I haven’t been shy about my feelings towards salon treatments meant to smooth, silken, or make natural hair more manageable. I wrote about my thoughts in one of the early articles on the blog, so if you missed it, check out the article here. My issue is not with the products themselves; I’m all for anyone doing whatever the heck it is they want to do with their hair. My main issue is rather that the assumption is that kinky or curly hair needs to smoothed, silkened, and restructured in order to be manageable. I vehemently disagree with that line of thought. A more minor concern is that the chemical composition of the treatments is unclear… there’s got to be something in there that is getting the hair straight, and even if it’s not the same chemicals in a relaxer, it’s still questionable.
Well modern day advances have taken these systems out of the salon and straight to you, in boxes and systems available to the average consumer. I first heard about the Beautiful Textures Reversible Straightening Texture Manageability System a few months ago when some of my blogger boos used it – I briefly thought: oh that’s cool, your hair is straight for some time and then reverts back, and then I continued scrolling through Instagram… I didn’t think much about what the system actually entailed, and quite frankly didn’t care. But since you might be interested, I came across this FANTASTIC look into what’s really in these products in an article by Dr. Susan Walker that was posted on Curly Nikki. I’ve posted a few of the best excerpts below, but head over to DrWalkerWellness.com to read the entire article by yourself – it really is chock full of great information about the actual chemical makeup of the product (pretty high quality research too) – regardless of whether or not you care about these kinds of products (stay woke!).
Dr. Susan Walker
So why am I angry?
I suppose I should be used to it by now. The shady, deceptive advertising that is done by companies. Preying upon the secret desires and fears of women and to have hair that is “more manageable” without the use of “harsh” chemicals. It’s like a relaxer without the chemicals right?
I guess I’m angrier at the message it sends to women who are natural. Those women who don’t have that desired hair texture. Let call the texture what it is – the “feels like silk” hair strands. The truly wash n go hair. The hair that requires little work to look good instead of spending hours washing, conditioning, detangling and twisting. Just to get the desired style. I feel the anger because my hair texture would be considered to be the “less manageable” texture. And I’ve fought so hard since I embraced my natural hair texture to understand it and appreciate it and truly get it and accept what I’ve been given. And I feel that even though some of us a natural, we haven’t truly embraced this process and we’re not truly free. So it both angers AND saddens me that “we” are asking for a new category of hair care products that chemically alter our hair without the permanence of a texturizer or chemical relaxer in order to make our hair easier to deal with.
Preachhhhh honey. We should be friends 🙂 Ok, one more summary excerpt:
Dr. Susan Walker
So what’s the bottom line?
- The Beautiful Texture Hair Manageability System (I hate the name BTW) is a new generation keratin treatment. Don’t get it twisted or believe the marketing jargon. If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck then (fill in the blanks).
- It IS a chemical treatment system that works by altering the chemistry of the hair through rearranging bonds and forcing the hair into a straighter shape…even if it is temporary.
- The process requires the correct pH and heat in order for it to be successful. The heat application required is blow drying and flat ironing at 450F. Is this a problem? Maybe or maybe not. But one thing is for sure. Heat can damage the hair. Read this to find out how.
- The leave-in lotions contain a lot of silicones. These silicones act as heat protectors to reduce damage from the application of heat during the process and to protect the cuticle from damage.
So there you have it! Make sure you read the rest of the article for the complete scoop! It feels so great when someone in the blogosphere just gets me!
I appreciate this article! There is absolutely NOTHING wrong with kinky hair texture. It is not unmanageable, it just needs to be managed differently than people realize. I wish more people would simply embrace their natural texture and there would be no need for this product. I am also concerned about the long-term effects of this kind of product.
The chick on the box is Renee from cycle 20 of ANTM. I’m mad that they use her in the pics because her hair isn’t curly like that in real life. They must have used a wig/weave to get her hair to be curly. I know that false advertising or “dramatizations” are common, but comeeeee onnnnn
Thanks for the shout out and the reference to the article! I’ll definitely check out your website! 🙂