INKED Inc. - a community for the counterculture
Surprised.
So I heard about this article written in a PA newspaper. Here is the article, and at the end I provided a link to it. I was even more appalled once I read other peoples comments.
You can tell where a culture is headed by examining whom its members seek to emulate.
Just a few centuries ago, there was a culture still mired in the Stone Age, with no written language, no science, no math, no architecture, no nothing requiring thought. Its members had not even managed to invent the wheel.
That culture's only contribution to the world was the decorative ''tatu.'' In most other parts of the ancient world, tattoos were disfigurements used only to identify criminals or slaves.
Now that Polynesians can read, use wheels, count and appreciate musical instruments other than drums, they've advanced to a point where most of them have abandoned tattoos.
As one culture ascends, it seems, another declines.
This week, we learned that 36 percent of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 have tattoos. It was just last year The Morning Call reported that 16 percent of all Americans were thusly self-mutilated.
The sight of Mike Tyson's gorgeous artwork, no doubt, has persuaded millions to flock to tattoo joints. Or maybe it's the growing popularity of ''mixed martial arts'' bloodfests, which put tattooed subhumans into cages to brutalize each other.
''Proud parents bear tattoos honoring their kids,'' said a headline over Monday's story.
''It's super big right now,'' the story quoted Steve Lemak as saying of the mom and dad tattoo trend. He owns The Quillian joint in Allentown.
''You'll never find a more meaningful tattoo than one for your kids,'' said Kiel Ferrari, described as an ''artist'' at the Minds Eye Tattoo in Emmaus. (I also have seen graffiti vandals described as ''artists.'')
Along with the story, there were photographs of bodies mutilated with hideous ''artwork.'' One was of an arm with a truly unfortunate depiction of a child's face. I am sure the real child is cute; no child could actually be that homely.
On the very same day that our eyes were insulted by those vulgar photos, the paper ran another story elsewhere, plugging the premier showing of a new television program about the joys of prostitution.
The show was imported from England, where, the story said, ''it was aired last September and was blasted in the media for glamorizing prostitution.'' (We have an MTV show glamorizing pimps, so why not glamorize their pathetic puppets?)
I can't say I'm an expert on prostitution. I'm too parsimonious to gain first-hand knowledge. (Stories on Eliot Spitzer's $4,300 dalliances nearly gave me apoplexy.) Nonetheless, I've said a lot about both prostitution and tattoos, which, come to think of it, always seem to go together.
No one can deny that the heaviest concentrations of tattoos occur in the lowest segments of society -- prostitutes, pimps, pugs, prison inmates, Ku Klux Klansmen and the members of street and motorcycle gangs.
Now, according to this week's story, 36 percent of young people have decided to emulate such lowlifes.
And some news media want to glamorize them.
Do not glamorize accomplishment. Do not glamorize intelligence, insight or integrity. Don't glamorize courage, generosity, leadership, skill or diligence. Such qualities are for nerds. By all means, glamorize pimps, prostitutes and those who emulate them. That is the future of America's culture.
Aware of how some of these devoted self-mutilators are going to react, I am compelled to emphasize that I do not favor any restrictions on personal behavior. If an idiot wants to get a tattoo, he or she should be free to do so. I just think responsible news media organizations should not glamorize them. What's next? Glamorizing child molesters or kluxers?
In some older cultures, influence traveled from the top down. Early Americans marveled at the intellect of people like Thomas Jefferson and James Madison and decided that education was a good thing, so they developed public school systems.
In some modern cultures, influences travel from the septic bottom up. In no time at all, we'll catch up to the Stone Age cannibals of the South Pacific.
After reading this the first thing I though of was this site, and how all of us here are a contradiction to everything he is saying.
Read the comments here
You can tell where a culture is headed by examining whom its members seek to emulate.
Just a few centuries ago, there was a culture still mired in the Stone Age, with no written language, no science, no math, no architecture, no nothing requiring thought. Its members had not even managed to invent the wheel.
That culture's only contribution to the world was the decorative ''tatu.'' In most other parts of the ancient world, tattoos were disfigurements used only to identify criminals or slaves.
Now that Polynesians can read, use wheels, count and appreciate musical instruments other than drums, they've advanced to a point where most of them have abandoned tattoos.
As one culture ascends, it seems, another declines.
This week, we learned that 36 percent of Americans between the ages of 18 and 29 have tattoos. It was just last year The Morning Call reported that 16 percent of all Americans were thusly self-mutilated.
The sight of Mike Tyson's gorgeous artwork, no doubt, has persuaded millions to flock to tattoo joints. Or maybe it's the growing popularity of ''mixed martial arts'' bloodfests, which put tattooed subhumans into cages to brutalize each other.
''Proud parents bear tattoos honoring their kids,'' said a headline over Monday's story.
''It's super big right now,'' the story quoted Steve Lemak as saying of the mom and dad tattoo trend. He owns The Quillian joint in Allentown.
''You'll never find a more meaningful tattoo than one for your kids,'' said Kiel Ferrari, described as an ''artist'' at the Minds Eye Tattoo in Emmaus. (I also have seen graffiti vandals described as ''artists.'')
Along with the story, there were photographs of bodies mutilated with hideous ''artwork.'' One was of an arm with a truly unfortunate depiction of a child's face. I am sure the real child is cute; no child could actually be that homely.
On the very same day that our eyes were insulted by those vulgar photos, the paper ran another story elsewhere, plugging the premier showing of a new television program about the joys of prostitution.
The show was imported from England, where, the story said, ''it was aired last September and was blasted in the media for glamorizing prostitution.'' (We have an MTV show glamorizing pimps, so why not glamorize their pathetic puppets?)
I can't say I'm an expert on prostitution. I'm too parsimonious to gain first-hand knowledge. (Stories on Eliot Spitzer's $4,300 dalliances nearly gave me apoplexy.) Nonetheless, I've said a lot about both prostitution and tattoos, which, come to think of it, always seem to go together.
No one can deny that the heaviest concentrations of tattoos occur in the lowest segments of society -- prostitutes, pimps, pugs, prison inmates, Ku Klux Klansmen and the members of street and motorcycle gangs.
Now, according to this week's story, 36 percent of young people have decided to emulate such lowlifes.
And some news media want to glamorize them.
Do not glamorize accomplishment. Do not glamorize intelligence, insight or integrity. Don't glamorize courage, generosity, leadership, skill or diligence. Such qualities are for nerds. By all means, glamorize pimps, prostitutes and those who emulate them. That is the future of America's culture.
Aware of how some of these devoted self-mutilators are going to react, I am compelled to emphasize that I do not favor any restrictions on personal behavior. If an idiot wants to get a tattoo, he or she should be free to do so. I just think responsible news media organizations should not glamorize them. What's next? Glamorizing child molesters or kluxers?
In some older cultures, influence traveled from the top down. Early Americans marveled at the intellect of people like Thomas Jefferson and James Madison and decided that education was a good thing, so they developed public school systems.
In some modern cultures, influences travel from the septic bottom up. In no time at all, we'll catch up to the Stone Age cannibals of the South Pacific.
After reading this the first thing I though of was this site, and how all of us here are a contradiction to everything he is saying.
Read the comments here
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Dana on
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OH my god! This guy lives on stereotypes...this is horrible. I haven't read the comments yet...should I? I don't know if I can resist....
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Permalink Reply by Mary on -
So the author has managed to associate tattoos with pimps, prostitutes, and the KKK. That last one pushed me over the edge, I've never actually commented on one of these articles before, guess this one shall be the first.
It's never been the demonization of tattoos specifically that pissed me off. It's the overlying idea behind articles like this that someone would presume to know exactly who you are and judge you, based on nothing more but an assumption based on appearance. The arrogance that people like this man hold, that he actually believes he has the ability, the right, to judge an entire segment of a population without any real knowledge at all is ridiculous. The fact that the author is older also makes me sad, you think just by living that long he'd come to realize how ridiculous it is to make assumptions this broad.
I am always aware of looking stupid by talking authoratatively on a subject that I don't know backwards and forwards. And then you have people like this who feel free to spout their idiotic opinions basing on them on a few shallow facts taken completely out of context. I would be embarassed to write something this poorly researched and blatantly biased.
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Permalink Reply by Bill on -
This article sums up everything that is wrong with the people in this world. I love my art, however I have never ever thought it made me look like a gangster or a prostitute!
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Permalink Reply by MACDIESEL on -
wow! that is an opionion! hahahaha, it sounds like HE is in the stonage. I don't think he just insulted the tattooed, I think he hit upon quite a few groups there. I forget that there are still a lot of people like that walking around....very scary!
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Permalink Reply by Jess on -
Yeah....I think I'll skip the comment part. This is just stupid. We all know better than to believe this or to even let him ruffel our feathers. I know I am nothing of the sort, I'm well aware of my value to society and those I hold closest. With the prettiest smile on my face I say: Everyone else can FUCK OFF! LOL ;)
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Permalink Reply by Jess on
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He probably got passed over for a REAL job by a tattooed fellow or something haha
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Permalink Reply by shevonne on -
He doesn't understand what a tattoo means to each individual person. Sure there are some ignorant ones who do it for reasons that are ridiculous. But those are the typically young individuals that do it for attention. The other ones, people like those who come here, that have appreciation for the art and significance of tattoos, these people aren't as "glamorized" (as he puts it). Why? Because our society feeds on, frankly, the bullshit of the ignorant.
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Permalink Reply by Valley of Bones on -
Unfortunately, I am not surprised by this. I have heard too many people (some "well-meaning," some not) say too many stupid things about choices that others make.
Sigh -- just in a cynical mood today, I guess.
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Permalink Reply by J.T. on -
LOL ...wow !!!!Hes mad cuz his mom never let him get ink.Then his wife left him for a guy that had a "tatu" shop..!! wow.how do ignorat bastards get to write in newspapers ...??
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