![Tyra showing off her "real hair" on CNN](http://a323.yahoofs.com/phugc/_dzccy8pmU4d/photos/5671c6a7ae94e77828433f87826d5280/ori_e756a2fd46300c.jpg?ug_____DYIzXNjkR "Tyra showing off her "real hair" on CNN")
Tyra showing off her "real hair" on CNN
Tyra went on "Larry King Live" last night, and amongst other topics, she once again was asked about her "real hair." Check out the transcript below to see what unfolded:
Larry King King: All right. You kicked off season five of your talk show by revealing your real hair...How did that feel?
Tyra Banks: Oh my God, it felt so liberating. It felt so liberating. I have worn fake hair since I was 17 years old.
King: This -- is this real?
Banks: Yes. This is me. You want to feel my scalp?
King: Yes.
Banks: Yes? It's a little kinky in the scalp. That's like real black girl hair. But -- go -- go in there. Yes. That's -- yes. It's kinky. Exactly. My natural hair texture is very kinky. You felt my real hair texture. This is straightened. This part is straightened. This part is not, inside. But, I mean, hair for black women, we spend $9 billion a year on hair products -- black women do. So growing up as a young girl and seeing images in the media where they're saying that a certain type of hair is beautiful and yours isn't is very difficult for a black woman -- for black women and it's a -- it's a long, political thing that we can do a whole show about. But I felt it was my responsibility to show as much of my real hair as possible.
Excuse me, Tyra, let me get this straight. While you did go without any additional hair that wasn't your own, your hair, the hair you had viewers comment on and come up and touch and feel straight out of the shower with nothing done to it was actually chemically straightened?! So when you say "show as much of your real hair as possible," you mean just the kinky roots that are way "in there"? OK. Got it. You smizing hypocrite.
Editors note: Some comments are insisting that I don't get it. While I'll admit I can never experience what it's like to be a black woman, I have had several of chemical treatments done on my hair, from changing the texture to the color. I grew up with thick ringlets of curls I wasn't happy with and sweat it out with a flat iron too. I dyed my hair every color from red to purple to black. If someone came up to me at that time and said, "Wow, is that your real hair?" I would say, "Actually, no, I had it straightened/dyed/permed." Perhaps some of us have a different definition of "real." To me I was excited to see Tyra with her hair looking as it naturally grows out of her head, and felt tricked that it turns out she had colored and straightened what she showed us and described as "real" and assumed we would know it was treated.
