Comic and actor Loni Love is currently on the promotional trail for her new book, I Tried to Change So You Don’t Have To, and Love isn’t holding back on a plethora of topics.
The 48-year-old opened up about breaking into the entertainment industry, getting profiled at 19 by a racist cop, and a few dating mishaps. But what really peaked our interest was when she spilled the tea on Tamar Braxton‘s firing in 2016, and how online bullying from an army of Tamartians affected The Real.
“I’ll give you my side of the story. I’m not dishing dirt or spilling tea. I’m just telling you the truth about what happened and how it impacted me,” she wrote.
“You look at other talk show hosts. They get canned and contracts end all the time. This was the first show that was like, all women of color, and it really tarnished the show, I believe. It left this cloud of suspicion on the show…,” Love explained. “The show wasn’t meant for that. The show was really meant to uplift and show diversity amongst women.”
Taking exclusively to ET,’ Loni even described her feelings when online trolls accused her of being directly responsible for Braxton’s firing.
“I used to be the person that was like, ‘You know what? It will all blow over.’ But we live in the age now of social media where it doesn’t blow over. It’s there forever, there are things that everyone on the show has said that are still living. So, you still have to continue to fight for your character, and I think there’s nothing wrong with fighting for your character and fighting for your truth,” she explained. “I’ve always been a strong person, and in the book, you will understand why certain things were said, why certain things weren’t said. Hopefully this will give people another view.”
“That was embarrassing, it was hurtful, it was confusing for all of us,” she later confessed. “I have a set of fans that really want to understand it, so I put it in a book.”
In addition to defending her reputation, she also stood up for remaining ‘The Real’ co-hosts Tamera Mowry-Housely, Jeannie Mai, and Adrienne Bailon.
“I think I got a bad rap, and all the girls got a bad rap. But it was really mostly on me because we weren’t allowed to speak about it and when you’re not allowed to speak about it, that means only one side of the story is out there,” Love says. “Then what happens is perception from that one side becomes reality, and that’s what hurts. It’s so unfair, but people in the industry, they probably know, but outside people don’t and that’s what is totally not fair. None of the girls should have been blamed. None of us did anything.”
Loni says she has tried to reach out to Tamar several times over the years, but has yet to hear a response.
I would really love to get to the bottom of what really happened behind the scenes of The Real, but I feel we’ll never know. Maybe after Tamar hears this she’ll finally give us the real story, instead of always being vague whenever the topic is brought up.
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