it sounds like your curly hair was happy with just regular brushing and air drying? Mine was not, and a lot of girls' isn't (particularly those who opt for relaxers). So add in time for brush styling and diffusing (diffusing took an hour). My curls never looked good the next day, so I'd have to re-wet and style (or just put it in a bun). My curls were really picky and finnicky, because my hair is low porosity and fine. So for me, curly hair took way longer than what you're describing. I get a Brazilian blowout every 4 months or so, and for the entire time in between blow drying takes like 5-10 minutes, OR I can actually let it air dry, something I could never do with untreated curly hair. The treatments do cost a lot of money, so that's the trade-off. But the time saved is the biggest factor for me!

Personal preference was only one of the things I listed. Racism regarding natural hair styles should not be ignored in conversations about chemical relaxers.

As a curly haired person, using a straightening iron is time consuming, yes. Styling curly hair is also incredibly time consuming, as I explained above. I takes hours. What actually saves time is relaxers, which is what are being talked about here. Your assertion that curly haired friends all saved tons of time wearing their hair curly instead of the alternative of a relaxer doesn’t ring true at all, unless they’re exceptionally blessed with curly hair that is easy to maintain.

As to why we aren’t happy with what we have, I explained that too. There are countless examples of “makeovers” in pop culture where curly hair is straightened, and where nerds who are mocked and considered ugly have curly hair.

A few things, for why women with curly hair straighten it. One is we were mocked for it as children. Even for white women (like myself), curly hair was universally considered an undesirable, ugly “nerd” feature. Look at the Princess Diaries— before: ugly, nerdy, unpopular Mia Thermopolis had curly frizzy hair. She gets a makeover to become beautiful, popular, Princess Mia Thermopolis Grimaldi— with straight, shiny hair. That was our example growing up. It’s hard psychologically to look at myself in the mirror with curly hair and not see my 12 year old self, and my 12 year old self was told I was ugly.

For black women and girls, they have the added issue of racism. Natural hair is ridiculed as messy, unprofessional, undesirable compared to straight hair. I can’t speak to that experience but I know it’s a very prevalent one.

On a lighter note, curly hair is very difficult to care for and maintain. For me following a curly girl wash day routine takes about 2, 2.5 hours. At the end of it, my hair often looks awful and I have to put it in a bun right away. It’s constant trial and error of numerous, expensive hair products and techniques and I spent two years trying to figure out what my hair liked and I still failed. Treated hair you know what you’re going to get. It can take only 5 minutes to dry after a shower and it looks good. It’s hours and I get hours of my time back. And again, hair maintenance can be even more difficult for black women who have even more difficult hair types. So those are some of the reasons why curly haired women treat our hair.