Tattoos have gone from being the province of a sailor who gets a concealed Mom or an Anchor Tattooed on his body to being an openly flaunted carpet of disfiguring ink. Getting more than two tattoos was considered a sign that the individual was sinister and untrustworthy.

Entertainers as usual have led the parade, of excess, and the rest of the nation has followed suit. Most male and female characters on television carry multiple visible tattoos. Gangs such as the Japanese Yakuza, MS-13 Aryan Brotherhood, Nuestra Familia, Bloods, Crips, Texas Syndicate, Netas, Black Guerrilla Family, and many others use tattoos to convey information as to connection and degree of violence perpetrated by the individual. Most tattoos, even for those of the non-criminal class seem to be concerned with violent themes.

To me, they are ugly. Nothing annoys me more than seeing a good-looking woman who has adorned herself with ugly inkings, particularly on her hands and arms. It is like painting a mustache on the Mona Lisa, an act of senseless vandalism.

Aside from the esthetics, does anyone believe that these are normal men and women, who are so enamored of these inkings that they persist in getting more skin covered. Is this a sign of psychopathic behavior and some mechanism of concealment?

An incident from my young life returns to memory. We were in Juarez on a Saturday night and going from bar to bar, drinking and passing on “To see the Elephant”. We walked into one of our usual haunts and there was a local who had set up his tattoo equipment in the main barroom.

There was a large crowd gathered around so naturally we had to see what the cause of excitement was. A young soldier was laying across one of the barroom tables, with a beer in his hand and one of the prostitutes in the other. His trousers and underwear were down around his ankles, his naked buttocks were thrust up in the air and he was getting tattooed.

He was getting two small Butterflies, one on each cheek. He had a crowd of working girls giving advice and direction, not to mention commenting on the G.I’s equipment. To me, this made perfect sense. What else would you want when you are drunk as a skunk in a Juarez whorehouse?

Tattoos have gone from being the province of a sailor who gets a concealed Mom or an Anchor Tattooed on his body to being an openly flaunted carpet of disfiguring ink. Getting more than two tattoos was considered a sign that the individual was sinister and untrustworthy.

Entertainers as usual have led the parade, of excess, and the rest of the nation has followed suit. Most male and female characters on television carry multiple visible tattoos. Gangs such as the Japanese Yakuza, MS-13 Aryan Brotherhood, Nuestra Familia, Bloods, Crips, Texas Syndicate, Netas, Black Guerrilla Family, and many others use tattoos to convey information as to connection and degree of violence perpetrated by the individual. Most tattoos, even for those of the non-criminal class seem to be concerned with violent themes.

To me, they are ugly. Nothing annoys me more than seeing a good-looking woman who has adorned herself with ugly inkings, particularly on her hands and arms. It is like painting a mustache on the Mona Lisa, an act of senseless vandalism.

Aside from the esthetics, does anyone believe that these are normal men and women, who are so enamored of these inkings that they persist in getting more skin covered. Is this a sign of psychopathic behavior and some mechanism of concealment?

An incident from my young life returns to memory. We were in Juarez on a Saturday night and going from bar to bar, drinking and passing on “To see the Elephant”. We walked into one of our usual haunts and there was a local who had set up his tattoo equipment in the main barroom.

There was a large crowd gathered around so naturally we had to see what the cause of excitement was. A young soldier was laying across one of the barroom tables, with a beer in his hand and one of the prostitutes in the other. His trousers and underwear were down around his ankles, his naked buttocks were thrust up in the air and he was getting tattooed.

He was getting two small Butterflies, one on each cheek. He had a crowd of working girls giving advice and direction, not to mention commenting on the G.I’s equipment. To me, this made perfect sense. What else would you want when you are drunk as a skunk in a Juarez whorehouse?