And about Tattoos…

216 thoughts on And about Tattoos…

1. I personally find your linking being tattooed with wanting attention is really offensive – It feels like close kin to “If you wear that skirt, you must want to be catcalled”. I’m a visibly tattooed female-bodied person, and I got all of mine not because they’re “sexy”, though I know that some people find them sexy, or to have an “edge”, though I know that they make some people view me very differently to how they’d view a non-tattooed person, but because I enjoy them as art.

   If there’s any deeper reason, I like that they allow me to always be wearing something fancy, even when I’m just lounging around in canvas trousers and a shirt. I often feel self-conscious about wearing beautiful clothes or even makeup, so it’s nice to have something which is mine, and beautiful, and portable, but which I can choose to hide from the public when I want to.

   As for finding them acceptable on men and to do with “issues” on women, is it because you may have internalized some of society’s demands that women be as lowest-common-denominator-attractive as possible, whereas men can come in all shapes and sizes and styles and still be conventionally attractive?

2. I got my first tattoo to spite my boyfriend at the time. When I was 18, I was involved in a (brief) relationship that ended when he slapped me. Before the actual violence, though, he was extremely controlling – and one of the things he was very stern about was that he did not want “his” woman to be marked up with piercings, tattoos, etc. So when we broke up, I went and got my first tattoo on my upper arm – I dipped my cat’s paws in ink and put them on paper to get the prints and got those done. In a way, it was absolutely my way of making the breakup permanent in that I know if I did that, he’d never want me back (I also got my navel and lip pierced in the same day). I eventually got three others – a bonsai tree, a German flag style one and a Sioux-inspired one (those last two are for my parents).

   I do think that part of the discomfort with with chest and arm tattoos is that they’re almost impossible to cover up in certain settings (though I work with a female lawyer whose currently sweating her ass off due to mandated long sleeves because of arm tattoos).

   I wouldn’t assume that the location of a tattoo is really symbolic. Many artists will suggest locations based upon the size and complexity of the design. Your relative may simply be putting the design there because that’s the best place for it, from an artistic or convienance perspective. I think the belief that if somebody puts a tattoo where others can see it, ergo they are clearly intending for others to see it isn’t very strong. Like I said, the person getting the tattoo may simply be indifferent to its placement, not care whether it draws attention, etc. So I don’t necessarily think it’s a craving for attention from others in any way. Like I said, it could solely be a matter of convienance.

3. I think chest tats look tacky on both men and women, so…I dunno. I don’t associate them with anything other than ” that person likes that tat”. I have 3, 2 were drunkenly done at 16 with a tat needle but no gun. (painful) and 1 done several months ago by a professional. All are on my ankles because I can hide them if I want or show them if I want. I’ve given too many massages to 75 year old ladies that had “secret” tats to think they’re edgy or anything other than art people wear. Some of it I like, some I don’t, just like any other medium. When everyone and their dog has one, it’s not nearly as attention getting or edgy as some might think.

4. It sounds to me like you’re projecting your feelings about tattoos onto the people who get them, which is questionable at best. Some people get them because they want other people to see, other people get them because they just want them, and want them the size they are and where they are. Tattoos are permanent; most of the people in our lives are much less so. The choice to get one, what to get, and where to put it is usually intensely personal, as are feelings about who gets to see parts or all of it and when. No tattoo inherently means anything, and what meaning it does have belongs to the wearer. They don’t inherently signify a desire for attention or “issues” or anything else.

5. I think that, at most, certain types of easily-visible tattoos might say something about the lines of work a person is not interested in. I’m not picturing a person with skull neck tattoos getting hired at a Catholic prep school, generally. But that’s about the limit of intent that I attribute towards them. (Unless the tat in question is like a Nazi swastika in which case, yes, that’s probably about being an asshole. :p)

6. I can’t help feeling like it’s a cry for …something. (Help? Attention? Is it armor? Is it just sexy?)

   As the least tattooed and youngest of a family of heavily tattooed people, I can honestly say I never really thought too much about what the rest of the world thought about my tattoos. They’re just what my brothers and sisters and parents and I do. My sister’s chest pieces are epic. And my brother has the absolute worst back piece ever, ever conceived and put to skin. I have a few really nice pieces, all of which are on regular display in my daily life.

   It never occurred to me, until now, that anyone could use them as an excuse to “put there shit off on me.”

   So, yeah, thanks for that.

7. A dear internet friend of mine has tattoo sleeves as well as chest tattoos. They’re gorgeous and wonderful and they define her as a unique and wonderful person. And people just like you, Eve, call her a crack whore or worse because of those tattoos. They’re vile to her and judge her for no reason other than she chose to decorate her body a certain way.

   Judgement of looks is a terrible way to treat someone you don’t know. And it would be even worse if it were someone you did know.

8. I’m pretty uncomfortable with an entire blog post dedicated to postulating about women’s bodies and extrapolating implications on their cries for “Help? Attention? Is it armor? Is it just sexy?”

   People probably get tattoos for any number of reasons. Perhaps instead of focusing the conversation on other people’s appearance we could use this as an opportunity to focus on our own judgement and assumptions – and how we can overcome them to stop valuing (or not) people based on their appearance.

   1. Guys, can we recognize that Eve wasn’t actually extrapolating the meanings or motivations of women’s tattoos? She was, in fact, saying that she had a particular experience with presenting a non-standard appearance that was motivated by a desire to seem “edgy,” and she’s wondering if other women who also intentionally present a non-standard appearance have similar desires. Which is why she asked questions. And which is why she directed those questions specifically at women who have had the experience she’s wondering about. She’s definitely not focusing on her own judgments and assumptions; she’s presenting her experience, recognizing that she has a particular reaction to particular types of tattoos, and then asking all of us to weigh in with our own experiences and reasons for tattooing ourselves.

9. I do sort of have to wonder – you bring up your experience with dreads as something you did for cosmetic / attention reasons. But surely you know that dreads, for many people in the world, are deeply political, symbolic or religious (such as the Rastafarians, who wear them as a matter of faith). So, for you personally, a tattoo might be about the same motivations as the dreads, but is it really hard to believe that some people may have their own non-attention seeking reasons for getting tattoos? (And yes, tattoos can be religious / social / political statements as well). Not all tattoos are done for the same reasons.

   (I mention this because over the summer, we got to travel to New Zealand – and meeting Maori people, who tattoo for very profound reasons made me appreciate the practice of tattooing far more than I did before).

10. I’m about to get my first tattoo (on my shoulder, although I might have gotten a chest piece or sleeves if it wasn’t for 1. cost, and 2. the fact that my family has strong opinions about tattoos and I don’t want to start a fight). I’m getting it because I think I might be about to go a rough time in my life, and I want my tattoo to be a promise to myself that I’ll be OK.

    I guess my point is that people get tattoos for lots of reasons. Some people get them as a cry for help or attention, like you said. Some people get them as a promise to themselves. Some people get them as memorials to lost loves ones. Some people just get them because they think it’s attractive. If your daughter is getting a chest piece but there’s nothing else going on don’t worry about it, and if she’s getting a chest piece and it turns out it IS a cry for help worry about what she needs help with, not the tattoo.

11. I raised an eyebrow about that line in your previous post. Now I’m fairly sure my eyebrows are levitating off my face.

    So in other words, visible tattoos on men are neutral, and yet on women they’re a sign of some sort of damage? Have you even read what you wrote? What is that bizarre question about trans people you’ve tacked onto the end even asking?

    Signed,
    A trans man with both dreadlocks and tattoos who is far from “edgy.”

    1. I will again ask that we please back up, read what Eve actually wrote, and not project all of our own issues and defensiveness about our tattoos on to her post. She did not say that tattoos on women are a sign of “damage.” She did say that she has some history with using visible indicators of “difference” to express her own issues, and that influences her perception of certain tattoos. She clearly realizes that her own perception isn’t the reality of every woman with a large and visible tattoo, which is why she is asking for other experiences and viewpoints. She also clearly indicates that her focus on women instead of men isn’t the fault of women with tattoos — it’s an issue with Eve herself, or society, or both, or something else.

       Sheesh. This is why the Feministe commentariat scares away bloggers and guest-bloggers and new commenters. When there’s a community-wide immediate reaction to TAKE ISSUE with anything a writer puts out, or to read it in the worst possible light, we have a problem.

       So again: Before commenting, take a step back and read what Eve wrote. Try to separate what Eve wrote from what a family member or friend or anti-tattoo message board somewhere said. Try to recognize that sometimes having conversations without One True Answer is a good thing and an interesting thing. Those conversations at times require sharing one’s own biases and reactions which may be unfair, but walking in and commenting from a place of trying to be The Best Feminist On The Internet doesn’t lead to a particularly productive discussion; being honest about one’s own biases (and recognizing those biases are often unfair and limited) and explaining how one’s past led one to that perspective, and then asking for and engaging other views and experiences, is good writing and powerful community-building.

12. This post reminds me of a trip I took to Chicago with my partner and his parents. My mother-in-law (who is in most respects a progressive individual) was surprised by all the women with visible tattoos, and wondered at some point “why they would want to do that to themselves”. She didn’t comment on any of the tattooed guys.

    I get the impression that her and your feelings about visible tattoos on men vs. woman has to do with the male gaze, and ideas of what male and female presenting bodies are “for”. A tattoo on a man is just a tattoo because his body belongs to him. Women, on the other hand, are there to be looked at, and so alterations to their appearance are coded as “sexy” or “edgy” or “attention-seeking”.

    I’m not trying to say that this is a conscious decision that you are making here, exactly, just trying to point out something that can be unpacked from what you wrote.

13. I think I would only worry about a relative getting visible tattoos inasmuch as the tattoos were liable to prevent them from doing things in their life as important to them, or more important to them, than decorating their bodies in a permanent way. I’m not a fan of the fact that tattoos themselves are seen as inherently unprofessional, but I can also get why workplaces aren’t enthused about people with possibly controversial or distracting tattoos in highly visible places (like topless mermaids, or explicitly political or religious tattoos).

    I want to be a doctor, so all visible tattoos are out. I also find the whole idea of permanently marking up my body according to what I like and value at the time frightening and a bit creepy, but I come from a family that doesn’t get tattoos, on either the upper class or the working class side, so I’m not really in the know about tattoo culture.

    But honestly, the barrier to women with tattoos is judgmental attitudes about women with tattoos — there’s nothing about having a chest piece that physically disables someone from being a doctor or a lawyer or a kindergarten teacher or a nuclear physicist. This post is oddly unreflective and, well, unintellectual and unprogressive for Feministe. I don’t get it. What’s your point? You got dreads for stupid reasons, and now you think that gives you right to judge EVERYONE with “alternative” appearances?

14. I have a plethora of tattoos, some easily hidden, some proudly on display. I got them for different reasons, from memorial of a dead relative, to purely aesthetic and pretty, and a few reasons in between. But NONE of them were obtained with the thought process involving what others would think of them, they are all for ME. I had a “friend” once tell me that girls who get tattoos are trashy, but guys who get tattoos are sexy.

    Tattoos are no more a cry for help/attention/whatever than ponytails or pedicures are a cry for whatever, the generalization being made is a rough one, because it’s usually more complicated than that.

15. It takes a lot of energy for me not to internally react to statements about how “dreads/tattoos/piercings = possible edginess and/or other attention whoring issues”.

    The first thing that comes to mind about this problematic belief, is that many of those things were originally culturally appropriated from groups of people who were thought to be exotic, strange, or bizarre. All of a sudden when one pioneering person introduces it to the mainstream, and enough of the cool kids wear it, then it becomes some kind of social statement. And for some things… it’s really not a nice thing.

    A detailed personal example:

    My natural hair texture will easily form into locs, which is how I choose to wear my hair. As did many of my foremothers and ancestors further back. It’s part of my ethnic identity and I embrace this as a piece of living heritage. But somehow, what is natural and traditional for me gets lumped in with what is punkish and counterculture in the larger sphere… which hasn’t even existed for near as long.

    I’m going to be honest and say, I don’t typically like what I encounter when I see a white person with “dreads”. The majority that *I* have met seem to conflate wearing them with lifestyle choices that many black folks who wear locs don’t want any association with. I’m employing a big bad stereotype about “dread heads” right here, but try and convince me that any bit of this same stereotype doesn’t impact the perception of PoC more heavily when it’s lumped on them too.

    Notice, I call what I wear locs instead of “dreads” or “dreadlocks”. This is a purposeful divergence that many black folks felt the need to create in order to create distance ourselves from the mainstream takeover of “dreads”. You can see the evidence of this in places all over the internet… see the difference in images that come up with these two word searches.

16. Ugh, reading over the last sentence of my previous, it maybe sounds like I’m telling you how to raise your daughter. I apologize, Eve.

17. Sometimes the commenters on this blog seem like they’re in a race to be offended first, or else seem determined to be just eagerly, willfully obstinate within the guise of some kind of extra open-mindedness.

    I will try to engage the OPs actual points and questions (never blanket accusations or assumptions, as far as I can tell… how are people reading this so differently?)

    I know *a lot* of people with tattoos (I have one on the inside of my forearm), and in my experience– for both men and women– the ones that put them in highly visible, physically sensitive areas like the chest and neck have frequently had more troubled histories than those I know that don’t have any, or have just a few in discrete locations. Is this the case because, for certain people, they’re a kind of display of toughness? They went through this pain as a kind of micro-symbol of past trauma, which they still carry with them?

    In other cases, visible tattoos can be leftovers from a harder lifestyle, and it’s difficult to simply block out that possibility when first seeing or meeting someone. For instance, I know a lot of people steeped in car and bike culture, many of whom turned to those interests *after* beating some severe drug addictions and/or criminal histories. It definitely seems like my (20s/30s) generation is embracing a much more lax and accepting attitude toward tattoos in general, but I don’t think we’ve completely shook those kinds of stigmas… And still, pain and permanence are inherent to tattoos which, I think, will always be considered when thinking about them as a choice someone made.

    Also, tattoos can be great personal storytelling mediums, displaying the things an individual is interested in or exhibiting their particular aesthetic/style preferences on the one hand, and on the other indicating *at least* an edgier or more intriguing perspective than the average bear.

    Obviously none of this applies to everyone who has EVER gotten a chest tattoo EVER EVER, but I fail to see how these kinds of observations are inherently offensive when it is absolutely the case for many, many people… And in some cases, what value would it be to completely eliminate those assumptions if some people are indeed using them, consciously or subconsciously, as signals or red flags?

    All of which makes tattooing an intriguing part of the culture, and of human interaction! Love ’em.

18. I am deeply involved in Japanese street fashion, which is really dramatic, attention-getting, and hyper-feminine. I get a lot of attention, and the negative attention upsets and occasionally frightens me, but the postive really makes me happy,

    I enjoy being seen, having my effort to project my personality be seen and appreciated. I’m not doing it for attention, I’m doing for interaction, as a way to start a dialogue. Even if a person doesn’t speak to me, I feel I’ve started an internal dialogue in them.

    Other people I know, dress for themselves only, and hate ANY kind of attention or commentary. Some are frightened by it, some are offended to be treated like a object to be seen (I, on the other hand, embrace the idea of being an object to be seen).

    I think any kind of public presentation have people of different elements. I think, in general, tats are to make a statement about who you are, but whether that statement is meant to be read by the public or the tattooed person really varies. My mother, at 45, got a tattoo on her lower back, above a scar she got when she was nearly stung to death by hornets. A hornet now sits on that scar, and she has never fully articulated even to me what this tattoo means. She doesn’t talk about it, or show it to anyone.

    My cousin the tattoo artist has covered his body, and he loves to talk the meaning of his tats, when and where he got them, what they represent.

    His brother the soldier has memorial tattoos, of the men he served with in combat who died. He is willing to talk about those only with family and close friends, and when strangers pry he gets terse and angry.

    My friend has a religious tattoo he only will discuss with people who share his faith. He was considering getting several more tattoos of pop-culture things he loves, and he told me, “I will never hate my tattoos. They are a reminder of who I am now, and if I’m fifty years old I can look down at the Dragonball Z tattoo on my wrist and remember who I was when I was 25. Why wouldn’t I want that?”

    I think really visible tattoos do position you in society, as a person who feels very strongly about who they are, and often isn’t invested in other people’s ideas. Sometimes such a person wants to be heard as making a statement, other people are making a statement about how they are supremely uninterested in what you think or how you evaluate their body.

19. I take issue with people who assume that everyone who gets visible tattoos have not considered the permanence and the social ramifications.

    I know a girl who, when she was in her late teens, started covering herself with tattoos. Many she had designed herself. My mother, every time this girl comes up, always mentions how beautiful this girl is and how she ‘could have been a model if she wanted to’ (this is true) and what is she going to do one day if she wants to get an office job?

    I always have to point out that a) as more people get tattooed, more people are becoming accepting of the practice and b) she’s probably not the type who is going to WANT to have an office job.

    I just always find the whole ‘what about when you’re old?’ to be paternalistic and concern-trolling. Fact is, tattoos ARE permanent AND hella expensive. So not a lot of people just go get them (or at least, large back and chest pieces or sleeves) willy-nilly.

20. haha well if you thought that women with tattoos didnt have issues… just take a look at the the defensiveness and wierdness on display in this thread.

21. Jill, I am trying to keep your comments in mind while I write this, but I really do bristle at Eve’s words, particularly “I can’t help feeling like it’s a cry for something…” She’s entitled to her opinions, but that statement was clumsily worded at best and hugely judgmental at worst – why is the go-to assumption that tattooed women must have some kind of fucked-up-ed-ness?

    So anyways, to answer her question, I have a large chest piece and a full sleeve. I hold multiple degrees, work in a conservative professional environment, and do not have any daddy/attention/armour/cry-for-help issues. I got my tattoos because I like them, plain and simple. It’s an art form that I’ve admired since I was a little kid, and I think that large pieces in particular are stunning when well-executed (which I like to think mine are).

    After being warned by several family members that my tattoos would impact my career, I’ve been delighted by the response to them at work – while I generally keep them covered (because really, why would I be wearing a tube top at the office anyways?!), edges peek out, and I’ve only ever received positive remarks about them.

    It’s funny to realize that the suit-and-tie civil servant baby boomer set think my tattoos are beautiful, while the guest blogger on a progressive feminist blog thinks I must be sad and want attention.

22. I went back and re-read this, and, while I did attempt to see where Eve solely places the issues on herself, that is not how it comes across. If Eve wanted to make it very clear that she KNOWS that her personal feelings are not the major reason why women get tattoos, then it should have been made much clearer. And to me, that partly begs the question – if she knows that her feelings are not really correct for the vast majority of people and that women get tattoos for a huge variety of reasons – then what is there to discuss? The piece isn’t really a strong rumination on the cultural and societal disparties in treatment between tattooed men vs. women – it’s one experience being extrapolated out.

    And if its clear the author is writing from an admittedly biased perspective, there needs to be an acknowledgement of the bias. This, I think, is why people bristled – it did not come across as an admission of bias, but just bias itself. So I’ll leave it at that. But I do enjoy a chance to talk about tattoos, since it has so much feminist potential.

23. After being warned by several family members that my tattoos would impact my career

    I feel like there are two kinds of ways people can come at you about this.

    My aunt is the kind of person who really thinks I’m too stupid to know my decisions have consequences and she has to be an adult to remind me.

    My mother likes to hear my decision making process and asks open-ended questions about my choices, without judgment or telling me what to do. My mom often prefaces her warnings with, “I know you probably know this, and I’m sorry if this is disrespectful, but just in case, X.”

24. It’s funny to realize that the suit-and-tie civil servant baby boomer set think my tattoos are beautiful, while the guest blogger on a progressive feminist blog thinks I must be sad and want attention.

    If you’re taking this personally, you’re missing the point. To word it differently, she’s asking whether tattoos have a relationship to trauma. And yes, according to nearly every sociological impact study out there, they absolutely do. How does that translate to our trauma-whitewashed culture? People wear signs of their trauma literally on their sleeves and carry them as a point of pride and reclamation, or, well, as an expression of trauma. Tattooed people are conflicted about their tattoos. That’s not a reflection on your person.

    I guarantee a good portion of the suit-and-tie civil servant baby boomer set you’re speaking of is just being polite. I’m saying this as a corporate ladder-climbing mother of two with three massive, conspicuous tattoos.

25. To word it differently, she’s asking whether tattoos have a relationship to trauma. And yes, according to nearly every sociological impact study out there, they absolutely do.

    Lauren, out of real curiousity – can you cite the studies? I wasn’t a sociology major, but I do recall a discussion of tattooing in my psych and anthropology classes, and I don’t recall the practice largely related to trauma. I do recall that the practice varies widely for people – and that they run the gamut from trauma based to celebratory. I’m not attacking you, I’m generally curious what the studies out there are and whether you know them.

26. I went back and re-read this, and, while I did attempt to see where Eve solely places the issues on herself, that is not how it comes across. If Eve wanted to make it very clear that she KNOWS that her personal feelings are not the major reason why women get tattoos, then it should have been made much clearer. And to me, that partly begs the question – if she knows that her feelings are not really correct for the vast majority of people and that women get tattoos for a huge variety of reasons – then what is there to discuss? The piece isn’t really a strong rumination on the cultural and societal disparties in treatment between tattooed men vs. women – it’s one experience being extrapolated out.

    I think Eve was assuming that the audience was capable of having a conversation on a personal essay and asking the audience to share their personal experiences without needing to bend over backwards to explain she wasn’t judging anyone or that we needed to have consensus on whether tattoos are okay or not okay. (Ladies, they’re okay.)

27. I spent the first 40 years of my life in the northeast US. Tattoos were uncommon, at least as far as I could tell. Bikers got tattoos. And I thought tattoos were ugly — because I had only ever seen ugly tattoos.

    When I moved to the west coast of Canada, I got a whole different view of tattoos. They were relatively common, lots of different kinds of people had them, and many that I saw were beautiful.

    I got my first, and so far only, tattoo a couple of years after I moved. It’s a tattoo of Raven Steals the Light, a Haida story. It’s on my upper right arm, so it tends to be visible in the summer. I was drawn to a particular rendering of this iconic image by a native artist whose work I admired. I was hesitant about using this image because I am not First Nations (that I know of). So when I saw the artist, I asked him if he thought it was OK for me to get the tattoo, and he said yes. I later showed him the result, and he was pleased (the tattoo artist, also native, was very good).

    I got it as a kind of rite of passage. I had moved across a continent and across an international boundary to start my life over again in many ways. It was part liberation from east coast conventions, part embracing of the culture of the indigenous local peoples. I hope that my ink honours those cultures.

    I didn’t get it to be noticed, but I’m happy when someone does notice and appreciates it.

    I’m rather slow and careful about my skin art. After all, it’s permanent! And whatever I put on myself has to be meaningful to me. But I am now contemplating a new design, probably for my left shoulder onto the back and arm. Another rite of passage.

    I personally wouldn’t want a chest tattoo, and I’m not particularly fond of that location, but others can make their own decisions. I know people with quite prominent ink, and the only thing I think about that is that their ink is gorgeous.

28. I’m trying to keep Eve’s OP in mind as well as your comments, Jill, but white people getting dreadlocks just to be edgy makes me quite uncomfortable. It’s appropriation, and yeah, Eve, maybe you understand that now and have moved past it but its something I think many progressive white people don’t think of so I’m glad others on the thread are pointing it out.

    As far as tattoos go, I don’t think i’ll ever be able to get one because of a skin condition so I can’t comment on that facet. I don’t really judge people on their tattoos unless they’re problematic or done poorly i.e. a misspelled tattoo, a “tribal” or nonsense Chinese character tattoo, or this one man I saw on the train who had a giant arm tat of a disembodied stripper pelvis stuffed with dollar bills that read “cash rules everything.”

    The majority of tattoos I’ve seen have been (if they weren’t aesthetically awesome) thought provoking, even if thoughts were just “wonder what this means to its owner?”

    1. I suppose it likely comes from not living in the US, but dreadlocks have never seemed particularly appropriative to me. Maybe they sometimes are and the different context matters (it almost certainly does), but I struggle to understand how something that happens so naturally, and has appeared in so many cultures over time, can be seen to be the cultural property of a particular group of people.

       I would draw a connection between braiding my hair. I don’t believe that just braiding my hair is appropriation; I do think braiding my hair in a particular way specifically to look like the people of a particular culture could be appropriation.

29. Lauren, out of real curiousity – can you cite the studies? I wasn’t a sociology major, but I do recall a discussion of tattooing in my psych and anthropology classes, and I don’t recall the practice largely related to trauma. I do recall that the practice varies widely for people – and that they run the gamut from trauma based to celebratory. I’m not attacking you, I’m generally curious what the studies out there are and whether you know them.

    Unfortunately I don’t off the top of my head. I used to be a regular at a local tattoo shop that kept a library of picture books about tattooing. It was a regular theme.

30. …as an expression of trauma. Tattooed people are conflicted about their tattoos. That’s not a reflection on your person.

    Maybe it’s because I forgot my coffee at home today, but this is failing to make any sense to me. My tattoos are an expression of some trauma that I’ve apparently experienced? But making that huge generalization isn’t a reflection on my person?

    Fascinating.

31. Oh, and also a tattoo a white girl i knew in college had of Pocahontas, who she considered her spirit sister or something. My eyebrows went all the way to the ceiling, and my eyes rolled across the earth.

32. Jeez, Lauren, that’s odd. Funny of commentators on a blog that’s dedicated in part to dissecting bias to demand that when one articulates a bias, one should acknowledge it up front and say so rather than present it without any comment. Jeez, who would have thunk it?

    (I realize this is a derail, but Lauren seems to be bending over backwards to make this post seem totally A-OK, when it really is not). (Jill, feel free to delate this).

33. Unfortunately I don’t off the top of my head. I used to be a regular at a local tattoo shop that kept a library of picture books about tattooing. It was a regular theme.

    But that’s not what I asked. You said “sociological studies.” So I assumed that you meant actual studies that were published in sociological journals and the like. I think you make be conflating a theme in imagery with cultural attitudes, and they’re not the same thing.

34. Maybe it’s because I forgot my coffee at home today, but this is failing to make any sense to me.

    Sorry, “SOME” tattooed people are conflicted about their tattoos. THAT is not a reflection on your person.

    It’s me that forgot the coffee.

    Jeez, Lauren, that’s odd. Funny of commentators on a blog that’s dedicated in part to dissecting bias to demand that when one articulates a bias, one should acknowledge it up front and say so rather than present it without any comment. Jeez, who would have thunk it?

    Or the bias is obvious and doesn’t need to be explicitly articulated. It’s a personal essay, not a paper on critical theory.

35. I just always find the whole ‘what about when you’re old?’ to be paternalistic and concern-trolling.

    When I was about 10, I spent some time a man who had tattoos that he’d gotten while serving during WWII (a work colleague of my mother’s). They looked pretty dreadful 50 years on–text blurry, images fuzzy. I am sure tattooing technology has improved a lot since then, but when I’m struck by the idea of getting a tattoo, the idea of “Eh, what is that going to look like when I’m 70?” always stops me.

36. Tattooed people are conflicted about their tattoos.

    I wonder if you can elaborate on what you mean by “conflicted” here, Lauren? Because I really am not conflicted about my future tattoo in any way I can conceive of.

37. @Sulyp:

    WORD to everything you’ve said.

    I too refer to my hair as locs, and for the reasons you’ve mentioned.

    I’m sure that there are plenty of wonderful well-meaning white people who wear their hair “dreaded.” But every time I see one, I can’t help but think that said person either:

    1) Doesn’t know that many black folks consider this a form of appropriation.

    or

    2) Knows but doesn’t care.

    In my experience, it’s almost always been #2. I don’t care to associate with those people.

    Even if I did meet a white person with dreads and they managed to convince me that they are in the first category, I’m usually not in the mood to be the good sweet Teaching Negro and thus, I don’t care to associate with those people either.

38. Oops, and I see you answered the question while I was typing. My bad.

39. But that’s not what I asked. You said “sociological studies.” So I assumed that you meant actual studies that were published in sociological journals and the like. I think you make be conflating a theme in imagery with cultural attitudes, and they’re not the same thing.

    They had a library of some 200+ books on tattoos that were picture heavy because they were used as references for the artists. That doesn’t mean they were devoid of scholarship. You can google it. There is plenty out there.

40. I think the thing that is bizarre to me in some of these comments is the vehement denial that tattoos could or should have any perceived meaning for the person viewing them.

    We all have to cope with the way that people will interpret our appearance, whether we are facing judgements about things that we have no control over (race, sex, physical stature, disabilities) or things that we do (how we dress, tattoos, piercings, the car we drive, etc.) People take advantage of this all the time to manipulate people’s perceptions of them; they buy nice cars and clothing in the hopes that that will make them look rich and, in turn, acceptable or even superior to their fellow man.

    I’m not saying that perceptions are always accurate. Wearing a short skirt doesn’t mean that you are “asking for it” but it does signify something (we can say, definitively, that you are not a member of a religious sect or culture that precludes that form of dress). There are also a variety of psychological conclusions (accurate on a case-by-case basis) that can be drawn based on why you would be attracted to whatever you have identified as your style.

    In turn, we make choices, weighing the reactions that we will get when we step out into the world in our decisions. (I don’t wear 5 inch heels when I’m around my father, for example, because I don’t want to hear what he will have to say . . . and because I don’t own any).

    Obviously, social perceptions change over time, but when you get a tattoo in a highly visible place, I have to assume that as an intelligent person, you are aware of the perceptions and even stigmas that will come with it in today’s world. And the CHOICE to apply something to your body IN SPITE OF these perceptions does indicate something of a disregard for the value of these perceptions, at least to me. Perhaps this is the “edge” that has been referenced in the opening post. How each person feels about this “disregard of dominant social perceptions” – admire it, think it’s foolhardy or limiting – is up to them.

    But denying or feeling offended that people will react at all to our physical appearance seems pretty forcefully naive.

41. Eve, you done been piled on! Welcome to the family! :p

42. They had a library of some 200+ books on tattoos that were picture heavy because they were used as references for the artists. That doesn’t mean they were devoid of scholarship. You can google it. There is plenty out there.

    If they were image books, they were most likely artistic in nature. What you initially said was “And yes, according to nearly every sociological impact study out there, they absolutely do. So, uh, I sorta assumed that you were talking about actual sociological studies, with data, that come from realy scholarship, peer-reviewed journals. I did a quick Google and came back with no study currently out there. So, I mean, if there are actual impact studies with data, great, but I’m not finding them. I assumed you meant studies, which is the word you actuallu used, as opposed to books for artistic reference.

43. So, uh, I sorta assumed that you were talking about actual sociological studies, with data, that come from realy scholarship, peer-reviewed journals.

    I was.

44. Jill, you’ve said multiple times that this is not a Feminist 101 blog. That means guest bloggers get thrown into the deep end and don’t get mollycoddled when people are offended by their writing.

    As far as tattoos and trauma or tattoos and wanting attention, most of my tattooed friends did not get tattoos because of trauma. I sure didn’t. I have tattoos (and will get more) that represent periods in my life that I want to remember and celebrate. Every tattoo I have, I have gone with another friend (or two), so I have them forever tied to my memory and my body as well; even if those friends fade out of my life, I will always have this great memory of them.

    When I was younger, I parroted my dad when he would talk about my sister’s chest piece, a gorgeous tree. In fact, his coworkers still refer to her as “Willow” because my dad derisively talks about how it will be a weeping willow when she is older. When my sister would complain about creepers leerily asking to see the rest of the tree, my dad would have no sympathy. But that borders on victim-blaming; she must want the attention, she put it on her chest, therefore she must deal with the consequences.

    I can definitely see that tattoo (and my tattoos) as a bit of rebellion against our parents, but on the whole, these tattoos mean much much more to both of us than any desire to be rebellious or edgy. I think that can be a facet to getting a tattoo, but for most people it’s not the biggest factor, and it feels condescending when people assume that.

    1. Jill, you’ve said multiple times that this is not a Feminist 101 blog. That means guest bloggers get thrown into the deep end and don’t get mollycoddled when people are offended by their writing.

       I’m not asking commenters to coddle the guest-bloggers. I am asking that commenters not act like jerks. Commenters willfully misreading posts, looking for some flaw, and only commenting to TAKE ISSUE with a PROBLEMATIC line in a post has become the standard of engagement around here. It’s frustrating for the regular bloggers (we also enjoy productive conversation and get annoyed when everything we write seems to be read primarily for fault-finding), but it’s extra frustrating when we invite people int our space and that’s how they’re treated.

45. But denying or feeling offended that people will react at all to our physical appearance seems pretty forcefully naive.

    I don’t think that’s what people are arguing about. I think people are saying that the particular perception the author is talking about is not always correct (although sometimes it is) and that the perception might be rooted in some questionable ideas.

46. @ Lauren.

    The first study I googled said tattoos were NOT related to trauma.

    http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10932550

    I don’t have a very academic background though, so I might be missing something.

    I am interested in the subject though, so if you could point me in a more fruitful direction, I’d be grateful.

47. haha well if you thought that women with tattoos didnt have issues… just take a look at the the defensiveness and wierdness on display in this thread.

    Hey, Chiara, just for the record? You’re being an asshole.

48. @ the people who are claiming that white people wearing dreads is cultural appropriation:

    You need to study your history a bit. Dreads have been worn by dozens of cultures, many (most?) of which have not been African (Maori, Indian and Tibetan Buddhists and the ancient Irish, to name a couple. There’s some evidence Incan preists did this, too, for what it’s worth). Dreadlocks are not inherently ‘black,’ they are what happens to hair if you don’t brush or cut it over a long period of time (though to be sure there are other methods of getting ‘locs). Calling dreads on white people appropriation is silly.

49. haha well if you thought that women with tattoos didnt have issues… just take a look at the the defensiveness and wierdness on display in this thread.

    Why the fuck is Chiara still allowed to post here?

50. Another thing that this thread made me think of is that my tattoos (for me, I can’t speak for other women) are kind of a big F U to the patriarchy. I’m claiming my body as my own, branding it in the most literal sense. It’s my scream of defiance to The Man. So maybe my tattoos are more rooted in issues than I thought, but it helps me feel like I’m doing SOMETHING to challenge patriarchy.

51. I have two tattoos, large and colorful, and I want more. I love my tattoos because they are lovely works of art that I adore having on my body.

    I generally assume that about other tattooed people – that they love their body art, and they want to carry it with them.

52. But then, Lauren, if they were scientific journals, why are they not showing up in Google? And why would they be included in artistic reference books that are predominantly used by artists? I mean, I just ran google using “tatto trauma study” and the first page is solely of results of treating individuals who were tattooed by force or medical treatments for injuries sustained during a tattooing – not any themes of trauma. Seriously, if you’re gonna come and make such a really broad statement, don’t you think that you should have at least one study to back that up? And you’re saying that almost ALL the sociological data backs you up – but there’s no evidence of it. So that begs the question of whether your initial proposition was correct. It’s your job to present the actual evidence, not anyone else’s to refute it.

53. Drahill, this is the closest thing I’ve found to what Lauren’s talking about, not that it entirely supports the conclusion she was advocating.

54. Lauren, did you mean that sociological studies say that SOME tattoos are related to trauma? I mean, I don’t think that’s really in dispute, but my quick google search couldn’t find anything saying ALL tattoos were related to trauma. From what I saw, sociological studies said that people got tattoos for a variety of reasons, like you’d expect.

55. Dan @49, that’s a really narrow study. It’s important that we don’t pathologize tattoos, and I hope it’s clear that’s not what I’m saying.

    Drahill and Dan, try “Bodies of Subversion,” or any feminist or queer socio or anthropological (esp anthro) approach to tattoo culture. Drahill, I think we’re talking past each other. There’s a healthy discussion of trauma and reclamation in every single tattoo book I’ve ever picked up, pictures or otherwise, provided it wasn’t whitewashing tattooing’s dirty history for a middle-class audience. Even with a passing knowledge of American tattoo culture it’s evident that people link their own tattoos to trauma, memorializing cancer, death, childbirth, break-ups, divorce, etc., not just fashion. It also memorializes membership in certain groups — membership that may or may not change over a lifetime that can and does breed personal conflict, like gang membership or, hell, I know a guy with a Straight Edge tattoo that gets really sheepish when it’s pointed out at the bar. Fashion and expression are part of it, but people really value the experience of getting a tattoo as memorial. Frequently these memorials are trauma-related. This shouldn’t be controversial.

    In my experience, especially having a couple of LARGE trauma-related tattoos is that the trauma didn’t stay with me forever, and sometimes when someone asks me about the meaning behind my tattoos (a question I hate — how do you convey something so personal?) I cringe a little. It’s not that I regret getting them, they are a part of me. It’s that my attitude towards them changes as I grow, personally, emotionally, professionally. That’s my bias.

56. I’ve got both a history of trauma and tattoos, and while I don’t buy that there’s a sociological link between tats and trauma per se, I did get a particular piece (wings) to help me put my trauma behind me.

    I also think that people do get tats in part to communicate something-but I think it has more to do with recording your own personal story, your stages in life, who or what is imprtant to you, which is why people will often get memorial tats, or tats celebrating the completion of something. I also think it’s naive to assume that the story told by your tattoos is for the billion other people in the world to read. Frequently it is just for you and is encoded in deeply personal symbolism, and thus, not on display for consumption by others. (Possible exception being gang tats which show who you are in your group)

    In short, no it isn’t generally an attention thing-attention is a byproduct of having visual stimuli inked on your body, and the more pretty colors the more people will notice you. Do some tattood people like the attention? yes. Do others get really tired of it? yes.

57. I spent some time a man who had tattoos that he’d gotten while serving during WWII (a work colleague of my mother’s). They looked pretty dreadful 50 years on–text blurry, images fuzzy.

    There’s a possibility they may have been pretty dreadful when he got them, depending on the method used. Hand-poked or tattoos done with what is commonly referred to as a ‘prison-gun’ (the ex started with one of these, made from a spoon, a ballpoint pen, a guitar string and a motor from a hand-massager) can often be fuzzy looking.

58. Whatever trauma created this tattoo was the most awesome trauma ever: http://failblog.org/2012/08/22/funny-tattoos-ugliest-tattoos-tesla-win/

59. Hi! Wow!!

    First, I think I should have offered more context for the “family member” reference—this is a girl in her late teens who has been exhibiting a number of potentially troubling signs in the past few years. This large chest piece is one choice in a series of choices that seem to be signposts on a long, possibly dangerous road, which is why I was curious about other people’s perspectives on my making that kind of assumption or association.

    And for me, that was the whole point of this post! I have been thinking about tattoos more than usual lately—my own, my biases, my interactions with people who have them—and I was curious about everyone else’s thoughts. I hope it’s okay for a guest blogger here to want to learn, to engage in open-minded and respectful discourse, and to freely admit when they have points of view and even possibly problematic hang-ups. And if there is a way that this post was specifically offensive in the wording, please let me know, because I’m honestly having a hard time understanding the defensiveness many are displaying in this thread.

    I am confident that I made no blanket statements or assumptions about anybody or anything in my original post… I was relaying a conversation I had in which others (a few men) stated their opinions, and then asking a few questions about what I suspected might have been some shortsighted views (theirs and mine). I, too, was troubled by the fact that “I don’t have such concerns about males having extreme tattoos,” which is why I asked for people’s opinions about that instinctive reaction. How some people have read this as an accusation is quite confusing to me!

    As to my dreadlocks, I was very young, and I was eager to find something that established my independence and edginess after an extremely conservative childhood. Social or racial concerns were not remotely on my mind, and—at the time—tattoos seemed too scary. The hairstyle worked for me, and I felt like it was my passcode into the completely different, far more exciting social group that I began hanging out with. Also, this group is where my thoughts regarding race, gender, sexuality, religion, etc. began to dramatically expand.

    Finally, to the person who said that people “just like me” call your friend a crackwhore and worse… I think you have me mixed up with someone else.

60. Drahill and Dan, try “Bodies of Subversion,” or any feminist or queer socio or anthropological (esp anthro) approach to tattoo culture.

    Ok, here’s the thing; “are people with tattoos more likely to have suffered a trauma than the average person” is an empirical question, so politics and paradigms are irrelevant. What you need to do is find a representative sample of people with tattoos and a control group, and then compare the rates at which those two groups have suffered traumas.

    Feminist theorycrafting is well and good for answering subjective questions like ‘hey, what type of society should we build?’ but has literally zero value for assessing the truth or falsehood of empirical claims like ‘are people with tattoos more likely to have suffered trauma than those without?’

61. @amblingalong, I’m only going to address this one time only before leaving this unproductive exchange:

    You need to study your history a bit.

    WTF? I already said how locs are a part of my ancestral history. The worldwide usage of “dreads” is not what I’m talking about. And I made no such claim about “dreads” being a black monopoly, because they are most certainly not. I was talking about people in the society I live in, totally detached from any knowledge about the significance of them, both casual wearers and mainstream onlookers, ascribing things that are not only false, but harmful. And that’s pretty much the sum of it.

    I’m outta this thread.

62. Ok, here’s the thing; “are people with tattoos more likely to have suffered a trauma than the average person” is an empirical question

    Oh, for fuck’s sake. Nobody actually asked that question.

    Drahill wanted to know where I’d seen social science on tattoos and trauma. It’s out there. I am sharing where I’ve seen social science on tattooing and trauma. I am not saying that people who get tattoos should be pathologized or that tattoos are a sign of trauma. If folks are actually curious about the tattoo culture, there’s a lot of excellent cultural histories and ethnographies that cover this and a lot more that should be of interest.

63. Eve, I don’t think you’re wrong to ask questions at all, and I apologize if any of my posts came across as implying that.

    I’m trying to think of a good way to explain what rubbed the wrong way a little about your post. This isn’t a perfect analogy, but it’s the best I can come up with right now. If you had written a post which said something like:

    “I’m worried about my daughter wearing a short skirt. A lot of the men I have talked to said 1. they find it sexy, and 2. they think it’s a sign the girl wants to have a lot of sex. A family member wears short skirts, and I feel like she’s doing it as a cry for attention. Why do you wear short skirts?”

    I think people might have been similarly annoyed. Because even though you’re just asking a question, the base of your question is an interpretation that is often wrong, stereotypical, and a little bit harmful.

    I do think some people were too harsh with you, and I worry that I’m being too harsh with this comment, but I think that that’s what is going on.

64. WTF? I already said how locs are a part of my ancestral history. The worldwide usage of “dreads” is not what I’m talking about. And I made no such claim about “dreads” being a black monopoly, because they are most certainly not. I was talking about people in the society I live in, totally detached from any knowledge about the significance of them, both casual wearers and mainstream onlookers, ascribing things that are not only false, but harmful. And that’s pretty much the sum of it.

    …uhhh, what? You said:

    I’m sure that there are plenty of wonderful well-meaning white people who wear their hair “dreaded.” But every time I see one, I can’t help but think that said person either: 1) Doesn’t know that many black folks consider this a form of appropriation or 2) Knows but doesn’t care.

    So yeah, I have no idea what you’re saying now. It’s not wrong for white people to wear dreads, but you’d never associate with one who does because they’re racist?

65. It seems to me that this post was an honest and candid look at how Eve made choices about her physical appearance in the past ,and her desire to hear others tell stories about THEIR choices. How we dress and do our hair is a conscience decision that results from a variety of motivations. Why would tattoos be any different? Why is this controversial?! Many of you have joined the conversation to voice your genuine experiences- but it seems that some of you are just looking to be offended.

66. Fashionably Evil:

    “When I was about 10, I spent some time a man who had tattoos that he’d gotten while serving during WWII (a work colleague of my mother’s). They looked pretty dreadful 50 years on–text blurry, images fuzzy. I am sure tattooing technology has improved a lot since then, but when I’m struck by the idea of getting a tattoo, the idea of “Eh, what is that going to look like when I’m 70?” always stops me.”

    When I’m 70 I’m going to have wrinkly skin, a bit of a gut, shitty vision, weird body hair, and a big nose. My tattoo will probably look pretty bad, too. Comes with the territory. I will give even less of a fuck then than I do now.

67. I’m going to agree with SophiaBlue on this one. Maybe the intent of the article really was a rumative, “just asking questions” kind of message. But the questions that are “just” being asked are based on incorrect and sometimes hurtful stereotypes. I’m not sure why anyone is surprised that people were offended by the OP’s stereotype-based questions about people with tattoos.

68. I’ve always wanted tattoos, and then got them when I could. The things I got tattooed varied in the reasoning, but I’ve always planned out the placement based primarily on what the design meant to me, or simple aesthetics. Eventually, I’ll have a full backpiece and two 3/4 sleeves, but I don’t think I want them anywhere else.

    Speaking of tattoo placement, my first tattoo was of a phoenix, which I got when I was 18, on my lower back. I had yet to be introduced to that damned “tramp stamp” crap; I just really liked that area aesthetically, and because of the design of the tattoo. I hate that “tramp stamp” is a thing. Ugh.

    As for feeling more “edgy,” though, I get that. I remember once in high school, before I’d gotten any of my tattoos or piercings or more extreme hairstyles, I looked in the mirror and had this overwhelming feeling of looking “suburban boring.” I didn’t go to high school in a suburb, and most of my friends did look so-called “edgier” than I did, so I think some of my randomly-decided body modifications were done in a deliberate attempt to have a more distinctive appearance. I pierced my nose on 4 different occasions, and eventually took out my lip ring, but interestingly, my favorite piercings ended up being the nipple piercings, which hardly anyone saw.

    I pretty much just stopped caring about that stuff, until recently when I was at a county fair and saw some earrings that were 6-gauge and a really interesting shape. My ears were gauged a while ago but had shrunk back to nearly-normal-looking, so I decided to re-stretch them. I might get my septum pierced next. I’ll inevitably take them out when I get bored of them. Sometimes it’s just a fun thing to do for the hell of it, to change things up once in a while, in the case of piercings.

69. @SophiaBlue and Katniss…

    The way that you’re reducing what the OP wrote seems, to me, to be just the problem. You change her wording from “I might be concerned if my daughter got chest tattoos” to “I’m worried about my daughter getting chest tattoos.” You continue this revision in your next two lines, shifting Eve’s concern to one about a possible articulation of pain or trauma to one about an extremely conservative, stupid fear of sexual exploration. The shift may seem somewhat subtle, but I believe it makes your read extremely wrong.

    By the same token, the questions Eve actually asked were:

    Someone in our family recently began the process of a huge chest piece; I can’t help feeling like it’s a cry for …something. (Help? Attention? Is it armor? Is it just sexy?)

    What do you think? Please discuss, especially if you having chest tattoos and/or arm sleeves. (and is there a difference in the extremes of both?) Does it depend on the design? Etc, Etc…

    and

    I also find it interesting that I don’t have such concerns about males having extreme tattoos– what does that say about me? our society?

    After relating a story about her own urge to wear external symbols, she was saying that she thought the family member’s visible tattoo might be a “cry for something,” and then asked a series of questions about whether that instinct MIGHT BE correct. She also revealed a discomfort with her own bias regarding females and tattoos, and asked for some insight into that.

    I don’t know… this whole thread seems like a bit of a missed opportunity to actually discuss something real and interesting.

70. I think SophiaBlue really eloquently outlined why some of us take issue with the premise of the original post.

    But to answer the question of why we have tattoos, and how we feel about them on ourselves and others: I have what is essentially a half sleeve on one arm, two small pieces above and below the elbow on my other inner arm, and a small chest piece that is virtually never visible. I’d have a much larger chest piece if the first one hadn’t hurt so much.

    I have the tattoos that I have–and the ones I imagine having some day–because I love the idea of writing what is important in my life on my body. I wear what I do because I’m proud of who I am (my first tattoo is representative of my family name, and is a bigger version of what my dad has on his stationery and address labels) and where I’ve been. I believe that mine are stories worth telling, and I firmly believe that sometimes body art is the best medium.

    I do think the discussion about our pre-conceived notions of tattoos in certain body placements is a really interesting one. Generally my first reaction upon seeing another tattooed person is “Hooray! Tattoos!” but I’ll admit that if I see someone with a neck or skull tattoo in particular I’m usually taken aback a little. I don’t like that about myself, but there it is.

71. I misinterpreted what you were originally saying, Lauren. When I read your comment @26, I understood it as closer to what amblingalong said @63 or as saying that people who get tattoos do it as a coping mechanism for being traumatized in some way.

    But it sounds like what you are saying is that people who get tattoos sometimes do so to mark or memorialize traumatic times in their life or as “recording their own story” as Morganna Marks put it. Is that closer to what you’re trying to say?

    Personally, I got my one and only tattoo because I was on a deadline and needed something to write about:)

72. For me the “is it a cry for help/attention?” question is what struck a nerve and made me uncomfortable with the article. That’s something a lot of us with tattoos hear all the time, and it’s based on a pretty condescending stereotype. Maybe that’s why others responded negatively to the article?

73. Hey, Chiara, just for the record? You’re being an asshole.

    your right, im sorry. what i said there was really mean

    i guess i just have an issue with people acting out against social norms for the sake of it or because there making a political statement or something. when i was in my teens that was totally my bag but now when i think of this kind of subversive! stuff it just seems so unbearably childish.

74. Sooooo basically:
    Everyone: This post is sexist and insulting and this is why.
    Jill: Everyone is reading it wrong except me! You jerks!

    Fun fact: if everyone thinks the OP said something, the problem is her ability to communicate – not our comprehension.

75. i guess i just have an issue with people acting out against social norms for the sake of it or because there making a political statement or something.

    You have a problem with people acting out against social norms because they’re making a political statement? Seriously? This is probably the most absurd thing I’ve heard all day (and my office keeps FOX news on, so that’s saying something).

76. Also: http://wtfwhiteprivilege.tumblr.com/post/16007896832/but-the-celts-wore-dreadlocks-tattoos-body

77. I have both dreads and tattoos, and not because I’m crying for help or have issues. I, too, found parts of this post deeply problematic.

    Over and over on Feministe I have been happy to see posts calling out advertisements, politicians, news articles, and other media for perpetuating the male gaze, rape culture, and patriarchy in general. That’s what I like about it- it’s a place where I can read feminist perspectives on the bullshit I see around me all day.

    Then, occasionally, something like this will get posted. It’s something that deserves critique, yet the authors of the blog seem to deflect anything except agreement with comments about what they ‘clearly meant’. Well, I call bullshit. If people want to write for a well-known feminist blog, they need to be able to back themselves up and explain or apologize as needed about the impact of their words. To do anything else is hypocritical.

78. @kai–

    But what in this post are you actually referring to?? Are you simply offended by Eve’s very existence? She presents herself as a person asking questions, relating a personal experience, a conversation during which others shared an opinion, admitting to her own troubling biases, and inviting conversation and conflicting viewpoints about all of this.

    Is it the fact that she’s asking questions to what should be as open and informed a group as the internet has to offer? Is that inherently offensive to you? Instead, she was overwhelmingly criticized for bringing these questions to the forum. Is this the way you intend to engage in conversation for the rest of your life?

    The only thing she seems to have “clearly meant,” and what she defended herself as saying in the first place, was that she was curious about everybody’s own experience and point of view. If you feel like the way she asked the question was wrong for a specific reason, THAT would be a valuable contribution. What you’re writing here is just not.

    Whether you know it or not, your comment is actually advocating that Feministe be an ideologically closed forum. That is so totally sad.

79. horseloverfat:

    You change her wording from “I might be concerned if my daughter got chest tattoos” to “I’m worried about my daughter getting chest tattoos.”

    Fair enough. You’re right that that does mitigate things, although I think we can still talk about the basis of her concern.

    You continue this revision in your next two lines, shifting Eve’s concern to one about a possible articulation of pain or trauma to one about an extremely conservative, stupid fear of sexual exploration.

    Yeah, that’s why it wasn’t a perfect analogy. Let me see if I can explain myself better

    Putting aside the fact that it’s perfectly OK for a woman to want to have a lot of sex, short skirt /= wants a lot of sex, and if you’re a woman wearing a short skirt and your don’t want sex right now, people interpreting it that way are going to annoy you, whether or not people mean that interpretation in a negative, positive, or neutral way. Similarly, large tattoos /= trauma, and people with large tattoos that didn’t get them for trauma-related reasons are going to be annoyed by people interpreting them that way.

    I realize that Eve is trying to move beyond that interpretation, but to me there’s a difference between asking “Why did you get your tattoo?” and asking “I feel like getting a large tattoo means the woman has been traumatized, why did you get your tattoo?” The former is just a request for information, while the latter sounds like the questioner is expecting a certain answer and if your answer doesn’t fit you’ll have to justify yourself. I know Eve didn’t mean it that way, but that’s how it sounded like to me to some extent.

80. Am @ 79:

    Well, good job not responding to anything I actually said.

    1) The argument isn’t ‘the celts wore dreads,’ it’s that dozens and dozens of non-African cultures did/do. When you claim that dreads are uniquely African you are erasing those cultures.

    2) Without intervention, many non-black people’s hair will become dreadlocked. The idea that these people are obligated to intervene in specific ways to avoid appropriation is stupid.

81. I still think the Tesla tattoo was a cry for help. Help with physics homework.

82. I think that “I feel” statements are fair game for a blogger to say. Eve feels a way. So what? Why is everyone super defensive about it? She already said in the post that her feelings might be based on weirdnesses in her thoughts and feminism. She is already interrogating those feelings; she doesn’t need Feministe waterboarding them FFS.

83. Reasons you might get a tattoo:

    -they’re pretty
    -they’re sexy
    -they’re cool
    -everyone in your family has one, so why not?
    -everyone in your unit is getting one, so just go with it
    -you heard that some men/women like to run their fingers/tongues/whatever over them
    -you hope a specific man/woman will want to run hir fingers/tongue/whatever over it
    -it’s an expression of your inner angst
    -it’s a reminder of all the angst you were going through not too long ago–so glad that’s over
    -to demonstrate how hard core you are to your new group of friends
    -to memorialize a death
    -to commemorate a birth
    -to remember a miscarriage
    -to remember a failed relationship
    -you’re sticking it to your parents now that you’re finally out of the house
    -you’re sticking it to your parents with this awesome fake ID you just got
    -you’re sticking it to your parents because even though they’ve been out of your life for a while now, you’re still kind of ticked
    -you’ve wanted one since you were eight
    -you like the attention they get you
    -they make you feel pretty
    -they make you feel edgy
    -they make you feel tough
    -you got drunk
    -you got drunk and lost a bet

    . . . and so on. The reasons will be different for everybody. Sometimes it’s a decision made on a whim. Sometimes it’s carefully planned and means so much that you could spend hours talking about it. The ones on this list can apply to anyone, but like you observed, women’s tattoos fall under more frequent and critical scrutiny. Some reasons are deep and emotionally relevant, some are silly or frivolous (which is okay because people are allowed to be silly), some may be signs that a person is going through difficulties. As a “warning sign,” though, I don’t think tats are particularly useful–maybe ze just thinks they’re pretty.

    You seem worried about your family member. Have you talked to her about her tattoo? She might want to talk about it if it’s clear that you’re just curious and aren’t judging. Are you worried because you think she’ll be objectified/ostrasized for her body art or because you suspect some deeper emotional issues? If it’s the former, it’s not really your concern unless she comes to you for advice. If it’s the latter, the other “signposts” matter. Signs of depression/self-harm/disordered eating can be a cause for concern, but if all she’s doing is dying her hair pink and listening to death metal I think she’s okay.

84. if they were scientific journals, why are they not showing up in Google?

    Not taking a position on tattooing, but perhaps because Google is not how sociological researchers catalog their journals.

85. -you’ve wanted one since you were eight

    Uh, way to erase people who’ve wanted them since they were seven. *huffs away*

    ;D

86. @ 79: that link is full of lies about tatoos and dreads and an attempt to sequester any present body mod expressions for one group.

    Here’s an actual link to actual info on who wore tatoos. Tats are not by definition non-European. They are as much European, pagan European to be exact, as any other culture. In fact most cultures all over the world practiced it. So from a Euro perspective a tat is a rejection of Judeo-Christian prohibitions on tatoos.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tattoo#History

    As for dreads huge numbers of US Europeans are of Celtic descent. Celts are one of the persecuted minorities within Europe having been steadily pushed westward over the years by other tribes and eventually to the USA.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreadlocks#History

    And dreadlocks also come from the Torah (Numbers 6:5) so I could be a jackass and ask that everyone stop appropriating Jewish culture, but I’m not gonna go there cause that sucks. Instead I will say that since Torah is for everyone on Earth, everyone gets to have dreads.

    Also, please stop seeing white people as some monolith.

87. Is this the kind of article Lauren was talking about? If so, these were both on the first page of Google Scholar results for tattoo and trauma, so I don’t get why the difficulty finding them (since I assume that everyone was looking on Google Scholar, as I did):

    http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1525/ac.2001.12.2.35/abstract

    Trauma and Tattoo
    Judith Holland Sarnecki

    myweb.ecu.edu/aldermand/pubs/tattoo_chapter_final_book.pdf

    TRAUMA WRITTEN IN FLESH:
    TATTOOS AS MEMORIALS AND STORIES
    GLENN W. GENTRY,
    SYRACUSE UNIVERSITY
    AND DEREK H. ALDERMAN,
    EAST CAROLINA UNIVERSITY

    There seem to be many similar articles as well.

88. @ amblingalong,

    Actually, I think tmc said what you quoted Sulyp as saying.

    @ miga,

    white people getting dreadlocks just to be edgy makes me quite uncomfortable. It’s appropriation, and yeah, Eve, maybe you understand that now and have moved past it but its something I think many progressive white people don’t think of so I’m glad others on the thread are pointing it out.

    I’m a white woman with dreadlocks, and I have in the past considered that it might seem like a cultural appropriation to black folks. My question is: what if my hair began dreading after my first night in the woods? Am I supposed to find a place to wash and brush my hair in order to avoid appropriating someone’s culture? I do feel shitty that it makes people uncomfortable to see my dreadlocks, but I am uncertain what to do at this point.

    Even if I did meet a white person with dreads and they managed to convince me that they are in the first category, I’m usually not in the mood to be the good sweet Teaching Negro and thus, I don’t care to associate with those people either.

    Whoa… that sucks for me I guess.

    @amblingalong

    Dreadlocks are not inherently ‘black,’ they are what happens to hair if you don’t brush or cut it over a long period of time (though to be sure there are other methods of getting ‘locs). Calling dreads on white people appropriation is silly.

    Without intervention, many non-black people’s hair will become dreadlocked. The idea that these people are obligated to intervene in specific ways to avoid appropriation is stupid.

    I agree with these statements, but am I being insensitive? I’m open to learning. It has been made clear that my dreadlocks make people of color uncomfortable or irritated, so it seems pointless to ask who I am hurting. But is this a reason to cut my hair off? I’m just kind of working this out as I go along…

89. Not taking a position on tattooing, but perhaps because Google is not how sociological researchers catalog their journals.

    Uh, you’re away that abstracts show up on Goggle Scholar? Wild, I know.

90. Sorry, the second block quote above is suppose to read “@ tmc” before it.

91. Uh, you’re away that abstracts show up on Goggle Scholar? Wild, I know.

    Some do. Some- probably a significant majority- don’t. The ones they have also are not neccesarily going to come up if you just search some vague keywords.

    Check your facts before condescending to people.

92. Drahill, I think we’re talking past each other. There’s a healthy discussion of trauma and reclamation in every single tattoo book I’ve ever picked up, pictures or otherwise, provided it wasn’t whitewashing tattooing’s dirty history for a middle-class audience.

    I have no doubt of that. There is a lot of research out there that discusses tattooing as a way of dealing with trauma. but that wasn’t your initial statement, which is what I’ve been arguing with:
    ” …whether tattoos have a relationship to trauma. And yes, according to nearly every sociological impact study out there, they absolutely do.” The way you worded it suggested that tattoo culture as whole has a relationship to trauma, when in reality, there is a subset of tattoo culture that deals with trauma and healing. However, tattoo culture itself is not borne out of trauma or anything like that. That is the distinction.

93. @ unyun

    I think you answered your own question – a couple people of color came on here and made it clear it does make them uncomfortable and it is cultural appropriation. That should be enough.

    Being white means that we can come up with a million rationales for doing anything we want to, including “but my ancestors did it…” I’m assuming you live in the US, and what makes this kind of appropriation hurtful is that while white people are unaffected by or praised for appropriating African-American hairstyles or vernacular, people of African descent are looked down upon, discriminated against, and even fired for doing the exact same things. When we consider white people who wear dreadlocks “counter-cultural,” we’re congratulating their daring willingness to associate themselves with blackness, while not having to suffer any of the consequences of being black in America.

    Also, if you want to learn more, the internet is full of incredible resources about race, and as tempting as it is to expect people of color to correct us or show us the way, it’s actually our responsibility. If you’re interested, I can pass on some resources!

94. On locs vs dreadlocks:

    I was talking about people in the society I live in, totally detached from any knowledge about the significance of them, both casual wearers and mainstream onlookers, ascribing things that are not only false, but harmful. And that’s pretty much the sum of it.

    This seems to me the key point in the discussion; not white folks’ ownership of & everloving right to wear a hairstyle, but the politics of hair in a white supremacist society.

95. This seems to me the key point in the discussion; not white folks’ ownership of & everloving right to wear a hairstyle, but the politics of hair in a white supremacist society.

    @trees: THANK YOU. Exactly!

96. I’m open to learning. It has been made clear that my dreadlocks make people of color uncomfortable or irritated, so it seems pointless to ask who I am hurting. But is this a reason to cut my hair off? I’m just kind of working this out as I go along…

    I have a (for what it’s worth, black) friend who wore a mohawk for a while until they realized that it was appropriation. So they cut it off, giving a public explanation for why they did so, because it was more important to them that they not be racist than it was for them to wear a rainbow mohawk, and that was the end of that. It really is that easy.

97. This website is not improving on race issues. You have had problems with racism before and then you say you will improve but you keep having the same problems.

    Btw comment #51 trying to use Maori as an argument against African people in America can fuck right off. Did you just make that up 51 or are you naming cultures at random? A lot of Maori adopted Rastafarianism last century. I wouldn’t call that appropriation because we never colonized Africans and they never colonized us, we’re fighting the same enemy. And dreadlocks are not “just what happens to hair if you don’t wash it” how completely ridiculous. Maori do have traditional tattooing though (obviously all Polynesian cultures do “tattoo” comes from the Polynesian word “tatau”) and it has nothing to do with over-privileged white girls trying to look “edgy”.

98. Uh, you’re away that abstracts show up on Goggle Scholar? Wild, I know.

    Google scholar is essentially a link to JSTOR. Some articles and abstracts show up. Most don’t, because there’s no way to make money that way. Literature and language has a specific, professional bibliography of peer-reviewed publications. I assume other disciplines do as well.

99. What the fuck? I had an entire comment responding to amblingalong, Henry, and unyun and it has apparently disappeared.

100. Also, please stop seeing white people as some monolith.

     *snorts*

101. Goddammit this is annoying. I’m not typing all that shit again so here is a rough summary:

     The fact that various non-whites have culturally had locs has no bearing on the politics and privilege involved with whites today dreading their hair. The Celts and the ancient Irish and the Maori people and whoever else did not have white privilege. White people dreading their hair to be “edgy” and then when called on it saying “but the Celts did it!” even though their reasons for doing it had nothing to do with Celts or anyone else is a blatant fucking excuse to do something racist and then blow off POCs who give them the side-eye for it.

     @unyun: I don’t understand your “in the wild” scenario. Are you talking about camping or is this a weird hypothetical where you have no access to soap or a brush? Either way, it’s not that deep. Deliberately dreading your hair regardless of the racial implications is not the same thing as being in a situation where you don’t have the tools to untangle your hair.

     And please for the love of God, don’t equate dirty hair with dreads or locs. Associating locs with filth is why people so frequently associate all natural black hair with filth.

102. @pheenobarbidoll: Yeah, my eyes just about rolled out of my head at that one.

103. Henry, Wikipedia makes very clear that the practice of tattooing died out in Europe with the introduction of Christianity, and was essentially non-existent for 700 or 800 years; the reintroduction of the practice into Europe had nothing whatsoever to do with that history, and everything to do with colonization.

104. jumping here; things seemed to have derailed a bit, and language is becoming pretty hostile.

     i’ll write a response to everything once i’ve had some more time to reflect.

     thank you, everybody, for your passion, even if it’s occasionally misdirected.

105. Btw comment #51 trying to use Maori as an argument against African people in America can fuck right off. Did you just make that up 51 or are you naming cultures at random?

     Yeah, those are definitely the only two options.

     The pothat’ve that dozens of cultures have historically worn dreadlocks, so to claim that a white person wearing them is appropriating african culture is

     A) silly
     B) erasing every other culture which used/uses dreads

     Mohawks are a better case, though- and I say this as a member of not one but two cultures which experienced colonization and genocide- I find the entire concept of building walls around certain fashions kinda questionable. If an association is being made from dreads to black, and black to edgy, that’s racist and fucked up. But wearing dreads, period?

106. First of all, let me just say that I think that Eve is a very witty, engaging and thought provoking writer and while I might not always agree with all of her points of view, I enjoy reading what she has to say. Also I think she looked great with dreads!

     I think that tatooing has evolved into something different than it started out to be. I mean lets face it, sixty years ago the people who had tatoos were, ex-military, from a “rough” neighborhood, or had spent time in jail or in a gang. So yes it did represent an “edge” or a “dont mess with me Im tuff” mentality. You would have never seen a mother of four at the park playing with her kids, with tatooes covering half of her body. Today you see that all the time.

     I too have a tatoo, and I got mine fourteen years ago when I was 18 and you bet I was making a statement. I wanted my mom to know that I could do this if i wanted and there was nothing she could do to stop me. However being 18 , i didnt really think about the fact that I probably wouldnt want the japanese symbol for love on my lower back forever. I did have issues, I did need help and I did have an edge.

     Today however I think that tatooing has turned more into a fashion statement than an act of rebellion. Its a trend and and an art form. I have seen some really beautiful tatoos out there.

     However, come on people, lets not be naive. If a girl gets a tatoo plate on her chest, I dont care how nice of a picture it is, she’s pretty much stating, “I have a nice rack and I want you to look at it”.

107. However, come on people, lets not be naive. If a girl gets a tatoo plate on her chest, I dont care how nice of a picture it is, she’s pretty much stating, “I have a nice rack and I want you to look at it”.

     I disagree. My sisters very tattooed chest is stating, “I wear a uniform, and need these to be covered for work.” She doesn’t have what most people would think of as a “nice rack”.

     Everyone but my dad has a tattoo in my family, mine being a chevron from Stargate SG1.

108. Oh god in his heaven. White people are making me embarrassed again! STFU about the freaking Celts. You don’t learn about Celtic dreads or whatever in K-12. It IS appropriation (and btw whoever unironically mentioned Tibetan Buddhists- seriously? They get appropriated by white people too ok). It is, it is! And black people dyed their hair all sorts of colors first. And Indigenous people got tattoos first. Let’s just freaking own it already, white people! Let’s just freaking get it together and stop with the hurt feels when people call us on our bullshit already! White people ARE a monolith. Of privilege. Period.

109. Xenu:

     a) Speak for yourself, I’m not white
     b) Are you seriously arguing that white people should stop dying their hair?
     c) Celts, Tibetans, Indians, Inca, Pakistanis, whatever- the point is that if something evolved independently in many separate cultures, it’s kinda odd to call it appropriative when it becomes popular in yet another. Dreadlocks aren’t a particularly unique idea, which makes sense when you consider how basic the method of getting them can be

110. You don’t know what you are talking about amblingalong. The idea of a white person attempting to enlist ngati dred on your side is just so ludicrous. Stick with the ancient celts bro, they’re not around to speak for themselves so you can make up whatever you want.

111. Pingback: Dear fellow white people, stop embarrassing yourselves | everythingruined

112. Something tells me that people will still find something to complain about if, from now on, all white people only ever ‘stick to their own’ in terms of fashion and hairdos.

113. Oh amblingalong says he is not white, maybe that is true but you are obviously not Maori or African amblingalong so if you want to speak about those cultures you can do some research first before you post misinformed shit. I don’t think the corpse of Cherokee great great grandmother endorsed your comments.

114. That’s true igglanova, we’ll complain about colonization, Imperialism, genocide, the theft of our land and resources, being 3rd class citizens in our own countries. The fact that SOME white people refuse to show the smallest sign of respect to the people theyir societies oppress and insist on their right to steal everything they haven’t already stolen or destroyed is the least of my complaints.

115. I feel like dreadlocks are somewhat unique in that for most people, they truly are a natural occurrence. The locking of my hair was a natural occurrence. Can anyone “own” a natural occurrence? If we’re all human beings, don’t we ALL own this natural occurrence? People grow hair on their heads, hair dreads up if one allows it to… it’s a natural human experience.

     Also, men generally don’t shave their legs/armpits to the degree that women do. When you meet a man that does, is he appropriating the culture of women? I’m confused. And I’m really just asking because it seems like when it comes to women’s bodies, nature should be an option for US ALL. I don’t want to primp, prune, pluck, shave, or brush my hair partially because I feel I’m giving the beauty industry and all its fascistic beauty standards the finger.

116. Something tells me that people will still find something to complain about if, from now on, all white people only ever ‘stick to their own’ in terms of fashion and hairdos.

     y’all sure do have problems.

     But why is it always about your right to something, and never about responsibility?

117. Am @ 79:

     Well, good job not responding to anything I actually said.

     1) The argument isn’t ‘the celts wore dreads,’ it’s that dozens and dozens of non-African cultures did/do. When you claim that dreads are uniquely African you are erasing those cultures.

     2) Without intervention, many non-black people’s hair will become dreadlocked. The idea that these people are obligated to intervene in specific ways to avoid appropriation is stupid.

     What is stupid, is trying to pretend that the modern trend by dreadlocks is not inspired by Rastafarians, most of whom are Jamaicans of African heritage.

     I’m not saying I believe white people should be forbidden from wearing dreadlocks, I’m just saying your argument is nonsense. When I had a Rastafarian neighbor, one of his prayer group was a white guy, and he had dreads. According to my friend Bob, this guy took the whole thing very seriously and wasn’t using it as a fashion statement. But I can see why people who do use it as a fashion statement can come across as distasteful. Though I would give someone a break if they, like the OP are talking about the distant past.

118. OKay reading back on some comments again I think I have to go away and think about/read about this. I’ll come back tomorrow. I’m really sorry for hurting anyone who feels hurt.

119. I’m not talking about my ‘right’ to anything. This is hardly the hill I’m going to die on. But there is never a clear consensus on what an unproblematic fashion / hairdo landscape would even look like. (The easy answer is to just say ‘when we’ve undone the problems of oppression and colonization then it will cease to be an issue’, but that is just another way of dodging the question.)

     So, in the short term, what does a solution look like? If (e.g.) non-black people wearing dreads are always being appropriative and racist, then you are advocating for a situation of rigid fashion segregation, where non-blacks never deign to touch the fashions of black people. If those dreads are not always appropriation, what are the deciding criteria? Are there any that aren’t hopelessly subjective?

120. Wow, this thread is fucking classic Feministe.

121. Oh amblingalong says he is not white, maybe that is true but you are obviously not Maori or African

     Fuck you. Bigoted assholes don’t get responses (oh, you can tell I’m white from the way I write, huh? Original!)

     Also: ‘African’ isn’t a culture.

     Fatsteve: I’m not arguing about which culture inspired white people to wear dreads. That’s not my point. My point is that if multiple cultures independently evolved dreads, then that hairstyle isn’t specific or unique enough to a single culture for charges of appropriation to be valid.

     I mean, like I said earlier, I have a hard time getting behind charges of appropriation for something the human body can do itself, without any particular interference.

122. Wow, this thread is fucking classic Feministe.

     Don’t you love it?

123. Don’t you love it?

     It beats the movie I’m watching. 🙂

124. Don’t you love it?

     It beats the movie I’m watching. 🙂

     This flippant response reveals the differing stakes in this discussion. This is all hypothetical or about adventure and edginess for some, but for others the stakes are far greater and may come with real world risks and consequences.

125. What, this conversation on a blog? Doubt it.

126. You know, I’m reading this convo on dreads a week or two after participating in a forum on a pre-med forum where two women of African descent (don’t know if they were African-American or West Indean or from African immigrant families) were told that if they wanted to get into med school, they should get rid of their locs because dreadlocks are unprofessional and associated with hippies and alternative lifestyles. Other natural methods of wearing black hair, like braids and cornrows were discussed, and the “consensus” (from mostly white folks, of course) was that braids were SOMETIMES professional…

     in other words, this is a conversation with real TEETH for a lot of people. Tattoos and dreadlocks are a way for a lot of young white folks to rebel. Locs happen to be a way that black people can conveniently and naturally wear their hair.

     While I will argue (half-heartedly, I admit) that the so-called professional standards of dress are to some extent based in classism and gender norms, it nevertheless remains true that white appropriation of dreadlocks (and their subsequent association with a hippie, alternative lifestyle) has helped reinforce the idea that natural black hair is inherently unprofessional.

127. @Bagelsan

     What, this conversation on a blog? Doubt it.

     I’m referring to the larger cultural conversation, and ways of thinking. Yes, this does impact people in the real world. I know people who have to wear wigs to work over their natural hair, and I had a friend who was directly told in a corporate job interview that her employment would be contingent on her cutting off her locs. FYI: you don’t make locs by leaving the hair dirty and unmaintained, those ropes must be cultivated.

128. Some north African Muslim cultures traditionally wore white robes and covered their faces so if a white American wants to march around in a white robe and hood it is like racist against white people to object and erases the existence of other white-robe-wearing peoples. This comment is really sincere and well meaning, I really don’t understand the difference.

     Ps- Fuck you too amblingalong and this website for encouraging you. And I didn’t say that Africa was a culture I said stop posting rubbish about my culture to attack African American culture. I don’t care if you’re not white I can judge your character from your comments, totally colour blind.

129. But then, Lauren, if they were scientific journals, why are they not showing up in Google?

     Because Google only searches the visible web. Most journals are behind paywalls and not part of the visible web.

     A few years ago, there was an episode of “What Not To Wear” that featured a white woman who was a graduate student and had dreads down to her knees, including a solid mass of hair at the back of her head. She claimed to have the dreads because she was a Rastafarian, but when asked what that entailed, made it pretty clear that “smoking weed” was the extent of her knowledge of Rastafarianism (and, you know, her commitment to it wasn’t very deep since she was fine with cutting her dreads now that she was graduating and needed a professional job). When the hairstylist cut her hair, he put on a mask and gloves and you could see mold coming out of the giant mass at the back of her head (and she had the nerve to complain her hair was too short when he was done).

     Not long after, there was a black woman who had short locs and a professional job who spent a lot of time bracing herself for a showdown with the stylist, whom she was convinced would want her to change her hair. But all he said to her was, “This hair is perfect; here are some products to use to keep them clean and fresh between appointments.”

     I’d believe white people with dreads who say they’re getting in touch with their Celtic roots if they, say, painted their faces blue as well.

     As for the post itself and tattoos, I have two. Neither were inspired by trauma, but my first is a tiny rosebud on my ankle. When I got it almost 20 years ago it was A BIG HONKING DEAL to have any visible tats, even tiny rosebuds. My other tat is on my lower back, and I refuse to refer to it as a tramp stamp (or allow anyone else to), partly because that is so fucking misogynist, partly because I got it before it became A Thing, and partly because I put it there because it was not visible with most clothing and it’s somewhere that isn’t going to go anywhere when I’m 70.

     What’s stopping me from getting more? Not having any burning desire to put a particular design on my body, for one. For another, the ink in my lower back tat itches occasionally, so I figure I’d react badly to full-color, large-scale sleeves or what have you.

130. In Australia, the main non-ethnically specific subcultures that wear dreads are hippies/enviro kids and goths. In the case of hippies there are some people who have chosen to dread their hair because they frequently clash with police and some dread styles help protect against head trauma, but overwhelmingly these two subcultures are choosing to dread because they’re ‘edgy’ or countercultural. And, for the record, they’re overwhelmingly not doing it with hair that dreads naturally (non-curly hair tends to mat, not dread).

     In those cases, the question isn’t whether there’s ownership of dreadlocking as a practice by people of colour, but 1. how the use of dreads and other hairstyles which are strongly associated with people of colour to signify “edgy” by white people draws on/reiterates the marginalisation of people of colour’s bodies; and 2. How that aesthetic practice relates to white supremacy within those two subcultures.

     Goths are particularly irritating on this one, because goth beauty standards are ones that are highly inaccessible to many people of colour, especially people with dark skin. And that’s relevant, because the practice of dreading within goth communities becomes really obviously not neutral in a context where it can only be celebrated when it’s practiced by women who meet a really really racist beauty standard.

     So, yes, some white people will dread because it’s a good way to take care of their hair, but that shouldn’t elide the fact that the vast majority of white dreading practices are occurring in the context of the continuing marginalisation of people of colour, even by the subcultures practicing dreading, while simultaneously trading on that marginalisation in order to signify how ‘alternative’ the wearer is.

     tl;dr: cultural appropriation isn’t about who came up with what first, it’s about the contexts of racism and imperialism.

     Wow, this thread is fucking classic Feministe.

     You mean a whole bunch of black women are feeling like shit because members of the regular commentariat are treating them as oversensitive for talking about the context of racism? Yeah, I’d say that was pretty classic Feministe.

131. When the hairstylist cut her hair, he put on a mask and gloves and you could see mold coming out of the giant mass at the back of her head

     Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh harglblarghlbgr

     I’d believe white people with dreads who say they’re getting in touch with their Celtic roots if they, say, painted their faces blue as well.

     Has anyone said this here?

     Ps- Fuck you too amblingalong and this website for encouraging you. And I didn’t say that Africa was a culture I said stop posting rubbish about my culture to attack African American culture.

     This is just totally disconnected with reality. I attacked African-American culture? You didn’t, just a few posts ago, refer to ‘Africa culture?’ OK, then.

     I don’t care if you’re not white I can judge your character from your comments, totally colour blind.

     Colorblindness is a myth.

132. For the record, I don’t think any of you are being oversensitive about racism. Again, I sincerely apologize for making anyone feel like shit.

133. In those cases, the question isn’t whether there’s ownership of dreadlocking as a practice by people of colour, but 1. how the use of dreads and other hairstyles which are strongly associated with people of colour to signify “edgy” by white people draws on/reiterates the marginalisation of people of colour’s bodies; and 2. How that aesthetic practice relates to white supremacy within those two subcultures.

     Yeah, no argument from me.

     You mean a whole bunch of black women are feeling like shit because members of the regular commentariat are treating them as oversensitive for talking about the context of racism?

     I seriously hope this isn’t referring to me, since I’ve said nothing of the kind, and pretty much agree with everything in your post (and in my previous post said, specifically, that dreads become problematic when used to convey an ‘edginess’ linked to blackness).

134. I’d believe white people with dreads who say they’re getting in touch with their Celtic roots if they, say, painted their faces blue as well.

     LOL. Except it seems to be the general consensus that the Picts weren’t Celts. Some believe they were related to the Basques.
     And sometimes, they not only painted themselves but had blue tattoos!

135. Sorry non-Jews locks are Jewish, it’s in the Old Testament which predates Rastafarianism by oh about 4000 years or so. You’re approriating my people when you wear your hair like that. So everyone has to stop, except for Jews of any color (brown, white, black, olive, yellow whatever box the rest of the planet decided to put us in after they appropriated: our faith, our God, our laws (and boy did some of you take a liking to the shitty ones), and then proceeded to nearly wipe us off the planet after pillaging our culture).

     Ditto on use of the Star of David. Please get your own religious symbols.

     ^ I don’t believe any of the above (except the pillaging/death stuff of course), but the vitriol in the above posts leads me to conclude those arguing the most strenuously must be right. So I’m choosing their rule and applying it to a rather absurd result – Jews own locks because we have the oldest use of them. Please submit your hair style applications to my Rabbi.

     If people who are part of societies based on the Abrahamic faiths want to wear locks to set themselves apart from mainstream society (cause that’s what I believe Eve was expressing – I’m not part of this mainstream culture) as those taking nazarite vows do they should be able to without being accused of racism-appropriation.

     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazarite

     You may view traditional African hair styles here, not everyone there wore locks, that’s East Africa, a region with continuing strong cultural links to the Israelite people:

     http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xc24Alo76iE

     And no whites are not a monolith of privilege. White tribes discriminate between themselves too – when you start to understand that you can finally begin tackling racism in way that is not giant media created blocks of us vs. them. So my tirbe may be above yours on the pecking order that is America but that doesn’t equal privilege. Just ask any ethnic minority about exclusion, fear mongering, and denunciation by Anglos, the dominant European society north of the Rio Grande river.

     Basically you don’t get greater ownership of something that many cultures have been doing for thousands of years just because Bob Marley sold a lot of records, aspects of his religion became popular with white hippies and thus locks became popularly associated with only one society – we’re all the same human species after all.

136. I don’t believe any of the above (except the pillaging/death stuff of course), but the vitriol in the above posts leads me to conclude those arguing the most strenuously must be right. So I’m choosing their rule and applying it to a rather absurd result – Jews own locks because we have the oldest use of them. Please submit your hair style applications to my Rabbi.

     How many times does it need to be restated that cultural appropriation is not an issue of historical ‘ownership’ but one of contemporary power relations?

137. How many times does it need to be restated that cultural appropriation is not an issue of historical ‘ownership’ but one of contemporary power relations?

     Quoted for truth. It’s a bit like trying to have a conversation about bigotry within establishment religion in the US and having people try to go back to fairly arcane and scholarly disputes about translation of Hebrew and Aramaic rather than talking about the actual practices which are affecting contemporary lives. Sure, it’s interesting (and important) to know the history of tattoos and dreadlocks, but when you’re talking about current injustice it’s more important to figure out what’s happening right now than to argue about whether or not because the oldest textual citation of dreadlocks may be in the Hebrew bible, locks were never worn previously by anyone else.

138. So I’m choosing their rule and applying it to a rather absurd result – Jews own locks because we have the oldest use of them. Please submit your hair style applications to my Rabbi.

     Henry, nobody has come close to putting forth this kind of ‘first dibs’ argument. For fuck’s sake. If you’re going to disagree, at least do it honestly.

139. By that argument Li, Alex & igg, if another religion adopted the Star of David and advertised it heavily enough, I’d be deemed appropriating for using it. In other words, one may never revive a tradition, or use one if some other culture is now the dominant user. And awhole subset of Orthodox Jews still do these rites, so it’s not that obscure anymore.

     On tatoos, you realise you guys are effectively arguing that because Europeans gave up tatoos 800 years ago when the last of the pagans were forcibly converted and only started reusing them in the 1600s that they may now never use them because they are appropriating tatooing from Asian, Pacific and African cultures who happened to keep on tatooing? Are we really going there? I can’t abide by telling people what to wear, how to wear their hair, or how to modify their bodies. We’re on the verge of creating a new brand of conservatism here where we deny people their right to display themselves in a way meaningful to them, because we think they want to be Black or Pacific Islander and are therefore marginalizing those groups. We could have the same discussion about body piercings (non-ear) which were inspired by other non-European cultures. Are you guys really gonna go there? Guess we have to look like the stereotypical white dudes in a Dave Chappelle skit so we can conform to what light skinned folks are expected by others to look like. It’s easier to attack a group when you force it in a conformist box.

     Would you support me banning tatoos, body art, hair styles and clothing at a workplace unless the employee had enough of a cultural connection to the group it came from? So I can tell Messianic Christians to stop covering their heads with yamakas cause it offends me as a Jew? Cause that’s where this is going when you tell people like Eve they were being racist for wearing their hair a certain way.

140. I think the arguments against dreads have been getting more understandable. Still I must say for me, “Don’t treat white people as a monolith”, which someone said, means don’t assume all white people have the same reasons for having dreads. I grew up very far from people of colour and I don’t think I knew the word dreadlocks as a kid. I first paid attention to them on both white and black people and didn’t associate them with either one. So if I had decided I wanted that hairstyle, it would’ve just been because I liked it.

141. @unyun:

     There are plenty of folks acting like utter tools in this thread. For what it’s worth, I don’t think that you’re one of them.

142. We’re on the verge of creating a new brand of conservatism here where we deny people their right to display themselves in a way meaningful to them, because we think they want to be Black or Pacific Islander

     Nobody has said that or anything fucking like that. If you’re going to continue to just make shit up, then there is no longer any reason to engage you.

     White tribes discriminate between themselves too – when you start to understand that you can finally begin tackling racism in way that is not giant media created blocks of us vs. them.

     Golly gosh! However would I know how to attack racism if nice white men like you weren’t around to explain it to me?

     By that argument Li, Alex & igg, if another religion adopted the Star of David and advertised it heavily enough

     It’s not about who does it more and it’s not about who did it first. It’s about power, privilege, the politics of black hair (there are entire books on the subject if you actually want to learn something), and the fallout that occurs when white people who want to be “edgy” or “counterculture” or “cool” do something that – in our society which is horrifically WHITE SUPREMACIST – marks marginalized bodies as unkempt, unclean, or unprofessional.

143. Henry. . .where’s my bingo card? A few women of color are explaining on a blog thread that all these white people wearing dreads makes them feel marginalized. . .and now (according to you) we are a few steps away from a totalitarian conservative/politically correct dictatorship that will ban all tattoos and body piercings? Give me a fucking break.

     tmc. . .I’ve read enough of your posts on Feministe to remember that you seem like a smart, politically astute, cool person. I especially remember your contributions to the thread about how it’s not right to call LGBTQ people sinners, contributions which were pretty badass. I’m a white person. I don’t have dreadlocks, and part of the reason why I would never adopt them in the future is because I wouldn’t want rad people like you not to want to associate with me.

     Selfish motives aside. . .it seems to me that white people should respect the right of Black people to have some symbols/expressions of their own. In my country, the USA, there are way more white people than Black people, and we have way more power. Whenever we adopt something that was previously largely used by Blacks, their chosen meaning for that expression gets drowned out by our new White-approved meaning. And in the case of dreadlocks, that new meaning largely appears to be pretty racist.

     I’m not claiming any moral high ground here because I have a lot of internalized racism, and I’m a long way from getting over it all. But I also want to be the kind of person who says something when she sees oppressed people getting talked down to and mocked on the comment thread of a blog she likes to read. Because that shit is not right.

144. Oops. . .I shouldn’t have said I had a lot of “internalized racism”. . .that makes it sound like I am racist against myself, which is impossible because I’m white. What I meant is that I still have a lot of racist beliefs about people of color despite working on unlearning them. I try to keep them “internal” to myself, however, rather than barfing them all over people of color as Henry is doing.

145. so what’s your point tmc – no white people with dreadlocks, no white smelly drug addict hippies with dread locks? I’m not getting your point here or the other posters above who accused Eve for having locks because it marginalizes Black people by making white racists think locks are dirty and unprofessional and had the audacity to congratulate her for becoming not racist by “moving past that” and getting normal hair.

     Guess what, white racists are gonna find some other reason to not hire Blacks because at their core they are racists. It will never be good enough, if it’s not the locks, it will be clothing, or jewelry that’s too African, or a head covering, or not having straight hair, etc. People who are not racist know the difference between a smelly high on weed 24/7 addict and a professional person who has locks or some other appearance style whether it obviously part of their culture or not. We can tell by the intelligence with which they present themselves, their overall cleanliness, and their resume.

     And yes I’m a nice white man – more olive, but it passes for white these days more than it did in the past, at least until they start asking where your family is from cause your last name is “weird” and you mention places south of the Mediterranean and they dump you in the “off-white” category in the paints dept.

146. Guess what, white racists are gonna find some other reason to not hire Blacks because at their core they are racists.

     Henry. . .I think you should consider whether your flippant analysis of racism, and your explanation of racism to a Black woman, might be condescending and oppressive and fucked up. If I were to “guess,” I would say that tmc has probably experienced a lot more white racism firsthand than you have, and she really doesn’t need to have you outline to her how it works.

147. I get the feeling Henry is one of those people that thinks racism is “over there”, stemming from a core group of evil racists lurking somewhere cackling and planning the oppression of people of colour, rather than, you know, a system of power in which all people are implicated and inculcated. And it’s mean and unfair to call things racist when obviously the person doing them/holding those views is a lovely person and isn’t even a member of the official White Racists club!

     Critical race theory: you’re doing it wrong.

148. Lotus racists talk differently when there are no minorities around. Unless you out yourself as a liberal they say all the shit they would never ever say in public. You think I made up the examples in my post to lecture someone and have no basis for them? That behavior is real and the problem is not a small group of “over there racists”, it’s a whole big ass group of them running things and actively looking to not hire people of color based on any shit they can make up. “Clients won’t work with her because [insert XYZ and that other thing]” is the frequent cover excuse.

149. I have a tattoo on my chest. It’s a simple black outline, not too big. I had it done when I was 19. I chose that spot because I can show it off when I want to, hide it when I need to, and I can see it myself. I didn’t want to get a tattoo that I couldn’t see!

150. the audacity to congratulate her for becoming not racist by “moving past that” and getting normal hair

     For plenty of black people, dreadlocks are normal hair. That’s the goddamn point.

151. huge numbers of US Europeans are of Celtic descent.

     I’d say huge majority – pretty much everyone that isn’t of Germanic, Slavic or Italian descent… Celts weren’t just one ethnic group, at one time they inhabited half of Europe.

     I have a (for what it’s worth, black) friend who wore a mohawk for a while until they realized that it was appropriation. So they cut it off, giving a public explanation for why they did so, because it was more important to them that they not be racist than it was for them to wear a rainbow mohawk, and that was the end of that. It really is that easy.

     I am a bit confused. So, Punk subculture was/is appropriating, too or not? Or is the appropriation only the case when it’s done by someone from group that colonized/subjugated the appropriated group, right? Because the cultural influences are pretty standart thing, so…?

     I generally find the idea of restricting any cultural practice to any group hard to swallow, so i’m trying to understand what’s wrong here. I assume it’s because of the historical and contemporary context (ie:subjugation and discrimination)?

     (also, for what’s it’s worth i have a haircut that’s like collossal appropriation, but it would be relatively specific to my cultural context. That makes me more interested)

152. Mohawks are Native American appropriation (someone please correct me if I am wrong)

153. Mohawks are Native American appropriation (someone please correct me if I am wrong)

     Well, it’s in the name, isn’t it?

     (although mohawk haircut is much easier than dreadlocks, basically shave everything but the top and you got some sort of a mohawk)

     I was a punk when i was young and had it too. Old times.

154. TMK, there’s a great deal of analysis of cultural appropriation floating out there on the interwebs, but I’d probably recommend some of the writing done/linked to by mycultureisnotatrend on tumblr.

     A basic google search got me to this post, for instance, which, while it doesn’t directly address mohawks and punk culture (mycultureisnotatrend tends to focus on hipster fashion and marketing), does I think lay out a lot of the relevant framework.

     If you don’t feel your google skills are up to tracking stuff down yourself, that tumblr has done a lot of work on cultural appropriation and does link to number of other texts.

155. Actually, Li, i wrote that post when i was reading comment #120-130, and right after that i read your #132 and that made it basically clear for me, so… 🙂

     Going to check that link, thanks.

156. Andie- calling them Mohawks, definitely. The haircut itself, probably not, since it’s not actually the same haircut the name ostensibly refers to.

157. However, come on people, lets not be naive. If a girl gets a tatoo plate on her chest, I dont care how nice of a picture it is, she’s pretty much stating, “I have a nice rack and I want you to look at it”.

     But I don’t have a nice rack (by conventional definitions, which seems to = large-breasted)! What should I do?

158. There is a lot of research out there that discusses tattooing as a way of dealing with trauma. but that wasn’t your initial statement, which is what I’ve been arguing with

     I believe you’re defining trauma too narrowly. When I said tattooing “absolutely” has a relationship with trauma, I was speaking in general terms, not a therapist-diagnosis-medication-and-the-couch kind of trauma. People absolutely self-report relationships between their own tattoos and trauma, and it’s increasingly legitimately recognized as a way to reclaim the body and heal after trauma. Not controversial. But there is also an easy case to be made that the older “tough guy” and in-group/out-group aspect of tattoo culture is also an expression of traumatic experience, rejection of or by society, especially a rigorously classist society. I’m saying so without judgement — there are a lot of reasons folks might reject the mainstream and express it through body modification, and tattooing is only one medium, but again, I think there’s an easy case to be made that some social trauma is behind that. I’m likely cribbing on someone else’s research by saying so, but there it is. Also not really controversial if you’re familiar with the literature.

     Now back to our regularly scheduled clusterfuck.

159. I can’t even begin to engage with everything else, but…getting tattoos is now racist? What the actual fuck?

160. it seems to me that white people should respect the right of Black people to have some symbols/expressions of their own.

     Agreed. Apparently that is way too much to ask though, because I’m seeing a lot of white people in this post essentially responding with “but I WANT to wear my hair this way”. They sound like spoiled brats, frankly.

161. I thank all of you who have appropriated a White Trash Meth Monster cultural icon, and transformed the tattoo into an art form. Down here in BFE, memorial tats here almost exclusively are done on the arms and legs, although I have seen one on the back shoulder. Chest tats, so far, have been esthetic though not always symmetrical. Arm tats often are employed to hide needle tracks and are taken to mean “Lock the medicine chest and hide your wallet”.

     Certain facts are self-evident: the prejudices against tats, freckles, Mediterranean off-whites, nevi and vascular growths, and, of course, the spectrum of African-American and indigenous skins, are all color prejudice. You’ll be hard-pressed to find Irish freckles on a front desk anywhere outside Boston.
     Female professional hair is edging shorter and slicker, nearing the white male style. Corporate culture is dogwhistle for sub-rosa racism, and excluding dreads is a means of ensuring whiteness. A white with locs is suspected mulatto rather than appropriating.
     Neither the tat nor the loc are to be found in front office employment unless it is civil service. Since tats are Biblically prohibited, this amounts to religious discrimination. Corporate rigidity, of course, breeds its own punishment, since businesses wither and die from deficiencies of creativity, and of health. I’m still pissed at the bacteriologist who forbade my walking a mile and a half to work and back, because it left my hair “unprofessional”. That business, of course, was bought out by better.

162. generalizations are inexact. there will always be outliers making an irrelevant racket going “what about meeeee! I’m not like thaaaaaaaat!”

     see, watch:

     white lady with dreads here. hear my voice of irrelevance!

     while I respect the Rastafarian journey and its roots in jamaican politics and the marcus garvey movement, that is not why I did it. I don’t smoke, although I respect the sacramental tradition inherent to Rastafarianism. While I like reggae and appreciate its roots in Nyabinghi worship music, I’m by no means an expert in the genre. (for what it’s worth, I think that Bob Marley is equally as important a political figure as a musical one.) I am way too old to want to be edgy and I am too tired to protest much of anything.

     I did my hair this way for a lot of personal reasons – to mark a transition, to take back my own body, to establish boundaries, to make peace with my appearance – I can’t explain it to those who are upset, and it wouldn’t make a difference even if I could. some gaps cannot be bridged, not even with well-meaning explanations and apologies. Women of color may be pissed at me, just by looking at me, even if they don’t know me. They may be so pissed that they don’t want to know me. that’s the price I pay for trying not to hate myself when I look in the mirror.

     is “sorry, my vanity trumps your oppression! can’t we all just get along?” going to mend this fence? no. but as far as my (uncontrollable, nonconforming, completely humiliating) hair is concerned, sadly, here I stand – I can do no other.

     I can’t count how many times people have asked me if I had african-american ancestry, based on the texture and behavior of my hair. not that I know of. but how much do I really know about my ancestry? I have enough non-conforming features to make me wonder a bit. it’s ambiguous.

     I just needed to get my hair to stop torturing me already after 45 years. I could have shaved my head, but I didn’t want to appropriate the suffering of cancer survivors. so this is how I finally went.

     the whole world does not need to approve of me. the sun will still rise and set every day if people who hate my hair and I are not friends.

163. HIIIII HEY!

     I am sorry that I did not moderate Derail Nation sooner, and I feel that it has now played itself out. Thank you, @Lauren, for trying to bring us back to focus. I wish I had done this last night,when the “fuck you”s and the “fuck off’s” and the “assholes” started flying. I was clearly too passive when I jumped in earlier (107) . I don’t feel “water boarded” as someone suggested, but I do feel taken advantage of. I have 2 weeks here at feministe; you haven’t scared me away yet. 🙂

     Anymore comments about dreadlocks/locs/appropriation will be moderated (deleted) by me.

     Thank you.

164. I believe you’re defining trauma too narrowly. When I said tattooing “absolutely” has a relationship with trauma, I was speaking in general terms, not a therapist-diagnosis-medication-and-the-couch kind of trauma. People absolutely self-report relationships between their own tattoos and trauma, and it’s increasingly legitimately recognized as a way to reclaim the body and heal after trauma. Not controversial.

     But again, Lauren, that is not what you said. There is a great body of literarature out there that examines tattooing among those who have experienced trauma as a healing mechanism. What you initially stated was that Tattoo Culture as a whole came out of trauma – and that is simply not true. Tattoo culture originated from a ton of places – religion, spirituality, cultural norms, warrior ethos, and yes, trauma, However, your statement was overly broad and did not define that rather than tattoo culture having roots in trauma, that trauma has, effectively found an expressive outlet in tattoo culture. So, yes, your initial statement was incorrect. Clarifying it would make this much easier.

165. Because Google only searches the visible web. Most journals are behind paywalls and not part of the visible web.

     Um, zuzu, Goggle Scholar pulls up the abstracts that are available in front of the paywall. Just sayin’.

166. Except that she did not initially state that “Tattoo Culture as a whole came out of trauma.” She said that “tattoos have a relationship to trauma.” The fact that you interpreted her statement in a particular way doesn’t mean that that’s what she said. At worst, her statement was ambiguous, and she clarified what she meant. So there’s no ambiguity anymore; hence, no reason for you continue to harp on this other than attempting to prove that you’re right and she’s wrong. Who cares?

167. Donna, more people than I took issue with that particular statement. And the idea that tattoos equate to trauma has actually been used for a long time to argue that tattoos are signs of mental illness, that they are signals of poor impulse control, etc. So yeah – that basic idea has actually harmed people (myself included, since I’m also PWMI). They actually used to use tattoos as one of the bases for committment years ago. So please, unless you really get the context for why that statement needs to be argued with, I’d suggest not getting involved. It’s easier that way.

168. Eve, if your daughter ever complains about you overreacting to her getting a tattoo, just point her at this thread and tell her that no way you threw a shit fit this big. (Also, tell her she’d better only get tattooed in blue, apparently!) :p

169. Um, zuzu, Goggle Scholar pulls up the abstracts that are available in front of the paywall. Just sayin’.

     Some. Not most.

     Believe it or not, Googling something is not the end-all-be-all of scholarly research. I know it’s hard to wrap one’s mind around this idea.

170. huge majority – pretty much everyone that isn’t of Germanic, Slavic or Italian descent…

     Gee, I never knew I was a Celt before.

171. Clarifying it would make this much easier.

     I did.

172. Believe it or not, Googling something is not the end-all-be-all of scholarly research. I know it’s hard to wrap one’s mind around this idea.

     Gods, don’t I know it. Trying explaining to library patrons that, no, not everything is available via Google yet. We actually do have to use databases and *GASP* physical resources sometimes.

173. physical resources

     I’ve heard of those. Ancient things like punchcards and VCRs, right?

174. Trying explaining to library patrons that, no, not everything is available via Google yet. We actually do have to use databases and *GASP* physical resources sometimes.

     It’s how I have to explain this over and over to my students that gets me down. “Sometimes,” I say, “you have to actually go to the library. The building. Physically.” And then they stare at me like I’ve sprouted another head and can’t understand why they got points off their paper for using as their own secondary source an article from 1972 which they got from JSTOR.

175. Gee, I never knew I was a Celt before.

     Is that supposed to be snarky? ;p They are mostly extinct apart from Eire, but it’s not like the bulk of United Kingdom, France and Spain/Portugal population doesn’t have pretty big Celtic ancestry, and by extension, this also applies to the US. So if your lineage has some folks from these Euro countries, chances are you’re a descendant of the Celts.

     (I forgot that English are part of the Germanic grup)

     I’ve heard of those. Ancient things like punchcards and VCRs, right?

     Phfff…

     Abacuses and clay tablets.

176. Lauren, what I’m seeing you say is basically “lots of people link tattoos to trauma or traumatic things.” And yes, they do. What I was taking issue with was your initial statement that is extremely broad and really did not make this point well at all. And in the context of a mental-advocacy standpoint, it’s a statement that has to be refuted due to its history (like I explained to Donna).

     I do think what you’re really getting at is that there is a strong linkage to tattoos and therapy, as opposed to trauma. My first tattoo was largely therapeutic in nature that helped me a lot. Most of the scholarly work out there seems to make the same link – that the tattooing process or result is an expression of acceptance, resilence, etc. In that sense, the tattoo is deeply therapeutic. Your initial statement came off as expressing a link between tattooing and pathology, which is why I think it sounded so harsh.

177. Is that supposed to be snarky? ;p They are mostly extinct apart from Eire, but it’s not like the bulk of United Kingdom, France and Spain/Portugal population doesn’t have pretty big Celtic ancestry, and by extension, this also applies to the US. So if your lineage has some folks from these Euro countries, chances are you’re a descendant of the Celts.

     Yes, it was supposed to be snarky, because your comment that “pretty much everyone that isn’t of Germanic, Slavic or Italian descent” is of Celtic descent completely ignored the fact that there have been Jews living in Europe for the last 2000+ years, since the earliest communities in Italy under the Roman Republic. Just because we were almost always viewed as outsiders doesn’t mean we weren’t there, continuously.

178. Also, the statement that Celts are mostly extinct apart from Eire would probably be news to a lot of people in Wales and Scotland!

179. And then they stare at me like I’ve sprouted another head and can’t understand why they got points off their paper for using as their own secondary source an article from 1972 which they got from JSTOR.

     EG, sometimes it’s a feat just to get them to use databases like JSTOR. My current crop of students seem to think anything with a .com address represents a perfectly reasonable source (despite the many, many times we go over research techniques).

180. Yes, it was supposed to be snarky, because your comment that “pretty much everyone that isn’t of Germanic, Slavic or Italian descent” is of Celtic descent completely ignored the fact that there have been Jews living in Europe for the last 2000+ years, since the earliest communities in Italy under the Roman Republic. Just because we were almost always viewed as outsiders doesn’t mean we weren’t there, continuously.

     Yes, and i also ignored the Balts, the Ugro-Finns, the Albanians, the Greeks, the Basques, the Turks, Roma and Romanians, i think. Oh, and Tartars. And most likely some other groups :p

     (and as you say in your next comment, i also sidelined the Scots, the Welsh, and the Bretons by naming Irish as most of modern Celts)

     Woe on me! At least i remembered your Jewish ancestry so i don’t have to ask anymore.

181. Sorry, I forgot that Jews get classified along with all the other apparently unimportant peoples of Europe, the ones left over from “pretty much everyone.” Here in New York, I guess we tend to have an inflated notion of our own historical significance.

182. I do think what you’re really getting at is that there is a strong linkage to tattoos and therapy, as opposed to trauma. My first tattoo was largely therapeutic in nature that helped me a lot. Most of the scholarly work out there seems to make the same link – that the tattooing process or result is an expression of acceptance, resilence, etc. In that sense, the tattoo is deeply therapeutic. Your initial statement came off as expressing a link between tattooing and pathology, which is why I think it sounded so harsh.

     Could I have been clearer? Sure, I guess. Unfortunate typo up there, too. You’re beating a really dead horse now.

     But LOL, no, I’m not approaching this from a mental health standpoint, advocacy or otherwise. I’m saying what I’m saying, and this many comments into it, it really shouldn’t need interpretation. Your deep reading is working against you. The question was whether tattoos have a relationship (any! singular!) to trauma. The answer was yes. Obviously, yes, tattoos have a long relationship to trauma through history on a variety of levels. In saying so, I was assuming that others spewing forth expertise on the subject had some deeper relationship to the literature or the culture than, “I have a tattoo!” I didn’t realize this was a referendum on the mental health of tattooed people, or that I would need to cite sources.

     Otherwise I’m done talking about it, other than to say that the level of toxicity is at a new level. Peace.

183. Sorry, I forgot that Jews get classified along with all the other apparently unimportant peoples of Europe, the ones left over from “pretty much everyone.” Here in New York, I guess we tend to have an inflated notion of our own historical significance.

     Ah, but wasn’t pretty clear i was going by numbers not by historical significance? Otherwise i would mention Greeks, wouldn’t i? And Basques. And Turks. And Tartars.

     Damn. I hoped you would mention someone i forgot. I am pretty sure i forgot some group. Mordvins? Sami? But they are Ugro-Finns i think. Not to mention that i don’t think there were more than 3 of them that moved to USA.

     Etruscans?

184. I think I have a great great great great great grandmother that was a Celtic Princess.

     1. Enough with the Celt derail, please.

185. Um, zuzu, Goggle Scholar pulls up the abstracts that are available in front of the paywall. Just sayin’.

     And abstracts in front of the paywall are only what’s on the visible web.

     Libraries and researchers and universities pay a lot of money to access the stuff beyond the paywall. If you could get it via Google, it wouldn’t be worth paying for, would it?

     Um. Maybe don’t get into a pissing contest about research with a librarian who can FIND MORE FACTS ABOUT URINE AND URINE ACCESSORIES THAN YOU EVER, EVER WANT TO KNOW.

     I think I have a great great great great great grandmother that was a Celtic Princess.

     You are not alone in that, given how many kings and kingdoms there were in ancient Ireland, and given how many Celtic peoples there were running around outside Ireland.

     As for current tattoo culture and appropriation, I think it’s complicated. I do think that certain designs are appropriative — Polynesian designs, Chinese characters that the bearer can’t read and could say anything (but are deeply, deeply meaningful of course), many traditional Japanese designs (though that’s its own ball of wax, since it’s not like Japanese tattoos have been part of mainstream Japanese culture), religious iconography of a religion you don’t really follow except that maybe you do yoga a lot, Native American symbols for non-Native Americans.

     But the act of tattooing, or simply having a tattoo, is not itself appropriative. It’s something that’s been around for many years, in many different contexts and cultures, so that it’s not strongly associated anymore with any one group.

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187. I would like some facts about urine accessories.

188. I know about different types of catheters…

189. Zuzau, I should put out that Lauren and I were arguing about what was actually available on the web. And that I actually used WorldCat too, so I’m totally computer functional! But that plenty of scholarly work (particularly the abstracts) are available througb Googe Scholar, which is an actual search engine for abstracts. Nobody was talking about ACTUAL Google (which seems to be the hangup here).

190. I can’t even begin to engage with everything else, but…getting tattoos is now racist? What the actual fuck?

     Did you even read this thread?

     As for current tattoo culture and appropriation, I think it’s complicated. I do think that certain designs are appropriative — Polynesian designs, Chinese characters that the bearer can’t read and could say anything (but are deeply, deeply meaningful of course), many traditional Japanese designs (though that’s its own ball of wax, since it’s not like Japanese tattoos have been part of mainstream Japanese culture), religious iconography of a religion you don’t really follow except that maybe you do yoga a lot, Native American symbols for non-Native Americans.

     I think that this is a really key point. Tattooing, even as it reappeared in Europe during the rise of colonialism, is more of a body-modification technique than a discrete cultural practice in an of itself. It’s relevant that western tattooing has been primarily used to inscribe symbols from people’s own culture rather than lifting wholesale from others (sailors getting mermaids and stuff rather than merely copying polynesian designs etc). That’s not to say that non-western symbology hasn’t been appropriated a whole bunch for white people’s aesthetic amusement (and that yes, your “tribal” tattoo is appropriative), but that the use of needle tattooing as a technique combined with people bringing their own cultural iconography into the practice is something that I think falls into a different category of cross-cultural exchange. I certainly think that tattooing as body mod is now pretty strongly embedded in western cultures.

     I do, however, give side-eye to people who engage in tattooing techniques like cut and rub as somehow more “authentic” or “primal”. Don’t even get me started on Sydney’s alternative bodymod community.

191. With due respect Eve. . .the discussion about dreads was not really a derail. Your description of your own dreads was an integral part of your post. Not only do you have a picture of yourself with dreadlocks visible, but pretty much all of your thoughts about tattoos are informed, according to you, by your own experiences with your dreads.

     The so-called “derail” was begun by Black women responding to the content of your post and explaining why they feel that white people wearing dreads is cultural appropriation. . .white people wearing dreads: something you talked about doing in your post. I don’t think that Black women pointing out the racially problematic content of a post is derailing. . .critiquing would be a better word. Since you read Feministe for three months with a dictionary handy in hopes of being ready for our culture. . .I hope can you understand that critiquing problematic aspects of posts from an anti-oppressive framework is an important part of what commenters do here. I’d appreciate it if you take the opportunity to say whether or not you believe white people wearing dreadlocks is a form of appropriation or not. . .or at least to say you encourage women of color to continue to voice their concerns on your threads and that you will moderate out racist comments directed toward them. . .rather than just shutting down the whole conversation entirely.

     Also I’m not seeing where you jumped in at comment 107? Did you moderate out your own comment?

192. You are not alone in that, given how many kings and kingdoms there were in ancient Ireland, and given how many Celtic peoples there were running around outside Ireland.

     LOL, that was a joke riffing off the whole great great great grandmother Cherokee Princess deal.

193. Possibly one of the worst, if not the worst, post I’ve ever read on Feministe. Perspicacity nailed it in the very first comment.

     Eve very accurately demonstrated why I prefer to keep my many bright, colorful tattoos hidden from the general public. It’s the same reason why I am extremely self-conscious about the clothes I wear over my 36-G’s. Sure, in an ideal world I’d wear whatever I want and look like whatever I want and screw what other people think. But in this real world, where even the supposedly feminist bloggers and blog editors on Feministe think this kind of judgmental, body-shaming bs is acceptable, being myself in public space is just too difficult to deal with.

     So yeah, thanks for that. Apologies to your readers is in order, don’t you think? You can start by saying sorry for projecting your own issues onto the entire female population.

     1. A reminder: Rude comments to guest bloggers (including calling their posts “the worst” and issuing non-sensical demands for apologies) will get you banned.

194. Thank you, LotusBecca. Calling a discusison of dreads as it relates to appropriation a “derail” is disengenious of the OP at best, considering her initial post of about five-ish paragraphs dedicated an entire paragraph to talking about her dreads.

     1. The author was using her history of having dreads to connect her own feelings about her previously non-standard appearance with her feelings on tattoos, which is what the post itself is actually about. The subject of the post is tattoos and their significance, their relation to trauma, etc. The subject of the post is not anywhere near whether dreads are culturally appropriative. As interesting as that topic may be — and I agree it’s interesting — it has not only been thoroughly discussed in this thread, but it has been specifically stated by the author of the post to be not on topic.

        Please respect our guest bloggers and their moderating decisions, instead of derailing further about whether or not a previous side conversation was a derail. Back to the topic of the post.

        (To ensure that we actually get back on topic, I’m putting this entire thread on moderation. Future comments that are not about the post topic, or that attack its author, will be deleted. Posts that attack the author will also get the commenter banned).

195. White woman with (former) dreads jumping to shut down black voices because they don’t validate her nice white feels? I for one am SHOCKED.

196. Alright then, on topic:

     OP, I’m wondering why it is you can’t help but think a large tattoo is a cry for help or attention. I’d like you to detail your logic on this one.

197. OP, I’m wondering why it is you can’t help but think a large tattoo is a cry for help or attention. I’d like you to detail your logic on this one.

     Here we go again, circling back to the beginning: that isn’t what she said (either generally or as applied to the specific relative she was discussing), and to the extent the comment was ambiguous, I think it’s been long since clarified. What exactly are you asking that hasn’t been answered?

198. I grew up surrounded by people covered in tattoos, I never really thought of them as induced by trauma. Sure, attention seems like a reason, but why is that a bad thing? “Look how awesome this skull is,” isn’t something I’d judge a person for. I literally cannot think of one person I know that doesn’t have at least one tattoo except for my father. Well, I’ll put a caveat on that, anyone under 60. My mom has a tattoo. She is the least edgy person I know. She’s fucking edgeless.

199. My mom has a tattoo. She is the least edgy person I know. She’s fucking edgeless.

     I had a 75 year old client with a little kitty tat on her hip. She just liked cats. No edge there either.

     The edge thing starts disappearing once every other person around has one. Be that tats or piercings. It stops being edgy when you can get it done at the mall.

200. Please respect our guest bloggers and their moderating decisions, instead of derailing further about whether or not a previous side conversation was a derail. Back to the topic of the post.

     Fair enough Jill. I think your policy that guest bloggers should be able to manage the direction of their own threads is a reasonable one. And I’m sorry you’ve felt taken advantage of as a moderator, Eve. If anything I said contributed to you feeling uncomfortable, I apologize for that. And you’re right to not get scared away. I was really upset during the first few threads at Feministe where I really participated because I felt (at the time) like a lot of people were getting on my case unfairly. It was one of Jill’s internet dating threads and a thread about the death of Christopher Hitchens. But I came around to like it a lot here. So I hope you get the most out of your two weeks here.

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202. Whooo! There’s a whole big ton of class stuff to unpack here.

203. I’m considering large tattoos on multiple areas of my body. For me, it’s just because I like the look of it. I like the way ink looks on other people and myself. To me, tattoos are like low maintenance decorations (versus hair color, for example). In my case, I have two tattoos so far. Everything about them save for their placement has a meaning to me. I get a kick out of sharing the meaning behind them when I’m asked, but beyond that, whatever people think doesn’t matter to me.

204. “Judgement of looks is a terrible way to treat someone you don’t know.”

     Come now.
     People with visible tattoos are making a statement. Like dying your hair pink. Or getting multiple facial piercings. Forty years ago, when I was a hippie, we dressed in a particular way to make a statement.
     It’s disingenuous to get all huffy about how you’re being “judged” by the non-tattooed. If you have a beautiful tattoo you want to show to the world, go for it — but don’t be shocked if the entire world doesn’t like it as much as you do.
     How you dress, wear your hair, show body art, and so forth are the choices you make about how you want others to see you. Tattoos mean something. To some they mean “wow” and to others they mean “ick.” (On men and women.)

205. As a new-found history need, I’d just like to throw out that tattooing is really interesting from a historical perspective- most cultures have taken part in adornment and body modulation (tatoos, peircings) for a long time.
     I’ve heard the argument made that dissapeoval of tatoos is racist, since it tends to be the descendants of eauropeans diss approving of other cultures’ practises (this of applies to Caucasians frowning on tatoos, I suppose). But would that make white folks getting a tatoo cultural appropriation?

206. Clearly I commented without reading the thread. My thoughts and much more have already been spoken, much more eloquently. feel free to delete the comment in moderation, or ignore it if it gets published.
     I have learned a lot in just 10 minutes of reading on this thread, thank you to all of you.

207. Yikes this thread.

     I looooove tattoos. Love them. I have three that are quite small but would like many more. I like that they are permanent beautiful art and I think they make people look interesting. Most of all I like that tattoos are a way of reclaiming my body in a society that treats my body as public property. Though sometimes this works in an opposite way, as I’ve noticed men especially acting weird about my tattoos and touching the flower tattoo on my back without my permission. One guy even said to me “it’s your fault for getting it, people will want to touch it”. Wtf no.

208. As for finding them acceptable on men and to do with “issues” on women, is it because you may have internalized some of society’s demands that women be as lowest-common-denominator-attractive as possible, whereas men can come in all shapes and sizes and styles and still be conventionally attractive?

     I don’t think that’s really the case. I do think we get more choices, but conventional attractiveness is still pretty limited and and the the expectations are still unrealistic.

     I doubt that there is a cultural appropriation issue here; although there is a tendancy for specific tattoo arts to culturally appropriate. (I note that cultural appropriation is one of those things where it’s easy to think up examples of Bad Things even if nobody is necessarily being hurt, and you need to be aware of natural cultural drift, etc.)

     Do MY PEOPLE really have a monopoly on disapproving of foreigners?

     One thing which seems to be a bit of an issue in SJ (and a HUGE issue in the Tumbler Fake SJ Scumhole) are the following attitudes:
     -If somebody is part of the Social Justice Clique, or a Designated Victim, their entire presentation is above criticism.
     -It is oppressive to have ANY abilitiy to distinguish between ‘self’ and ‘other’, but at the same time appropriation is doom

     -What do you people think about the idea of a person who does not speak Japanese getting a tattoo of the Japanese characters for ‘crazy gajin’ (crazy foreigner), knowing what they mean? I read about this on a webforum.

209. Tattoos and art have always been a great interest to me. I found your website very interesting and informing. I have bookmarked it for my tattoo and art loving friends. I will be back to frequently visit.

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