Why God! Why are tattoos popular? Why, why, why?
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Full disclosure, I'm 48. When I was an adolescent tattoos were what we used to identify the people coming back from the Vietnam War or WWII vets. Oh, and that rough trade class on the wrong side of town.
When I was in high school earrings were a scandal for a boy and then it became body piercings.
Twenty years after that it's like there's a tattoo virus that's attacking young skin and it's everywhere – and it's in my porn! I can't enjoy western porn, anymore. I've switched to Asian. :crazy2:
So why do you have tattoos? Where did you have them placed? How old were you when you decided to make yourself unappealing to me? And why has it taken off like it has -- they're everywhere.
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Tattoos have always had a certain degree of popularity among various subcultures, but in recent years have become more "mainstream," along with other practices.
Tattooing as a practice dates back to Neolithic times. "Ötzi the Iceman," found in the Alps and dating from the 5th-4th millennium BC, had a number of tattoos on his body. (And now Brad Pitt has a tattoo of Ötzi. Go figure.
)It has been practiced all over the world, even though the English word "tattoo" supposedly derives from the Samoan or Tahitian word tatau.
In the West, it was frequently associated with sailors and the criminal underclass, but many of England's gentry were themselves tattooed.
(Of course, tattoos have been used for more sinister purposes. The Romans tattooed their slaves to identify and humiliate them; Nazi Germany echoed this practice with the identification numbers tattooed onto the bodies of Jews.)
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I decided to get one as a birthday present to myself two years ago. I kinda did it just to do it, but I made sure it would be something I'd want to see permanently and has a good story.
My father passed away when I was 18 (I'm 26 now) and he was very active in his local Ford Mustang Club and had a 66 red mustang he had purchased a few years previously. My mother has since sold the car (a shame), but I got the whole car tattooed on my arm. Its a great conversation starter and when people hear about my dad's interest in Mustangs and that I decided to memorialize him in this way, people are touched. I feel a reminder of him every time I look at my arm, especially since I now live in a different country than where he is buried…
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I got the whole car tattooed on my arm.
You know, you could have made it the screensaver or wallpaper on your phone. It'd have been cheaper and less painful.
Have you encountered any problems with a tattoo abroad? Here in Japan, you'd have to cover it up.
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Nope I live in Tel Aviv, no problems at work with it, we dont even have a dress code anyways some ppl come in pajamas lol, many people after the army get tattoos as a sign of rebellion against the "system."
Tattoos are freely displayed including by waiters and waitresses at some of the finest restaurants, which surprised me…
Only place you should try and cover it up is a holy site I guess, but its not mandatory.
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I have a sweet tat on my left shoulder, multicolred Hebrew design. It's a bitch cuz I'm not supposed to sun to keep the color.
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@Icc:
I have a sweet tat on my left shoulder, multicolred Hebrew design. It's a bitch cuz I'm not supposed to sun to keep the color.
What does it say and why did you get it?
Seems like it's kinda out of sight, outa mind.
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Popularity of tattoos has risen in tandum with various other forms of body modification: piercings, body-hair removal, and scarification.
What had been the rebellion of one generation (punks in the 70s) became a marker of 'cool' and then became the norm for the next generation.
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I decided to get one as a birthday present to myself two years ago. I kinda did it just to do it, but I made sure it would be something I'd want to see permanently and has a good story.
My father passed away when I was 18 (I'm 26 now) and he was very active in his local Ford Mustang Club and had a 66 red mustang he had purchased a few years previously. My mother has since sold the car (a shame), but I got the whole car tattooed on my arm. Its a great conversation starter and when people hear about my dad's interest in Mustangs and that I decided to memorialize him in this way, people are touched. I feel a reminder of him every time I look at my arm, especially since I now live in a different country than where he is buried…
:love:
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Popularity of tattoos has risen in tandum with various other forms of body modification: piercings, body-hair removal, and scarification.
What had been the rebellion of one generation (punks in the 70s) became a marker of 'cool' and then became the norm for the next generation.
Are you saying there's one unbroken line from the 70's to today?
It feels like an on and off thing to me. Cool in the post-war 50's, not cool after; cool/rebellious in the 70's, an eyesore in the 80's; the 90's began a trend towards body mods and somehow later on tattoos got involved and –BOOM! -- tattoos all over my porn.
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I remember my parents freaking when I got an ear pierced in 1979. It was becoming a trend for gay men to have a single ear piercing. Other than the military or jailhouse tattoos men rarely got tattoos and women never got tattoos.
Maybe there were slight fluctuations in popularity but there had been a definite long term trend toward increasing the acceptability of body modification. -
I remember my parents freaking when I got an ear pierced in 1979. It was becoming a trend for gay men to have a single ear piercing. Other than the military or jailhouse tattoos men rarely got tattoos and women never got tattoos.
Maybe there were slight fluctuations in popularity but there had been a definite long term trend toward increasing the acceptability of body modification.Daring. Badass. Edgy.
;D