Source: WENN

Tamar is the Braxton sister we either love to hate or hate to love. She’s definitely an acquired taste. But in a recent interview with Ebony.com, Tamar shed some light on why she is the way she is. If you watch Braxton Family Values faithfully, you may remember the episode where Tamar remembers how she was in two abusive relationships, back to back. She told the story of how one boyfriend drug her out of her apartment by her hair. (Sounds like something out of a Tyler Perry movie.)

Here’s what she had to say about the relationships:

“I can’t make anybody believe, I can’t change anybody’s mind about anything. (The abuse,) it happened. I’m not all the way comfortable with sharing a lot of what happened to me (yet), but what I said was true. When I’m ready to talk about my abusive past I will, I’m sorry that I’m not. But if it wasn’t for (God), I wouldn’t be here.”

She said being abused and feeling like she had no power or say in her relationships “definitely, definitely, definitely” play a role in the way she interacts with people today. She says wanting to attack before she can be attacked is a defense mechanism.

“I haven’t always been vocal about my feelings, especially in a relationship. Now, I make sure that I’m very vocal about my feelings, everybody knows how I feel.  Sometimes it’s over the top and most of the time it’s ‘Team Too-Much,’ But I have to do a lot. (I was) a shy person who had self-esteem issues trying to figure it out — now,  I’ve gotten over my hangovers. You say, I’m comfortable and confident, it took a long time to get there. Maybe like a year or so before “Braxton Family Values,” I wasn’t that person. I was faking it til I make it, pretty much.”

You know Wendy Williams. She never shies away from throwing shade at any celebrity she can. It’s all for the ratings boo. The latest celeb to come under attack is none other than the Queen B, Lil Kim.  In promotion of her Hot Topics segment, Wendy tweeted a video of her talking about Lil Kim’s dramatic transformation, through what she claims is plastic surgery. Here’s the picture. And it’s not a flattering one.

Source: Wendy Williams

Well, naturally she @ mentioned Lil Kim. And she did not appreciate it. She had this to say to Wendy in response.

Source: Twitter

This is the picture Lil Kim put up as evidence that Wendy toyed with her image for ratings. Perhaps Lil Kim has not seen the thousands of other “photoshopped” pics of her floating around the net…but I digress.

Source: Twitter

Then Lil Kim went for the jugular, exposing a bit of personal information about the talk show host.

Source: Twitter

Whoop! Messy.

Apparently, Lil Kim is not playing with Wendy anymore.

Source: Twitter

Well dang!

Though Wendy has yet to respond to Lil Kim, it’ll be interesting to see whether or not she addresses Lil Kim’s accusation on her show tomorrow. What do you think about the one-sided beef between Wendy and Kim?

Winston Burris/WENN.com

Lil Kim is sick and tired of people taking advantage of her and trying to make fun of her.  In fact, she’s not taking it anymore.

On Friday, Kim filed a $1 million lawsuit against her former lawyer and his business partner over shady business practices, that according to the NY Daily News.

In the suit filed in New York, Kim claims that Sunny Barkats convinced her to sign into contracts that gave Barkats and his partner, Andrew Ro, a 44 percent stake in a company that would license her brand names (likely “Lil Kim,” “Queen Bee” and others).

While it hasn’t been released about when she signed into this deal, Kim said she figured out something was wrong in December 2012; however, Barkats wouldn’t let her out of the deal. For his part, Barkats said the lawsuit is frivolous and just a way for Kim to get out of the contracts.

In other Kim news… the 38 year old rapper let loose on the paparazzi and bloggers whom she claims are trying to ruin her image by photoshopping images of her.

On Wednesday, Kim made an appearance on MTV’s RapFix Live with Sway to promote her new artist, Tiffany Foxx. Of course, the blogs got hold of pictures of Kim as she was coming and going and posted them with some “harsh” criticism of how she looks. Well, according to Kim, the pictures made her look lighter, bigger and just all around different…and she was steaming. Like, all celebs, Kim took to Twitter to air it all out:

Twitter

I mean, okay, most of us actually have seen pictures of Kim that makes her look a lot worse than she actually does. But unfortunately, she’s the one whose made so many alterations to her face that people just feel the need to play around with her looks now.  However, Kim has a right to be mad if she’s made to look terribly different.

Oh Kim, it’ll be okay girl.

Source: WENN

Anyone who remembers old school, back in the day, mixtape Nicki Minaj knows that she looks almost nothing like mainstream American Idol Nicki, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but people have noticed the difference. Many suspect that the dramatic transformation can be credited to her plastic surgeon, as rumors of the “Starships” singer going under the knife have been circulating for years, but no one can really say for sure whether or not she’s had work done. In an interview with Extra, the Trinidadian-born singer, songwriter and rapper discussed the common assumption that she’s had work done and her latest Viva Glam lipstick shade with MAC Cosmetics.

On her new MAC Shade:

“I had the number one, top-selling Viva Glam lipstick of all time. So I figured hey, let’s give it a whirl again. It’s different for me. It’s the first time I’m not in pink and it’s all coming together for my new different look for 2013, which is a little bit more grown and Hot and it’s like, less is more.”

On plastic surgery rumors:

“When people see my makeup they think all types of crazy things that I’m doing to my skin, but it’s makeup.  They’ll see contour and they’ll think you had surgery on your nose, no no no, look at RuPaul’s drag race and you’ll see how you can make your nose look any shape you want. I’ve never had surgery on my face, it’s make up people!”

We agree, Nicki. Makeup can work wonders. While she may have addressed one surgery rumor, there’s still that other gigantic elephant lingering in the room. You know, the enormous behind she has, that appears to have magically “grown” overnight? It’s interesting how someone who calls herself “Barbie” can be so up in arms when she’s referred to as plastic. Go figure.

Check a video clip of Nicki’s interview on the next page. Thoughts?

L.Gallo/WENN.com

Beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, but we have to say that some celebrities’ quest to be flawless have gone terribly awry. Whether it was botched boob jobs, questionable lip injections or simply too much Botox, there are some celebs whose forays into plastic surgery haven’t had the results they hoped for. Madame Noire takes a look at 15 celebrities whose look took a turn for the worse after plastic surgery.

Source: Intagram

Fanny just can’t catch a break — from MediaTakeOut in particular it seems. Though most of us know to take everything they say with a grain of salt, or disregard it altogether, there’s a reason the site brings in views like it does. People like to believe the celebrity ratchetness they put out there. Apparently the latest rumor from them to take hold is that Fantasia Barino recently got a nose job, based on a pic she posted on Instagram while she was hanging out in Vegas.

Exhibit A:

Source: Instagram

Fanny didn’t take too kindly to the gossip site’s allegation so she took to Instagram once again and shut down the story completely. Posting the pic at the top of the page, Fantasia said the only place her nose came from is her mom and dad, and if anything has slimmed down it’s because she’s in get it right, get it tight mode. Here’s what she wrote:

This isn’t for my IG family but for ALL the media: so media takeout stated I had a nose job but once again the lies keep coming. This time I brushed it off but wanted to say I am a TRUE black women with great featured [sic] thanks to my mother & dad. I am on a serious wellness plan & everything is steadily changing!! So don’t stroke ME & THEN in same sentence you attempt to tear ME down. So that there is no confusion, follow me on my instagram etc.

Though Fantasia’s nose does look a little different from pic to pic, I’m sure the slimmer version isn’t anything that couldn’t have been achieved with a little contouring. And if she did get a nose job, so what?

Plastic surgery and Hollywood celebrities seem to go hand in hand. With the endless amount of money that celebrities have and the endless amount of plastic surgeons looking to do their job, it’s no surprise that black celebs too have gone under the knife for enhancements and changes. Here are 14 black celebs who have clearly had plastic surgery.

WENN.COM

Nicki Minaj

Nicki Minaj has definitely had a few body parts enhanced and upgraded with the help of breast implants, butt injections, a nose job, and probably more.

Did Anderson Cooper take it too far when he told “human barbie” Sarah Burge that he thought she was dreadful and that he honestly didn’t want to talk to her anymore? After all, doesn’t he host a talk show to engage various personalities including crazies like Burge? In any case, Cooper had apparently had enough after a discussion involving sweating, with Burge asserting that you shouldn’t see someone sweat on stage.

The British resident has reportedly gotten over $500,000 worth of plastic surgery and has gotten a lot of flack for promoting her young daughter’s plastic dreams. She continuously gives her daughter vouchers for plastic surgery to be done on her 18th birthday. For her seventh birthday, her daughter received a voucher for a boob job. Yes, you heard that right.

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Source: Xojane.com

After reading Wendy Williams’ comments on why black women will never go for any kind of surgery and her subsequent explanation of wearing wigs, part of me didn’t know whether I wanted to smack Wendy or slap her a high-five. In her mini-rant, she makes a couple of decent points about some women’s aversion to fake hair, plastic surgery, and the like, but the underlying hypocrisy and her obvious issue with women who are actually comfortable walking around in the skin and hair they were born with, left me leaning more on the smack side

As part of XO Jane’s Makeunder series, Wendy Williams was toned down from fitted dresses and stilettos to a white crew neck and jeans to talk about what beauty is to her and be candid about the plastic surgeries she’s undergone and her own mane regimen but then she threw black women under the bus a little when she was asked why people are so judgmental about plastic surgery. She told the site:

“They are jealous. Because if I said to that person, ‘I got the doctor and I’m going to pay for it. Choose three things you want to do,’ believe me, they would get it done. They are very jealous and scared. Scared of what their other friends would say, or to break out of the box and be different. And being black? Ugh, please. My people will not go for any kind of surgery. We are supposed to be natural. Ugh, whatever.”

Then hen the interviewer asked Wendy whether she feels the same is true when it comes to hair, she said this:

“Its like a 50/50 thing with women. Some woman prefer natural and then the other 50 percent prefer something fake going on. And for me, fake includes a color. Blonde is not natural in most of our background’s rainbow.

“Full blown wigs are looked at as the worst, in terms of hair type fakery. Getting pieces is the first line of acceptability. Then getting a full weave is a second line of acceptability. Then a wig is something that is acceptable for your old aunt, but not for a modern girl. If you do wear a wig, everybody wants you to take off the wig and show your hair. That’s what Tyra did on her show years ago. She did it because she was running out of ideas trying to shock her audience. They always ask me that, too.

“The reason I wear the wigs is because my hair is naturally thin. And I have thyroid disease which I was diagnosed with 12 years ago. And thyroid disease thins your natural hair and your eyebrows. It thins all of the hair on your body, along with giving you the eye pop and the scary stare. That’s why I wear wigs. Because the hair I would want is just not what is growing out of my head. If I was a librarian with a smaller personality, then I would keep the hair that I have.”

Did she just backtrack there? Wendy wears wigs because of thyroid disease? Sounds like she’s saying she’d rock her natural hair otherwise (maybe not in texture but at least free of extensions). It’s interesting she feels the need to explain that when she’s such a proponent of so-called fake beauty. I also think it’s funny she’s disgusted that black women prefer “natural beauty”—although I can’t say I ever knew that. I mean she can’t be talking about the largest consumers of hair weave, probably around the entire globe, can she? I personally never saw black women as a whole being against plastic surgery, what I did observe was women of color being more comfortable with their features and not feeling the need to go under the knife and “correct” things the way white women do (as much). Plus, we have to shout out those black women don’t crack genetics that don’t make botox such a necessity, as least quite as early. Truthfully I didn’t see the need to even make a distinction between black women and the rest of the world anyway. We’re hardly without physical image issues, I’ve just always looked at hair and skin tone as the main struggles we battle and there’s nothing going under the knife can do about either one of those. That’s why the weave is bought and sewn in and bleaching creams are still lucrative products.

Maybe Wendy was speaking more to the policing of other women’s beauty choices when she made her comments but they came off as pretty defensive to me, as if people should applaud her for going under the knife whenever she chooses and wearing overpowering and terribly groomed weaves every day. I also couldn’t help but remember the comment she made about Viola Davis and her natural hair that didn’t belong on the red carpet and feel some sort of way about her plastic surgeries and her wigs being a little bit deeper than thyroid disease and having cash to blow.

At the end of the day, I don’t think worrying about who has or hasn’t had plastic surgery is at the top of black women’s concerns but when it comes to why they don’t do it, I think the reasons that are a bit deeper than what Wendy would let on. As most studies show, we have healthier body images all around; but there’s also the issue of cost and a lot of black women simply not having discretionary cash to blow on a cosmetic procedure; there’s also distrust of medical professionals. If we won’t see a doctor about our reproductive or mental health, I don’t think we’ll be lined up to have someone cut us open for an optional surgery. Plus there are issues of scarring and contouring and keloids that just aren’t worth the risk for many of us. If getting chopped and screwed is Wendy’s forte I don’t think anyone is really mad at her. But she also shouldn’t be mad at black women who don’t want to do the same.

What do you think about Wendy’s comments? Is she right about black women and their feelings about plastic surgery?

Brande Victorian is a blogger and culture writer in New York City. Follower her on Twitter at @be_vic.

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musicjuzz.blogspot.com

You’ve got the “Best and Worst” lists of celebrity plastic surgeries, and then you’ve got the select few that slipped their renovations right under us .

Take a look at who secretly changed without saying a word…

Read the rest of this entry »