(via thereismoretotruth)
“taboo” tattoos in this hypercritical culture
I’m still a tattoo virgin. For the past two years I’ve been seriously contemplating how I want to brand my yet-to-be-marked skin. During this process, I’ve fallen in and out of love with numerous ideas in my attempt to find the perfect tattoo: something meaningful, something original, and something beautiful. I came up with a couple trite tattoo ideas with evanescent appeal before I finally conceived my current tattoo concept. After sitting on the idea for awhile, I’m ready to get this tattoo, but I can feel the societal stigmas breathing down my back.
I hear and read things which tell me a tattoo somehow transforms a person “from a respectable girl to a plaything for men”, that ”my chances of marrying a good man are eliminated”, and that “no one will take me seriously”. At first comments like this made me fearful of committing to getting a tattoo. Why would someone purposely get something that causes others to view them negatively? Then, I got some self confidence and I realized that some people in this culture are hypercritical; I just can’t change that. I can’t control the way someone is going to look at my tattoo (which I have yet to get but will hopefully happen soon), but I can sure-as-hell control how I let those ignorant people affect me and the way I view myself. Some people feel like tattoos debase a person. They don’t. I will not be any less of a person for having one. I know who I am, and if someone cannot see past some ink on my skin then I can’t take THEM seriously. I’m even more excited about my tattoo now because I look at it as one of the best means I’ll ever have for filtering people I don’t want to know from people I do want to know. If someone thinks that something on the exterior - a tattoo - detracts from who I am as a person, they’re not worth knowing.
“No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”
(Source: xxmisswhitexx, via sharks-ahoy)
Glenn Brown is a British painter based out of London. His fascinating style consists of smearing a beautiful grotesque layer of thick impasto paint, and then further rendering it. His swirling brushstrokes transforms the appropriate image by changing its position and color.
(Source: pinupenigma, via demiilauren)
(Source: through-rose-lenses, via thereismoretotruth)
"From their earliest years children live on familiar terms with disrupting emotions — fear and anxiety are an intrinsic part of their everyday lives, they continually cope with frustrations as best they can. And it is through fantasy that children achieve catharsis. It is the best means they have for taming wild things."
— Maurice Sendak, author of “Where the Wild Things Are.” (via thejennabrigade)
