“Let me tell you, if there’s one thing people have whispered about for years, it’s that Tina Knowles might just be the real problem in the Knowles family. And by problem, I mean how folks talk about her being controlling and, frankly, a bit narcissistic. There’s even talk that Celestine had some issues with colorism. Here’s what she supposedly said: after coming back to my place to tell me I made the right call, she said, ‘Ashley is talented, but she’s just too big, towers over the other girls, and is too dark and ugly.’ Harsh, right? And you know who could probably back this up? Her ex-husbands, Matthew Knowles and Richard Lawson, her daughter Solange, anyone who’s ever been in Destiny’s Child, and basically anyone who’s been close to her.
Now, let’s get into how she treats Beyoncé like she’s her only child. Like, really? Is Solange invisible? And don’t even get me started on those rumors about Tina and Jay-Z… I’m just saying, there’s some real family drama there. Solange isn’t one to just sit back quietly—she’s got real talent and integrity. It’s honestly awful how she’s been treated. Word on the street is that Tina’s the reason why there’s tension between Beyoncé and Solange, because she doesn’t even bother to hide that Beyoncé’s her favorite. And apparently, this whole sister feud got really intense while Beyoncé was working on Renaissance. An insider even told Media Takeout that something was definitely going down between the sisters.”
An insider mentioned, “We all thought it was odd that Solange wasn’t part of Beyoncé’s album; the sound seemed like something that would be right up Solange’s alley.” They also pointed out that not only was Solange missing from the project, but she didn’t even post a single tweet or Instagram shout-out to support Renaissance. The source added, “It’s strange for her not to be out there supporting Beyoncé. B really took a chance with this album and needed all the support she could get to make it a hit.” Although the insider admitted they didn’t have any concrete evidence of a falling out, they said, “I’ve heard some things about their relationship. I think there’s definitely something going on between them.”
Rumor has it that the real reason Solange didn’t publicly support her sister was that she was fed up with being pushed by their mom, Tina, to help build Beyoncé’s success without getting enough recognition herself. For example, during her Grammy speech last year, Beyoncé thanked almost everyone in her family except Solange:
“I want to thank God for protecting me. Thank you, God. I’d like to thank my Uncle Johnny, who’s not here but is here in spirit. I’d like to thank my parents, my father, my mother, for loving me and pushing me. I’d like to thank my beautiful husband, my beautiful three children who are at home watching. I’d like to thank the queer community for your love and for inventing this genre. God bless you. Thank you so much to the Grammys.”
Oh, poor Solange. But honestly, if anyone else has felt the sting of Tina’s wrath, it’s got to be Richard Lawson. As you’ve probably heard, Tina has filed for divorce from Richard, citing irreconcilable differences that led to the breakdown of their marriage, making it impossible for them to continue living together as husband and wife. According to the settlement terms, neither of them will receive spousal support, but Tina has to make a one-time payment of $300,000 to Richard. There’s also a non-disparagement clause, which means they’re both prohibited from speaking negatively about each other, their children, or their children’s spouses. It even specifies that neither of them can talk about any current or future grandchildren with the media or anyone else, whether in conversation or in writing.
A lot of people weren’t too surprised by the divorce, given how these two acted in public. It’s been speculated for a while that Tina never really saw Richard as an ideal husband, which might explain why she kept Matthew’s last name and often made comments that seemed to embarrass Richard in interviews:
“I envisioned the type of man I wanted. I prayed for the type of man I wanted, and I got pretty much that. Is he perfect? Absolutely not, but you know, he has a lot of the qualities, no, he has a lot of the qualities that I love, and we’re having a really good time, and I’m enjoying life. So, there is hope, women.”
The general belief has always been that Tina married Richard to get back at Matthew, and once she no longer needed him, she decided to end the marriage. Speaking of Matthew, he and Tina separated in 2009 after it was revealed that Matthew had fathered a child with Alexandra Wright. Tina initially dropped the divorce suit in 2010 but refiled the following year, citing irreconcilable differences. And as we all know, Matthew was involved with several other women besides Alexandra, but things got particularly messy when Alexandra went public with her pregnancy. And who could forget that dramatic photo of her crying next to a garbage dump? It was over the top, but you can’t help but notice she still had her nails done, so she was clearly trying to keep it together in some way. Then there was Toi, who was also pregnant around the same time as Alexandra, which blurred the lines of whether Matthew was actually divorced from Tina or still going through the process. It’s all so messy. I can’t help but wonder what Solange thinks about all this. Knowing her, she probably has a strong opinion on the matter.
There have been rumors that the reason Matthew never publicly acknowledged his children from these affairs was that Tina forbade it. Allegedly, she also prohibited Beyoncé and Solange from having any relationship with their half-siblings. Besides the child with Alexandra, there’s Koi, the daughter of Toi. Toi was a dancer when she met Matthew, and during their affair, he treated her like she was the love of his life. But everything changed when she became pregnant with Koi—Matthew suddenly distanced himself and denied that the child was his:
“When you told Matthew Knowles that you were pregnant with his child, how did he react?”
“He was very much like, well, you can’t get pregnant by me. This can’t be my child.”
“But you can’t deny it once the DNA test results come in—99.9% that you are the father.”
“…All the single ladies, all the single—”
So, word on the street is that Tina made sure any woman who got involved with Matthew ended up suffering, and their kids weren’t spared either. Honestly, it’s not like Matthew couldn’t have taken care of his own kids, but when Tina gave strict orders to let them suffer, his hands were tied. Now, don’t get it twisted—Matthew wasn’t exactly innocent in all this. In fact, some say he was just as bad, if not worse, than Tina, and there’s definitely evidence to back that up. But rumors also say Tina allowed Matthew to cheat because she was doing the same thing. David Lee Brewer, who was Beyoncé’s vocal coach when she was a kid, spilled some tea in his tell-all book Beyoncé: Raising Genius—A Teacher and His Prodigy. He wrote about how Matthew started getting into some really bad stuff, saying, “Turns out he had escalated to stronger drugs and even stranger behaviors. Rumor had it that Coca-Cola had long since stopped satisfying his thirst, and he had turned to crack.” Brewer also dropped the bomb that Tina was cheating on Matthew with Richard Lawson. He said, “I soon discovered that although unhappily married, Celestine was not suffering alone. One afternoon, when I went over to the main house to get my keyboard, I caught Celestine kissing a man. I recognized him immediately: Richard Lawson, a famous actor. The startled Celestine had no choice but to introduce me. It was awkward—she was supposed to be at her salon. I shook Richard’s hand and told him how much I admired his work.”
But if you think that’s bad, just wait until you hear what she allegedly did to the former members of Destiny’s Child. There are whispers that Tina was the puppet master behind a lot of the awful stuff that went down with the bandmates. For example, it’s been said that she was the one who orchestrated what happened to Farrah Franklin, a former member of the group. You might remember when Matthew made a statement to MTV saying the group decided to cut ties with Farrah after she missed a few shows. He was like, “The bottom line is that Farrah didn’t show up for work. I don’t care where you work, whether it’s a production line or whatever, if you don’t show up, you’re going to get fired.” He even repeated this story in another interview, saying:
“Farrah didn’t show up, didn’t call us, didn’t let us know. Then we left Seattle to go to Los Angeles to catch a non-stop flight to Sydney, Australia. We get to LAX, we keep calling her, and finally, she gets on the phone. At that point, she said she quit.”
But according to Farrah, that’s not how things went down at all. She made sure to tell her side, basically calling the entire family liars, including Beyoncé, for repeating her dad’s story:
“That’s not true. I’ve never missed a show, ever, or I would’ve been kicked out of the group. You know how much I was getting paid per show? That was the highlight of my day. I wasn’t missing any shows. But when I left the group, they didn’t tell people the truth—they didn’t say I left. They were trying to buy themselves more time to cover it up or whatever, but I’ve never missed a show, ever. And like I said, if I had, they would’ve kicked me out. So you can’t say I missed shows if I wasn’t even part of the group anymore. That’s a lie, plain and simple.”
But guess who was whispering in Matthew’s and Beyoncé’s ears the whole time? Yep, you guessed it—Tina. And maybe, just maybe, it’s because Tina saw how interested Matthew was in Farrah, so she had to go. Farrah has even said before that Matthew made some pretty inappropriate moves toward her:
“Unfortunately, my manager was Beyoncé’s father, Matthew Knowles. He hit on me, inviting me over to his hotel to talk.”
“Did Matthew try to sleep with you, Farrah?”
“I haven’t met many people in my life who didn’t like me. Let’s just leave it at that.”
Speaking of Farrah, she once revealed on an episode of The Wendy Williams Experience that during her time in Destiny’s Child, the other members were required to tan to appear significantly darker than Beyoncé. And guess who was behind this? Yep, you guessed it—Tina Knowles. What she did to Farrah was completely separate from her looks, so there’s no need to discuss that.
“Gorgeous woman, thank you. But I understand that while you were in the group, she tried to downplay your natural beauty. Did she ever make you dye your hair, or suggest changing it from its stunning natural black?”
“Yeah, my hair was red when I was in the group. I totally owned that red, like old Kelly red. What? Hair red. My hair was red.”
“You look a lot different now compared to when you were in the group.”
“Definitely, because even I don’t recognize myself from back then.”
“Yeah, I know your name, but I don’t know you. This is how I would have looked naturally, but this is the image they wanted me to have in the group.”
“What else did they do to, uh, tone down your appearance?”
“Well, I wouldn’t say it was necessarily bad, but I did have to tan a lot. They wanted Beyoncé to be the lightest one, so Michelle, Kelly, and I would tan sometimes.”
“So, wow.”
“And Beyoncé wouldn’t tan?”
“Wow, not unless it was at a beach.”
“Wow.”
I’ve also seen claims that Tina would tell the girls to go out and get sunbaked, but specifically instructed that Beyoncé shouldn’t participate. And besides making the other girls tan to make Beyoncé appear lighter, Tina apparently didn’t want to work with darker-skinned girls at all. For example, Ashley Tamar Davis was once part of Destiny’s Child, and a former voice coach mentioned that Tina didn’t want to work with her because she was, quote, ‘dark, big, and ugly.’ At the start of their conversation, the coach and Ashley were reminiscing about her memories with Destiny’s Child. Ashley mentioned that she could feel the negative energy from her parents and knew something was off. That’s when the coach started explaining why she was kicked out, and though he hesitated, Ashley insisted on hearing the full story.
I’m not sure Ashley was ready for what the coach said next about Tina wanting her gone:
“And Celestine had a color issue, so this is what she said: When she came back to my apartment to tell me I made the right decision, she told me that it was just as well. And this is a direct quote: ‘Ashley is talented, but she is so big, she towers over the other girls, and she is too dark and ugly.'”
Another thing said about Tina is that she allegedly forced Kelly Rowland to cut her hair because she didn’t want anyone looking better than Beyoncé. I say allegedly because the pixie cut was huge back then, so it could have been Kelly’s idea. But there are rumors that Tina made her cut it. The pixie didn’t seem to work against Kelly because she looked iconic, and in most interviews, she’s asked about those pixie cuts. A lot of people agree that Kelly looked amazing with short hair, but when you consider that it might have been done to keep her from outshining Beyoncé, it takes on a different meaning.
These are just a few of the things that have been said about Tina being a controlling narcissist, and there’s plenty more out there. Allegedly, even her ex-husbands have had things to say about her behavior. But what else have I missed? What is it about Tina that just doesn’t sit right with you? Share your thoughts in the comments below.”
