To tattoo or not to tattoo? That is the question.

Skin. Throughout your life, your skin will change constantly, for better or worse. In fact, your skin will regenerate itself approximately every 27 days (that’s a lunar cycle). Red blood cells live for about four months, while white blood cells live on average more than a year. Skin cells live about two or three weeks (data differ, as above). Colon cells have it rough: they die off after about four days. Sperm cells have a life span of only about three days. Brain cells typically last an entire lifetime (neurons in the cerebral cortex, for example, are not replaced when they die). So, except for the brain cells (without yoga of course!), which are eternal when compared to other body cells, most cells and skin cells in particular, will replaced themselves in quite a short time. This is why some people say you (as a cellular being) are completely renewed and different in 7 to 10 years (except for your poor brain of course, which only gets worse [without yoga]).

So we are modern, we want to be “natural”, eat “healthy foods”, protect animals from harm and abuse, maybe even banning bullfighting in Spain. We look at ingredients and say E-this, E-that – no, that’s no good; I want something more organic. I’m thinking of being a vegetarian, at least eating more fruit and vegetables (what about pesticide sprays and maturing agents? – well, dear writer, don’t make it too complicated!). We are seeking an identity – we want to be “eco-friendly”, “sensitive to the environment”, “caring and kind to other and to animals”. We are the fruit of previous revolutions in society, thinking, music, spirituality, whatever. We want to be “different”.

So this “different” that we want to be now includes going to a tattoo artist, bearing the pain of the application of a fixed design onto the skin in an indelible way – um, “indelible” means permanent and that cannot be removed – or if it can be removed, it is with another more expensive laser treatment that is not exempt from complications and doesn’t guarantee perfect results. Why do humans want to get tattoos?

We are born without a specific identity. When we as youngsters grow up, we seek our identity. It’s only natural, they say. The personality forms from the family and social milieu and reaches out to find an identity. That’s the way life is for humans today; it’s always been that way, they say. We need an identity. Some are satisfied with their identity as simply their personalities – they way they think and feel, they way they talk, the way they act towards themselves and towards others. They show an amount of self-assurance.

Others are not content with being something, but also have to show it – as if they had to prove something. What they have to prove we don’t know. So they dress in a particular way, they wear their hair in a special style, they talk or gesticulate in a certain manner. Some are not content with dressing, baring certain body parts, styling or talking. They have to stamp something onto their bodies to say something – what they have to say we don’t know.

Let’s see what they are trying to say. Stamping things onto the body has been done for millennia. Ever since man first acquired animals won from the wild and made to serve man for his particular purposes – usually for eating their bodies (meat) or using products from their bodies (sinews for bowstrings, horns for making noise, leather for keeping warm, milk for filling their bellies, wool for making clothes, also honey from bees). The exceptional one is “wool for making clothes” as wool grows seasonally, and is shed naturally in spring, or sheared off, and causes no harm to the animal, in fact, shearing relieves the sheep of excess heat required during the previous winter period. In all other cases – except honey, which if taken in appropriate quantities, does not harm the hive – human beings harm animals to get what they want. Aren’t we lovely? (And we wonder why cute little animals are afraid of us?)

So today, to “express oneself” to the world, as potential tattoo-receivers, we have to ask another human being who is an expert in skin branding treatments to harm us so we can say what we want to say. This costs money because the “branders” are professionals in this activity and have to paid, but for the receiver, it’s an aesthetic action, we are told, because the idea is that one looks “nicer” or more “beautiful” with a tattoo than without one. Except of course that the audience may be limited to those who may have permission or are able for some reason to contemplate one’s pudenda, lower back, buttocks, or the mid-right section of a left breast. If it’s an arm, the audience is larger, depending on the length of one’s shirt-sleeve.

OK, so the message is what? That something we didn’t even create – skin (which is Nature’s creation) – is not as pretty as skin plus something we can draw on it? Or maybe we are so proud of our drawing or that of someone else that it makes skin look better when applied to it? If it looks so good, why can’t it be framed and put on the wall? Or published on one’s timeline on Facebook? Or be worn as a badge, to be put on or taken off depending on one’s mood, the weather, or one’s outfit for the day? Sorry, no coats-of-arms or shields allowed – that’s outdated!

No, I guess the identification thesis is the best, so let’s look at the ways man has invented for identifying things by marking something on them:

Branding, banding, docking. This is for identification purposes. Someone owns animals and marks them to identify ownership. The animal is captured, held down and a hot iron is used to burn a mark on its hide, which causes trauma to the skin, but it heals, and then leaves an indelible mark. This is usually done with free-range animals like cows, calves and horses, sometimes with pigs. For sheep, simple earmarks are usually used, consisting of inserting a metal staple through the delicate ear and dabbing it with iodine so it won’t get infected. Lambs tails and testicles are “docked”, meaning a rubber band is placed over the tail or the scrotum to cut off blood circulation to these appendages and they are left to wither away. If you think dumb animals don’t suffer, try doing it to your testicles or your finger and see. In America, the black slaves brought from Africa were often branded, as they were considered to be just animals, and were owned by real pedigreed White Men. That was from the 1700’s to 1865, supposedly, but remember Blacks later still had to fight for their rights ONE CENTURY LATER in 1965, and are even today often looked down upon in some regions of America. Hate has a way of overstaying its welcome doesn’t it? Your history lessons might remind you that slaves in the Roman Empire were also branded, but that was around the birth of Christ, right?

Human tattooing. We are not going to consider branding black slaves as tattooing, because they were forcibly marked, whereas “tattooing” is something supposedly “voluntary”, except for strict social STIGMAS against the absence of tattoos, as in aborigines in the South Pacific, related to “rites of passage”, just like Judaic and Moslem “circumcision” (hey, don’t forget ablation = female genital mutilation) – another rite of passage or health measure, depending on one’s point of view – and in Native Americans and South American tribes and Indonesian peoples, etc. In fact, many “Great Spirit” peoples (aka primitive people [sic]) seem to care little about their bodies and perhaps in some cases skin markings actually had some kind of spiritual significance. Not necessarily today, as Japanese mafia, Russian mafia, sailors away from home and away from Mummy or their girlfriends, and gang members all seem to need tattoos to tell them which clan, which Mummy, which girlfriend, which gang, they belong to. As if their brains couldn’t do that, poor fellows. And poor African women, as well, with markings and etching on their bodies in some parts of the Dark Continent, as it was once called!

Oh, but today, dear writer, don’t you realise that tattoos have “come of age”? Now it’s not the Nazi concentration camp prisoners at Auschwitz who wear numbers etched onto their skin – the Nazis must have applied about 400,000 prisoner serial numbers in only 2 years (only to those who were supposed to work, not those sent immediately to the gas chamber – that was called “saving ink”). Dear writer, please understand, today the highest paid singers, musicians, soccer players and film stars also need to supplement their identities with permanent artistic etchings on their skin. Gen X and Gen Y members all have to have tattoo, don’t you understand? For the rich, that’s no problem, they can pay to take them off if they find they have mistakenly tattooed the wrong name on their arms (poor Melanie!). For the poor, you got it, you keep it, until it droops and fades and looks horrible in your old age – if you survive that long!

So it’s now “in” to do this, despite all former evidence. Why ask so many questions? If something’s “in” or “in fashion”, it’s “in” and it’s the “thing to do”, because everybody else is doing it. Um, sorry, but this dear writer has to retort: “Look, we older guys (above 22) have been around quite a while and we’ve seen things come and go, and today, despite your desires to get one, some people still look down on tattooed arms, legs and other visible parts of the body. They try not to hire people with tattoos. They may be wrong or right, but what’s “in” somewhere may be “out” for another social class. Because we older guys and gals (pushing half a century or more), have been around long enough in life to see that passing fashions don’t usually stay. They come and go. Like the wind. And tattooing is certainly not based on any reason or any reasonable or logical or rational human behaviour. And we folks love reason. We think that what makes us human. Not a brand, not a skin colour, not a sign or an identifier. It’s human reason that makes us human. The ability to think and reason.

So if you’re really keen to get a mark on your skin and you’re not content with your own beauty marks or freckles, don’t go for the permanent kind of tattoo at first. Get a provisional or temporary tattoo and see what it does for you, and for your supposed “identity”. After looking at it in the mirror for a few days and showing it to whomever you want and getting tired of it, decide if you really want to go for something permanent. Or visit an old Nazi concentration camp. Or a Russian prison. Or make friends with the Latin Kings. See what you think. Then decide.

Need more reasons? Look at the 26 Virtues:

Fearlessness	Don’t be afraid to be a non-conformist and not wear a tattoo.
Purity of Mind/Heart	Isn’t it your heart that counts, and not a picture on your skin?
Steadfastness / Perseverance	Keep on discovering who you are, persevere. Don’t come to a conclusion today. You have a whole lifetime ahead of you.
Charitableness /Almsgiving	Is spending money for a tattoo for yourself better than making a contribution to an animal shelter, the poor or the needy?
Self-Mastery/Control of Senses-Passions	You think you like something today, but will you like it tomorrow? Remember your favourite pop group when you were 8, 12, 16?
Readiness to Make Sacrifices / Fire Worship	Will you help a wounded animal? Or brand its skin with fire to identify it?
Studiousness	Have you studied any information about tattoos, beside how much it will cost?
Austerity	Is splashing out on a tattoo an example of being austere (in the meaning of “having a plain and unadorned appearance”)? Why adorn yourself? What is the reason for outer adornment?
Straightforwardness	Aren’t you being evasive, or avoiding the explanation, for decorating your body?
Non-Violence/Non-injury in thought, word, deed	Your skin is a living organ of your body, the biggest organ. Aren’t you being violent towards it if you inject ink into your dermis, the layer below your epidermis?
Truthfulness	What is the truth? Are you being truthful to yourself and others when you think about getting a tattoo?
Absence of anger/ Wrath	Will you just get angry for a while if someone advises you not to get a permanent tattoo at a young age?
Renunciation (of fruits of action)	This involves giving up “egoism”. Are you giving up or promoting egoism by printing something on your skin? Is a tattoo an identifier of your soul or spirit, or of your body and ego?
Tranquillity / Peacefulness (of mind)	Will a nice decoration on your skin that you can never remove give you peace of mind?
Aversion to Slander/Nonmaliciousness	Will you criticise others for wearing or not wearing a tattoo, and say how silly they are for getting one or not getting one?
Compassion towards Living Beings	Will you be compassionate to yourself and not subject your skin to permanent ink? Will you be compassionate towards others who give you advice?
Non-Covetousness	Aren’t you practising “coveting” or the desire to possess something, by thinking about getting a decoration for your skin?
Gentleness	Are you being gentle towards your skin, your life, by pricking it with needles at 80-150 pricks a second?
Sense of Shame in Doing Evil Actions/Modesty	Isn’t modesty good? Will you be modest about your tattoo, or will you want to show it off to others and have them think you're better than you were before you got it? Why better? Aren’t you good enough the way you are?
Strength Higher Nature (Absence of fickleness)	Isn’t a decoration on your skin for today kind of fickle, capricious? What if you change your mind in 10 years’ time? What will you do?
Energy / Vigour	Where is your “energy”, your “brilliance”, your “light”? In a decoration on your skin, or in your soul?
Forgiveness	Forgive yourself for wanting something to mark your skin. Be kind to yourself.
Endurance / Fortitude	Be strong and resist the temptation to give in to fashion. Be your own person.
Chastity/ Purity / Clean in Thought and Act	Pure skin can be part of purity.
Absence of Malice/Hatred	Don’t feel bad about being told not to do something by a parent or tutor.
Aversion to Praise/Absence of Pride	Feel proud of yourself as you are, not with a skin decoration.