I’ve never really understood tattoos.  What is their purpose?

For instance, let us say a man has tattooed on his arm some statement or symbol representing core principles of his life, such as “faith,” or “strength.”  Why did he do that?  Is it because if they weren’t tattooed into his skin, he’d forget about them, forget to live by them?  Or is it because he wants the rest of the world to know that these are his core principles?  If that’s the case, why didn’t he tattoo them on his forehead, where they would be more readily read?

The aesthetic tattoo is a little easier to understand, but still strange.  A lady has a flower or some other artwork tattooed on her calf.  Is it because she thought her beauty could be enhanced by this decoration?  If so, how again do we account for the fact that the tattoo is somewhere usually covered?  Why not wear her tattoos where she wears her jewelry, as a readily visible accent?

The easiest to understand are tribal membership tattoos.  It is the ancient practice of human beings to tattoo upon themselves their membership in whatever tribe with which they associate, because it does two things: it allows the individual to be positively identified by as a tribemate by his tribemates, who might slaughter him otherwise, and the permanence of the tattoo assures his tribemates that his commitment to the tribe is permanent.  If it was anything less, again, they might slaughter him.  The tribes of man demand permanent, absolute fealty.

But we cannot escape the fact that all of these applications of the tattoo share a fundamental nature: the tattoo is a psychological surrogate for deeper self-change.  The tribe member tattoos himself into the tribe as way to establish belonging that he can’t achieve by something deeper, the bonds of true brotherhood which come from shared sacrifice and shared commitment to a higher good.  (It is worth nothing that the ancient Hebrew corollary of the tribal tattoo, namely circumcision, is specifically a permanent mark that is never displayed to the rest of the tribe or to anyone else, can’t be used as a badge of pride, and can be discovered only through situations of profound intimacy or personal violence.)

The woman seeking an aesthetic enhancement does so because she believes an improvement can be made by permanent modification of her mortal flesh, and she hungers to make such a change to herself.  Why does she so hunger?  She must, necessarily, feel as if there is room for improvement.  A tattoo is an external, simple, relatively easy way to make an alteration to her fundamentally inadequate self, a way to give herself the feeling of improvement without anything so difficult as improving character or soul, or even health and fitness.

The man who tattoos “Love” on his forearm or “BAMF” on his knuckles has, likewise, found a quick and easy way to feel like he has committed to these things, to feel like he has incorporated them, by incorporating them into his flesh, rather than undertaking the much harder work of incorporating them into his life. If he tattoos the name of his lover into his skin, it is an act surrogate for taking into his life a real commitment.

The small pain of the tattoo is an acceptable price for a quick improvement of their being, a quick change to satisfy that sense of their own imperfection, their need to change, to be something better. The pain allows them to convince themselves they are buying something of value, a real improvement, rather than a surrogate for improvement.

In short, getting a tattoo is purchasing an indulgence from oneself.

So, I guess I do understand tattoos, after all.