Oprah goes "Natural" on the cover of O Magazine

Drum Roll please!!!

Oprah Winfrey is on the cover of O magazine this month sporting her NATURAL hair for the first time to the public!

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The cover seems to have sparked a lot of discussion on some of the black discussion boards, re whether it's really her hair (you know how I HATE that question) and also about why she is wearing make up (after all, they say, if she REALLY wanted to be natural she would be natural....all the way). Well, I wouldn't say we have to go that far. I have natural hair and I wear make-up, I don't think the 2 are necessarily mutually exclusive.

I once attended an Oprah event called Living Your Best Life or something to that effect. Anyway, it was back in the early 2000's when I first decided to go natural. During the seminar Oprah took questions from the audience and someone asked her if she would ever wear her natural hair.  Her response was that she loved natural hair, supported women who chose to wear their hair natural and that she planned to join the "club" at some time in the future. She just didn't think she was prepared to make the switch at that time. I had every belief that she would follow through with what she said and I figured it would be AFTER she was no longer on her daytime TV show.

And here we are, only some TWELVE years later (better late than never I guess!) My only thought is that - it would have helped the movement tremendously had she stepped up and done this when she still had her show on ABC.  I think she worried about the ratings as so many people watched that show. But, there could have been some meaningful and informative dialogue about natural hair (because it really goes much deeper than just deciding not to straighten your hair - it goes to the core of self love) Our little black girls could have seen someone with hair like theirs on a popular TV show. Oprah wearing her hair natural might have given other black women that little push they needed to make the switch and give up the dangerous ritual of damaging relaxers. Also, the white audience could have learned about natural hair and maybe employers would have learned by now to respect a woman's choice to wear her hair in its natural state and we might not have companies like Six Flags discriminating against people with dreadlocks.

But, we can't change the past. It is what it is.  My hat's off to Oprah as I shake all of my 500+ Sisterlocks in her honor!

this was my hair in 2000  

 

      this is how long its grown since

See my hair story video slideshow on the sidebar