Tattoos in the NY Times

This morning I was staring at the neck of a relatively attractive white woman with some flowers and the name “Mabel” tattooed on the back of her neck. I thought to myself, why would she do that? Can’t she just wear a name tag?

The New York Times was thinking the same thing today.

In a mysterious and inexorable process that seems to transform all that is low culture into something high, permanent ink markings began creeping toward the traditional no-go zones for all kinds of people, past collar and cuffs, those twin lines of clothed demarcation that even now some tattoo artists are reluctant to cross.

I think they have prole drift backwards. The higher classes are taking on the habits of the lower classes.

It still seems incredibly stupid to get a tattoo. What happens when they go out of style? It’s still not considered upper class. Why permanently prevent yourself from ever being upper class?

Nevertheless, I see many white people in Manhattan with white collar jobs and probably college degrees who have tattoos. I suspect that they are all voting for Obama. College gradautes with tattoos just has a left-wing feel to it, but I can't pinpoint why. Normally, left-wing people have no qualms about hating low-class white culture like hunting and NASCAR. It’s a real shame that the General Social Survey has never asked any questions about tattoos.

Comments

[Peter]

You're not alone, I don't get tattoos either. Unfortunately, that pretty much marks us as senile old farts, given that tattoos have become so widely accepted in our culture. I'm somewhat skeptical as to whether they'll ever fall out of popularity.

[Carl Shulman]

"College graduates with tattoos just has a left-wing feel to it, but I can't pinpoint why."
Surely Big Five Openness to Experience should come to mind as something correlated with both left-wing political orientation and tattoos.

[robert61]

This summer at the shore in Sweden, I saw middle-aged ladies with tramp stamps stretched taut across their broadening backsides - a first. I even saw a ten year old girl with a water soluble tramp stamp tattoo just above the rear of her bikini bottoms. Doesn't this imply that the tramp stamp has jumped the shark and the white people of Manhattan will soon move on - albeit perhaps to some even more grotesque mode of self-mutilation?

[sabril]

Hasn't technology advanced to the point where it's not too difficult to remove a tattoo? If so, that might explain the increase in popularity.

[Totschlagen]

"Nevertheless, I see many white people in Manhattan with white collar jobs and probably college degrees who have tattoos. I suspect that they are all voting for Obama. College gradautes with tattoos just has a left-wing feel to it, but I can't pinpoint why. Normally, left-wing people have no qualms about hating low-class white culture like hunting and NASCAR."

I see lots of idiot hipsters with tattoos in the NYC area. I doubt they majored in Finance or Law, etc...(if young Wall Street/Lawyer types have tattoos, I haven't really noticed). They are majority liberals who will be voting for Obama because they think it is cool and want to be cool. Whiterpeople stuff, etc..."Look at me I love blacks and have a black friend...I'm an artist..." Others have documented this type better than I. And these young liberals also have distinctive dress that makes them easy to spot.

Tattoos on liberal hipsters are very "different" from those on rednecks and other low-class whites. I don't know how, but they just are!

[Christopher Tracy]

I'm 19 years old and I don't understand tattoos. They look ugly and disgusting, regardless of whether or not they're indicators of a prole lifestyle, although I'll have to admit that at least from my observations, more of my prole friends have tattoos than my peers here at college.

[dhulqarnayn]

@Totschlagen:

First, Wall Street types didn't major in Finance, a public school major for future accountants and bank tellers. They probably majored in Economics, a private school major for future assholes. That or went to the University of Chicago and majored in whatever and got the job anyway. Second, their work clothes conceal all but the head and hands, so you'd really have no idea about any tattoos they might have.

Second, your hipster caricature is painfully disconnected. Have you ever met anyone who says things like I'm voting for Obama because I want to be cool, and P.S. I have a black friend? Or maybe you just see college kids with tattoos and set up big, obvious strawmen? It'd be as easy to lampoon college republicans, who also facilely espouse nonsense.

Anyway, this post was pretty dumb all in all. Tattoos are mainstream. Money- and power-seekers try not to make mistakes that can hinder their upward mobility, and this includes not getting inked up. Don't date the Mabels of the world if it bothers you.

[john Lilly]

This New Yorker cartoon by Eric Lewis offers the best analysis of the phenomenon I've ever encountered:

http://www.cartoonbank.com/item/44542

dhulqarnayn
Don't be so bitter.

[Jailhouse]

"Anyway, this post was pretty dumb all in all."

Your's or Half Sigma's?

[Rain And]

Nothing sullies the smooth young skin of a woman like a tattoo. It's like a giant, permanent patch of zits that you pay someone to give you.

On a scale from 1-10, a tattoo, especially a giant tramp stamp, reduces your hotness number by 1 whole point.

[Rain And]

"Have you ever met anyone who says things like I'm voting for Obama because I want to be cool, and P.S. I have a black friend?"

Oh, *come on*! Do people have to spell out their every thought and motivation like this verbally for you, for you to be able to read them? Do you have full-blown autism?

I have a college age friend who told me there is something messianic about Obama. No hint of irony about it. She flaunts an Obama pin on her backpack. But when I very casually bring up some Obama policy minutia or political goings-ons from the news, I get blank stares.

But if I send her a link to the Obama girl video or some other pop cultural Obama triviality, she gets excited. This is seriously what politics is to her. From her limited vantage point, Obama is the president who leads to amusing Youtube links, while McCain isn't. And as far as she knows, that's what politics is.

[Jim Beam]

The more I read this blog, the more disgusted I get with the lower classes.

What's next for the middle and upper classes?

Smoking cigarettes and drinking beer with the 'rents? Romanticism about janitorial work while living paycheck to paycheck? Being easily distracted?

("Oh my! Somebody walked into the room! I'm going to stop what I'm doing and stare that person down!")

[Peter]

Much as I dislike tattoos, I can't get too worked up about them, not after reading this hideous, heartbreaking news from Australia:
http://www.2blowhards.com/archives/2008/09/fact_for_the_da_32.html#005570

[The Griffyn]

If you're not born into the upper class, why aspire to be upper class?

[agnostic]

There's no such thing as Prole Drift -- the only examples are cherry-picked. Rarely happens, though.

Re: tattoos -- there actually is a random-digit-dialing survey (national, representative) on the demographics of tattooed and pierced people. I've been meaning to post on it for awhile...

[Turambar]

The whole article is shenanigans.

The article cites "Artists...practicing physicians, funeral directors, fashion models and stylists ". I dont think I'd really count artists, model and stylists as straight jobs, esp in New York. The pictured woman, Jenny Dunbrow, also went by the name "Jennytalia" according to this and was a bald headed club girl a few years ago.
http://books.google.com/books?id=HiMMLfQUAMwC&pg=PA246&lpg=PA246&dq=Jenny+Dembrow,&source=web&ots=NuRvcfxCaX&sig=QycaIQEuJg-so_G53AUJ5L59MTA&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=3&ct=result#PPA246,M1

There are no funeral directors or "practicing physicians" interviewed for the article, although if you remember the "Family Plots" reality show from a few years back funeral home people arent the highest class. There is a Robin Turnbow who claims he has a doctorate, but in a post on sublets.com he said that he is a student in substance abuse. In that field you can probably get away with tatoos.

I do agree with HS that its stupid to get a tattoo. After even 5 years they are going to look terrible on a woman. I saw all kinds of women out at fairs recently with tattoos and the tats had not aged well. If anything they are aging or pathetic. That type of collar that Jenny Dunbrow is going to sag and look terrible. The vines do look nice, but the lines with highlight any aging of her neck skin

[M]

@Rain And:

Right, because if you ask the average McCain supporter why they like him, you're sure to get an in-depth and thoughtful analysis of the major issues. Certainly not vague proclamations about "experience" or worries about Obama's "eliteness" or "otherness."

Face it, 95% of voting is ultimately along cultural lines, for BOTH sides. Cherry-picking anecdotes can make either side look stupid or smart, and if you think that's reality then that just reveals a profound (but quite common) lack of perspective. We're all biased to remember smart people we agree with, and stupid people we don't.

[Jack]

Lots of young, attractive women have "tramp stamps" on their lower back or even tattoos in other areas. Usually, they are not like all over their body (an obvious sign of lower class). Still, I must agree I don't see the point. At best, it makes you look kind of slutty. At worst, it just looks ridiculous. As Roissy said, three quarters of the doable girls in his city have at least one tattoo.

[Wade Nichols]

"The higher classes are taking on the habits of the lower classes."

Indeed. Wasn't that the topic of a Charles Murray editorial in the WSJ a few years ago?

I've also spotted some "professional", otherwise non-prole, attractive looking white women with tattoos, while running in Central Park on the weekends. Many of them are actually "serious runner" types also, they were running with members of running clubs. They probably went to good colleges and ran cross country in high school.

I don't understand why anyone would want to desecrate their body and emulate pagan rituals either.

[Ragnorak Rocks]

"I don't understand why anyone would want to desecrate their body and emulate pagan rituals either."

Don't knock those pagan rituals too hard. They're usually great fun and involve lots of booze, fires, BBQ and the occasional sacrifice.

[janes'_kid]

About the fourth grade, 1948 or so, I discovered a National Geographic in our one room school of legend and lore. It had pictures of people with tattoos, punctured noses and ears, stretched lips and necks, rows of nobs where pebbles had been inserted beneath the skin.

People have been doing these things since prehistory. What has happened that would make us think people should behave differently now? After all, George The Lessor started a war because Saddam Hussain was 'the guy who tried to kill my dad'. (http://archives.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/09/27/bush.war.talk/)

[Tech 9]

"About the fourth grade, 1948 or so, I discovered a National Geographic in our one room school of legend and lore. It had pictures of people with tattoos, punctured noses and ears, stretched lips and necks, rows of nobs where pebbles had been inserted beneath the skin."

Sounds like a bunch of NAMs to me. Nice tie-in by mentioning Bush though. It always makes an argument stronger, like using "Nazi!" or "Racist!" Selected, Not Elected! Now as someone told Roschelle, go canvas for Obama. Hope, Change and more loans to really bad minority credit risks!

[Wade Nichols]

"People have been doing these things since prehistory. What has happened that would make us think people should behave differently now?"

Yes, and for large periods of human history, we also engaged in cannibalism. So why stop with tattoos? Why not take the "logical step" to the "next level"?

[Rain And]

"Cherry-picking anecdotes can make either side look stupid or smart, and if you think that's reality then that just reveals a profound"

M, oh right you are. I did not say or mean to imply that ALL Obama voters were a certain way, or even a majority. And I'd bet there are probably more stupid stereotypical McCain voters.

http://www.halfsigma.com/2006/06/democrats_may_n.html

What peeved me was instead dhulqarnayn's comment denying the common stereotypical subtype exists at all. And the stupidity of his suggestion that people need to vocally articulate all their true motivations to you before you can make a good inference about the reasons for their behavior based on behavioral clues.

[Days of Broken Arrows]

"People have been doing these things since prehistory. What has happened that would make us think people should behave differently now?"

People have also taken child brides throughout history, and also engaged in sacrificing children. People also did bloodletting for years. Men used to beat their wives with sticks without repercussios.

The reason we think people should behave differently now is that we're supposedly no longer a society filled with superstition and pointless rituals.

Then again, looking at all the people who actually think praying to god works (like idiot baseball players), maybe we haven't advanced at all.

And if any of you think players making the sign of the cross while at bat is a good idea, can someone tell me which teams god likes best?

[SFG]

"Surely Big Five Openness to Experience should come to mind as something correlated with both left-wing political orientation and tattoos."

European Journal of Personality
21: 931–951 (2007)

On the straight Big Five, the only category with a p below 0.05 was a lower Agreeableness (this does correlate with testosterone, so the 'tramp stamp' bit may make sense); it was correlated with sensation-seeking, though.

[Captain Beefheart]

One true sign of a sick society is when the upper classes try to emulate the lower classes. It used to be the other way. The poor wanted to enjoy the high culture of the rich, and attempted to learn their mannerisms.

Now rich suburban kids look and sound like the lowest ghetto trash, and this is supposedly "cool?" In fact, if rich white kids aren't talking like ghetto blacks, they're arguing over who is more "white trash." I even seen a kid wearing a hat that said "WHITE TRASH" in big letters.

The thing I wonder is whether this is "natural" or by design?

[Days of Broken Arrows]

Glad to see Captain Beefheart is alive and well (see above). I've missed you since "Ice Cream for Crow" came out in 1982.

As for why high culture imitates low, well, blame your beloved rock and roll, Captain. Rock elevated low culture to high art. Actual high art became largely irrelevant after rock completely took hold of pop culture (followed by hip hop). It's from this mindset the other parts of our culture have evolved. People copied what rockers did. Their odd behaviors were mainstreamed. Tattoos -- once seen almost only on metal types in the 1980s -- became part of that. A permanent version of long hair, earrings and spandex pants.

I mean, even the Good Captain had to leave the rock world for painting. And as far as I know, Beefheart never had any tattoos.

[Lawful Neutral]

Christ, the mainstreaming of tattoos is one of the most ridiculous and disgusting developments of the last few decades, and that's saying something.

[Jay Fink]

The first time I saw a woman with a tattoo was at a county fair in 1982. She was an attractive blonde but her mermaid tattoo on her arm was so shocking and upsetting to me that I had nightmares about it. Little did I know how ahead of her time she was.

I went to a county fair this summer and every single woman I saw was covered in tatts. Not only does it look disgusting to me, it's depressing to be repulsed by women insead of attracted to them. As bad as they look now it will be all the worse when they get older. Imagine a nursing home 40 years in the future with all the old wrinkly people with faded ink images all over their body. My only hope is that as the tattoo generation ages without grace a new generation of young people will realze how ugly it looks and rebel by keeping their skin ink free.

[Eric]

As far as saying that tattoos are based in lower class and that getting one, even if upper class, simply imitates lower class and/or prevents a person from ever being upper class is completely unsupported. In early China only the royal would have tattoos, and to get a tattoo was blasphemy to the emporor (hence the Hakusa). In plenty of other societies only the upper class could afford costly inks and artists. Before you drop complete editorials as facts, do the research. This article is just a support to a closed mind and a sign that even though you may out age me, I have already outlived you.

[Half Sigma response: the fact is that in the United States, tattoos are low class.]

[Robin Turnbow]

Just because you don't understand tattoos does not mean that you have to hate them. I don't understand why stuck up, uptight upper class, or those that are kissing the "right" backside to be thought of as upper class, act as if they are better than the majority of the population. I don't understand why the media is full of young girls from the "right family" getting arrested, drinking and driving, and acting like animals and that is considered acceptable in our society, yet my choosing to mark my body with an image that represents something important to me is looked down on.

Who are you to judge something and someone you know nothing about. To imply that you think everyone should strive to be upper class is just outright stupid. What would you extra conservative boring people do then. If we were all upper class then you would have no "causes" to donate your money to, taking away your hefty tax right-offs and that warm feeling you get deep down inside just before you go to bed that makes you really feel like you are making a difference in the lives of those less fortunate then yourselves and in touch with the real world.

And as for you Turanbar, I know your small circle of friends might not let you imagine that there could be more than 1 person in all of New York City named Robin Turnbow, but surprise....here I am. Not only is that my name, but I a woman who does have a doctorate and is a pediatric physical therapist and many of my tattoos are well over 5 years-old. After 5 years I can honestly tell you that my tattoos have nothing to do with being in "style" nor do I care now, or when I originally had them inked into my skin, what you or anyone else thinks. Tattoos are not a trend, they have been around since the indigenous people had to actually hunt and fight the dangers of nature to survive. What makes them trendy is not that people are getting them, but many of those that do get them these days see it is right of passage into some type of under ground culture.

I can also tell you that after 5 years my husband still thinks my tattoos look great!

You should be careful who you judge, I might just knock on your door one day to come and evaluate your little darling and it would really be a shame to judge my knowledge and expertise because I do not fit into your American dream.