Gabby Douglas, the 16-year-old 'Flying Squirrel', has made us all proud by helping the USA women's gymnastic team win a Gold medal for the first time since 1996. But instead of giving her due applause many are asking: What is up with her hair?
The debate over black hair has clearly reached its pinnacle. Kinky haired women are criticizing those who don't embrace their natural texture. Women with relaxed hair are firing back to desperately defend their straightened locks (even Oprah has jumped on the natural hair bandwagon). It seems Gabby's hair is the latest mane to be caught in the crossfire.
After Gabby's big win an onslaught of people took to Twitter to broadcast their thoughts on her infamous 'do:
Not long after the backlash began, Gabby's gymnastics fans came to her virtual rescue:
While we'll admit that Gabby may be guilty of double dipping into the gel jar (and so are her teammates) we don't think it should take away from the shine she deserves. Can we please stop using Gabby as hair war ammunition?
As young gymnasts ourselves we remember finishing an amazing routine only to get points deducted for trying to tame a pesky flyaway. Sadly our gymnastic careers ended rather abruptly but we sympathize in spirit. We wish we'd given more thought to our hair clip distribution. No matter what your stance is on this Gabby Douglas debacle last time we checked we didn't win a Gold medal at 16. Did you?
P.S. if you need something more exciting to discuss, check out Gabby's, um interesting, rendition of the "Dougie."
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