything hair should be the last thing that gives you confidence. Then again, that’s a whole different subject. ..I get off track sometimes >_>
Smh and you still don’t get it. It was SATIRE, it was a fake study. It wasn’t real. It was meant for laughs and a bunch of black women fell for it and took it seriously.
*raises glass* Hear, HEAR!!!!
Honey please…
I already had amazing self confidence and self-esteem prior to returning natural. Once I did the Big Chop I felt so liberated and free. My self confidence and self-esteem increased tremendously! I have received nothing but compliment’s from my co workers. My employer doesn’t have a problem with my hair. Now, I will say this. I receive more compliment’s from people outside of my race than my own people. The negative feedback has been from black men and women. I feel good about myself no matter how I wear my hair. My hair doesn’t define who I am as a woman.
I have always had my hair natural. I love the way my hair feels after not flat iron it for a few weeks.
Natural feels like the day I was born! Strong power full just being me. But low self esteem ? that’s a whole other problem because if straighten your hair gives more esteem than we have the option . But I love my natural hair .
*eye roll*
Didn’t even pay no mind to that article. Thought it was a mess anyways. Love my natural hair!
I read the article on news nerds. But I never heard of the site before and did not know of this image of being satirical. Retrospect is funny because it’s the complete opposite but I have to admit I took the original article as truth and was HIGHLY offended.
Lol man they got what they wanted. I was all riled up. Lol
Um really luv my natural hair!
Lol!! Funny
I just love the idea I can keep those harsh chemicals out of my hair. I love wearing my natural hair
Biggest crock I have read recently regarding hair…mad because they are losing money in the perm business…we have strength and I will not give them my money again ever! I’ll put my money towards some natural product first…
How can something you are born with lower your self esteem? …… Love your natural beauty! Love yourself!
So pre-K did this study?
Um, get real….
I do any hairstyle that fits my mood from natural to wigs .
my experience has had it’s ups and downs, but I think it’s the opposite. I went from shoulder length, gorgeous relaxed hair to the big chop… and that took a whole lotta courage and mental prep to pull off. Now I rock a fro sometimes, and to save time and get a different look I do box braids but after rocking a twa for so long I have the confidence to rock anything. So I could say being natural boosted my self esteem.
never my not going natural is lack of laziness becaue afro hair needs shea butter cocoa butter etc and unless ur sourcing the real thing with no chemiical then prabably going natural is a waste of time if treated correctly otherwise hair is hair please stop promoting thispropaganda for the media theres so much krazy things happy tings and mysteries in the world than afro hair thanks for the update pls be sure to keep reminding us but we just look at at it as grooming
I knew that article was fake. Yet people were losing their minds! I swear folks believe anything they see and read online and don’t understand what a satire is. Internet trolls are everywhere, they post anything just to get a rise out of you. Whoever that was KNEW that if they said anything about a black woman or anything involving hair it would cause an uproar and it did. Bravo sob.
My self is is soooo low that I will NEVER get a perm again….lol!
Who cares what some study says? I’m amazing, my people are beautiful and no “study” (with racial/capitalist motives) is going to change that FACT. Bye Felicia
Foolishness! I am natural and I love my natural hair.
It’s been beautiful!
We are beautifully & wonderfully made!
I just big chopped for the second time on Monday, so far so good. I have positive self esteem, but I’m always busy battling other’s opinions of me because they’ve been conditioned to think natural and short hair isn’t beautiful.
Lol this a joke right? I can’t speak for anyone but myself but my self esteem never been low and since I been natural almost 4 years it’s only gotten better and I’m more confident and comfortable in my natural beauty.
And who conducted this study
No offense to anyone however one would have to be of very low intelligence to believe that story. None of the sources cited could be verified. And it was written as if penned by a sixth grader. #DoBetter #SearchEngine #Google
I LOVE being natural. I find my hair extremely fascinating and so fly. If taken care of properly natural hair can’t be nothing but beautiful but it does take time to figure your natural hair out and get it to look the way u want it. To all brand new naturals: Don’t quit! There will be many days where your hair wont look the way u want it and there will be plenty of styles that u can’t do with your certain texture. The key is to figure out the products, styles, regimen, etc that work for YOU!
Wow! It was a satire!
I didn’t think the article was real. I didn’t even read it because from the title it made no sense.
Not no low self esteem ever. being natural rules for me
What a lie.. What courage we have. Telling society i don’t want your idea of beauty.
So many black woman say they like their natural hair but they add kinky extension in their hair ….
Ya ne interesting. I believe useless men want sophisticated women and that includes weaves long nails etc high heels short skirts etc etc vanity
wow, this couldn’t be more further from the truth
http://www.coilsandglory.com
wow, this couldn’t be more further from the truth
http://www.coilsandglory.com
You know what. … here me out, my daughter was duped this by her peers at 13… they would tell her she had low self esteem for being natural….. then it was she was a dike because she was natural and played ball.
I do believe that there was a time when new naturals didn’t like there hair before natural became popular again.
Who wears their hair to feel inadequate and less desirable? Yeah…that’s a joke!!
Naturalistas are going against the norm, and that Is what makes us feel more confident.
Lol I didn’t know either
We can’t win for losing
My natural gave me more self esteem!! That study is bull it’s a really big thing to cut you hair off and wear your own hair no perm weave its a big step it’s not a move a person with low self esteem!
I am natural but I actually find it comical that hair can dictate whether someone is confident or not. I was confident relaxed and I am confident natural. Someone who isn’t confident relaxed will not all of a sudden gain confidence being natural. Hair magically changes someone’s self-esteem and confidence level? I don’t think so.
I am natural but I actually find it comical that hair can dictate whether someone is confident or not. I was confident relaxed and I am confident natural. Someone who isn’t confident relaxed will not all of a sudden gain confidence being natural. Hair magically changes someone’s self-esteem and confidence level? I don’t think so.
Beautiful women with gorgeous heads of beautiful hair!
Just fine
It’s been almost a year since using creamy crak forever. I finally flat ironed & curl it for the first the and it didn’t feel right, no texture just too light. Self esteem issues, not here. I’m very comfortable with who I am. I’ll bet the person who made that inane comment blushes pink
That’s crazy! The bald phase was pretty rough but it made me actually accept myself for who I am. I love my hair now. And I can walk outside with my baby fro and not cringe at the thought of everybody seeing my natural self. If anything it was empowering.
That’s the dumbest thing I have ever heard. Especially since going natural is an out of the norm CHOICE. NICE TRY MAINSTREAM AMERICA BUT YOU WILL NOT succeed at making us feel insecure. Do you know the amount of confidence and take it or leave it attitude that one must possess to even begin to wear their hair Natural??? Go away!!
I love my hair the kinky afro is not the only style to do and it isn’t ugly matted or nappy. It’s gorgeous I have a curly medium afro and I wear it in a bun everyday . I wouldn’t trade my afro curls for nothing ! I get frustrated with my hair but looking back at my permed pics I don’t miss the thin damaged straight permed hair . I love my afro curls ! Also when you take care of your hair it won’t be matted . Don’t believe the hype . Healthy hair of all hair textures is good hair !
It is completely normal and common for a woman to wake up some days not knowing what to do with her hair. Natural or relaxed, white, Asian, Latino. We all get this from time to time. I myself had this problem when I was relaxed, and have the same issues as a natural. To used that as evidence of low self esteem it’s just pure nonsense. I love my hair now more than ever. So much so that I always look forward to wash days. I’m a 4b Btw. Love being natural!!!
I love my hair journey since i stop relaxing my hair i think i look better my face is clear and has a healthy glow. I exercise more cause i dont have to worry about my perm being ruined. When i hear about articles like that i know there are plenty naturals out there. The problem is we are so proud of our natural hair. Get use to it big hair do not care.
Very false. Proud natural.
We were not duped ~ we know what’s up ~ those sales are down
No women were duped. I saw that post and the women knew it was a bunch of misrepresentation.
I love it being natural gives me versatility in styles.
I definitely feel better with my natural hair than when i had thin stringy relaxed hair.