judgement day
June 22, 2009It’s always interesting when someone I’ve known for a while sees my tattoos for the first time. This situation usually involves a co-worker. When I am dressed for the office, you can’t see any of my tattoos except maybe a glimpse of the space ship on my calf when I cross my legs or a couple of stars on my right shoulder if my shirt has a wide collar. Unless I’ve mentioned them, which I don’t unless asked directly, then you probably don’t know I have them. Just like I don’t know if you have a birthmark shaped like the state of Indiana on your left butt-cheek. It’s not the kind of thing you just blurt out in conversation cause you’ll get the “ew, too much information” stare. Unless you’re drunk, then all bets are off.
When an office-mate sees one of my tattoos for the first time, or even just learns that I have tattoos, I can actually see the preconceived notions they’ve formed about me crumble and new, more than likely innaccurate, notions take shape. Amy + tattoos is not equal to just the variable Amy. To me, tattoos neither add nor subtract anything to my equation, while to others they could be a negative 15 or a positive 5. (Look at the English major bustin’ out the math analogy!) Either way, they judged me when they first met me and now they are judging me all over again.
How do I know they judged me? Well the short answer is: cause they are human. We all do it, we can’t help it. It’s a trait that evolved so we could instantly tell friend from foe, a tribe we wanted to mate with, and a tribe we didn’t. When we hear someone with a thick southern accent, we think they’re ignorant. When we see a balding man in a convertible sports car we assume mid-life crisis. Yes, I know, “judge not, lest ye be judged.” But, it’s not the judging itself that is wrong. What’s wrong is when we think our judgements are true, when our judgements are set in stone. We don’t know anything about another person except what they tell us, and even that could be a lie. You can assume what you want, but you also must also be prepared to be surprised.
So, either my tattoos conflict with your vision of me or they confirm what you always thought. Either way, it’s just a fraction of who I really am.
It means you are a HOOKER! HA HA HA, enjoy the beach, champagne & oh yeah me! woo hoo, summer break 2009. No I have not been drinking, just ready to judge bad bathing suits and fantastic outfits of others.
Whoa, I think your completley over-thinking some ink-stains on your body.
Um, I don’t know who you are, but I over-think everything. Duh, that’s why I have a blog!
Hey, I clicked on the link from your sig on CC and I just thought I’d add I had an intersting conversation with a randomer in Mexico City about this. He was a tattooist and liked to interpret not people’s tats but where they chose to have them. He’s convinced that where I want to get a tattoo when I have the money means that I feel incomplete, not quite whole, like “either the yin or the yang is missing” (I want one starting on my lower back, winding over my side, and then up my front to end between my ribs). Mind you, he was also convince that I couldn’t be a true Leo because else I would hate him.
Yet, the point is that it’s so easy to force our own assumptions onto other people. I deliberately chose that area, and not – unless unconsciously – for that reason. He said he chose to tattoo his arms because he wanted to draw attention to his strength; I guess that’s an obvious answer but I always just thought that sleeves were a lot of blank skin that could be easily shown as well as fairly easily covered.
Personally, though, this goes on at such a smaller level than tattoos (for example, high heels and jeans vs. high heels and short skirts vs. jeans and trainers. I’ll wear all three but that doesn’t mean people will respond to me the same way when I’m wearing them). I was discussing with a friend/ex the other day, and he took the stance that attraction is first and foremost shallow… I agreed to a certain extent, but challenged parts of it, and he admitted that he wouldn’t approach a gorgeous girl in 6″ heels and a short skirt because he’d assume she was a slut. This amused me… he’s always disapproved of aspects of my appearance.
Yet… I have to admit I’m as guilty of it as the next person. If I see a person in bloody clothes on the train, I’m going to avoid sitting next to them. Who knows, it might just be that they had a nosebleed… but I’m not going to give them that chance. It works on less potentially dangerous, smaller levels too.
We all judge each other on our appearances. Normally, we don’t have much else to judge each other on when we first meet each other. It’s just a shame that attitudes towards tattoos are so strong that even when people already know you, already have that other information about your personality, they revert to judging you by appearances.
Anyway, I’m going to stop rambling on now!
Glad you dropped in! I need to get my butt back in gear and start posting here on a regular basis again.
I agree that where you get a tattoo can say a lot. I have a very professional job, and I’d like to keep it. So, I got mine where they are easily hidden by my clothing. People with full sleeves or a neck tattoo usually don’t give a rat’s ass about what their boss or anyone else thinks. But again, I don’t know if you can read too much into it, though. I just got mine where I think they would look pretty. No deeper meaning than that!