Rethinking The Social Stigma Of Tattoos
It’s time for us to reassess things.
Regardless of the stance you decide to take on the subject of tattoos, fact is: everyone has an opinion. These opinions tend to take on a very polarizing position as well, typically being quite revering of, or strictly opposed to. Why is this?
At the end of the day tattoos are just drawings placed on someone’s flesh, so why does this so often come with such an unnecessary debate?
Older generations have tried to drill into our minds the ideas regarding what tattoos say about someone — that people who have them are thugs, jailbirds, lowlifes and so on. That very well may have been the case decades ago, when the process of getting a tattoo was a much more complicated and rare practice, but nowadays getting a tattoo is easier than getting a passport photo.
I see dozens of people with tattoos everyday, and those are just people with visible ones. I can’t help but doubt all these people are lowlifes walking around attempting to project their anarchy through body modifications. But hey, you never know — maybe Stacy at Sephora did earn that infinity symbol on her wrist after stabbing someone in prison to boost her yard status; I don’t know her, I’m sure she has layers to her character.
But I’m certainly not going to make such an assumption about her simply because she has some ink on her skin.
People enjoy making assumptions about one another. It makes them feel comfortable, believing they are all knowing of others. I mean sure, maybe some assumptions are more accurate than others, like how if a guy has “entrepreneur” in his twitter bio he is guaranteed to cheat on you; or if a girl’s favourite Rihanna album is Rated R she probably carries a can-opener in her purse. But these are all just preconceived notions based on simple assumptions. You can never truly understand someone without speaking to them first.
The issue with assumptions surrounding tattoos is that they’re rooted in something much deeper than personal feelings about aestheticism — it comes from a place of classism.
Despite the fact that millions of people all around the world from different economic backgrounds have tattoos on their bodies, there still exists the ridiculous notion that tattoos are a signifier of the underclass or anarchic counterculture. This prejudice is not only painfully ignorant, it’s comical. So let me explain to you just what tattoos REALLY are about.
For starters, tattoos did not originate in the 1950’s amongst rowdy sailors or beastly prison inmates, they actually go back thousands of years — beginning in the Oceania area and their indigenous tribes.
Tattoos originally served as status symbols amongst tribe members usually reserved for the most honoured of these members — or dare I even say, upperclass. The social significance of tattoos has been widely studied by historians and anthropologists as a means of better understanding lost civilizations and their cultures. The Royal Ontario Museum had an entire exhibit about the history of tattoos last summer. So suck it, snobs, and ask yourself when was the last time your “cultured” bougie ass went to a museum?
Another assumption being made of people with tattoos is that there is another correlation of class — in that people that have them are typically poor and probably ghetto.
Listen, if you know one thing about tattoos, it’s that they’re expensive as hell. An average parlour in Toronto charges a minimum of $85 for something as basic as an infinity symbol the size of a quarter (what’s up, Stacy?). Go into a custom piece, and they start charging upwards of $150 an hour, before taxes. So no matter how “ghetto” a dude on the street with two full sleeves and an inked up neck might appear, just remember that’s a guy who knew how to save up a nest egg and budget himself before dropping thousands of dollars on his body art.
And that’s just for average tattoo parlours. Move up to some world renowned tattoo shops and you see what quality costs you. Perhaps the most famous tattoo studio in the U.S., if not the world, Bang Bang Tattoos in New York City charges a flat rate of $300 USD per hour for their work, and rightly so. The craft these men and women create is something of considerable talent, and they know their worth. So if you expect a top quality piece or artwork then you had better be prepared to pay them top dollar for their artistic work. And believe me, this talent attracts quite the clientele.
Celebrities know that their image is everything, and if they’re going to commit their bodies to a permanent aesthetic for the world to see then they had better invest well. Fashionable clothes and accessories aren’t the only indicators of style, as a custom tattoo from a top artist is more valuable than a tailored suit or hemmed designer gown could ever be.
Lady Gaga has worn probably every designer’s clothes in existence ranging from Brandon Maxwell to Yves Saint Laurent, but nothing is more iconic than her custom black and white roses on her side done by tattoo legend Kat Von D. And no matter what glamorous outfit Rihanna might be wearing when she steps onto a red carpet, it’s her unique henna styled hand tattoo by Keith “Bang Bang” McCurdy that is her signature accessory.
With superstars as their regular clients, you can guarantee these artists have become quite in demand, and they can only accept so many clients a year willing to pay a starting rate of $950 USD for a custom Bang Bang piece.
It has taken some time, but the world is slowly starting to understand why the title of tattoo artist is something not taken lightly.
As someone who has been collecting tattoos for years — I got my first tattoo after just turning 16 and haven’t gone more than 9 months without getting one since — I can safely say that it’s really not that big of a deal.
To me, they are literally just drawings on my body that I happen to love and that’s why I got them, for myself.
I remember my parents first being mortified about me making such a big decision at a young age — one that would last me the rest of my life. Yet they didn’t mind me deciding when I was only 17 which university I would attend in order to pursue a career that would define the direction of my life.
Eventually however they began to lose this sense of anxiety, as they realized a drawing on my body has nearly zero effect on my life opportunities or inner self — besides the fact I like the way I look a little bit more. They have since given up on begging me to stop getting them, as they have lost count on how many I even have, and know that I’m going to make decisions about my own body with my own money.
I have one moderately sizeable tattoo on my outer wrist that is highly noticeable. To this day, it has not brought me any difficulty getting a job, apartment, or education; contrary to the beliefs that older people in my life have insisted to me.
I have mentioned to several of my friends my plan to one day get a tattoo that’ll extend to cover my entire left hand. People have warned me against this — they believe that a tattoo should always be able to be covered up, but I say fuck that. I refuse to let outside perception force me to hide something that I’ve envisioned in my head, put years of thought into, worked hard to be able to afford and endured hours of pain in order to possess.
I can’t cure ignorance or rid people of their judgements, all I can do is celebrate an art form that has existed for thousand of years all over the world, provided jobs for thousand of hard-working artists, and made me feel more comfortable in my own technicolor skin.
