I was working in psych in the 90s and that’s when tattoos exploded on the scene, in a huge way, people were getting them on their face even. I was working with women who had Borderline Personality Disorder and they LOVED tattoos because of the pain and self-mutilation aspect.
I started asking average people about why they got their tats, what they meant, and so on. Studies started cropping up, and they proposed what I thought about the topic. There’s a phrase, “wearing you heart on your sleeve” which can have good and bad meanings, but I’ll go with the bad, it means you’re a shallow person who projects shallow emotion. A person with serious feelings and passions can’t wear them on his sleeve, and typically restrains them to maintain dignity, so you cannot tell the passions he has.
The most interesting study I read indicated that people get the EXACT OPPOSITE tattoo from what they are feeling. People who are depressed and negative will get positive tats, like a bird or teddy bear. People who are scared will get “macho” tats like devils, skulls, etc. They are doing some shallow false advertising to project the opposite of who they really are. That’s because tattoos are driven by ANXIETY and that goes with self-mutilation behavior, pain reduces anxiety.
The other type of tat, the tribute tat, like a picture of Jesus, your dead kid, live kid, etc indicates the same thing. You feel little toward the person, god, etc and need to advertise you have great feeling, because you don’t.
I agree with all of that and have asked people about it. Usually their reasons are much like I explained, or an “I dunno” then, “Maybe I shouldn’t have…” because their decisions are shallow and nervous. Certainly not the worse qualities in the world, but as we know, tats have sigma, they mark your body, and are very expensive to remove. Also, if the person is sad, stuck, and confused in life it’s way better to unstick yourself through making meaningful relationships than getting a picture of a Devil Chicken on your chest.
I feel bad for all the “trump stamp” girls I’ve met. Almost universally, they explained they wanted the guys they had sex with to look at the design during doggy style and remember who they were. How helnously sad and pathetic is that! It literally makes my heart, literally, hurt thinking about it.
Some really nice looking girls told me that.
As many of you know, I’m an excellent artist, and I designed the
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