Homework 32 - Tattoos & The Presentation of the Self

Dan Brown once said (as proclaimed in his book "Angels and Demons"), "The human spirit craves mastery over its carnal shell." What makes a tattoo any different? We as humans are always trying to make ourselves stand out, to make ourselves feel superior over others of our kind. Our “carnal shells” are our bodies; the shells are the barrier we break through with body piercings or tattoos. We “crave” the feeling of being different, of being unique, of being unlike the others. But we want to be thought of as “cool” the entire time. We adorn our bodies with symbols or materialistic items that set us apart from all the rest, that make us feel “important” or “special”. By getting inked, we are portraying to the world that we are different. That we are not like the rest of the humans.

By getting a tattoo, we are using our bodies to portray to the world who we are as a person. Depending on where and what you get as your tattoo, you can come off as sweet and innocent (a simple butterfly on your ankle), tough and brolic (a tattoo on your bicep), or slutty (a tramp stamp). Or the final option, mysterious and worldly. People do this by getting other languages tattooed on their bodies (most common languages are Asian languages). By getting “love” in Chinese or “courage” in Japanese, we are forcing others who don’t speak the language to ask us about our tattoo, therefore drawing attention to ourselves. Think of it as an ice breaker, of some sort.

My friend Steven was telling me about how he took his friend to get a tattoo recently. His friend wanted a Japanese phrase, but he couldn’t decide what to get. Handing Steven a Japanese-English dictionary, he told Steven to pick our something that sounds nice for him. Steven, hating his friend for reasons I will not divulge, decided to pick our something that will not be repeated, because it was rather disgusting. Trusting Steven, the friend got that phrase inked on his body. Now, we all know a tattoo is permanent, and this friend does not know what his tattoo actually says. What happens if a Japanese speaker tells the friend what the tattoo truly means? That can bring embarrassment onto the friend. So are tattoos really a good thing? It is proven several times that people get other languages tattooed on their bodies, wanting one phrase but getting something completely different, if by accident or on purpose. Who’s cool now?

But tattoos are cool, no? Everyone cool gets tattoos, and everyone who wants to be cool feels the need to get a tattoo. We suffer through the pain of sitting still for hours on end, having a needle forced to slice our skin, all because we want something to set ourselves apart from others. The tattoo that we do receive portrays our personality, portrays who we are or who we want to be.

One of our friends, Jacara, wants to get a tattoo as soon as she turns eighteen. She wants a circle on her arm, to represent cycles and how they never end. Cool and mysterious right? Now if a random person was to see her tattoo, they would ask her why she got it, thus sparking up a conversation. However, her mother does not want her to get a tattoo. But of course Jacara wants one, because she craves that “mastery” over her “carnal shell”, feeling that she owns and controls everything that goes on her body. That feeling of power.

Dan Brown once said (as proclaimed in his book “Angels and Demons”), “The human spirit craves mastery over its carnal shell.” Tattoos are one of our humane ways to gain mastery over our shell. Tattoos make us feel “cool”, they make us feel “important”, they make us feel as if we have “power”. We want others to look at us and think, “hmm they’re cool” or “wow his/her tattoo is so cool”. We try to make ourselves stand out by adorning our bodies with ink, while conforming to a society which portrays tattoos as cool. We ink our bodies to stand out, but want to be cool and fit in…double standard much?