Wow that's a huge number, although not surprising given the number of people we come across, still didn't expect that high of a number!<p>Wondering why people do it, art or what are we missing?
As someone who grew up in America, this cultural shift seems seriously weird to me. I guess it's just a symptom of Americans' extremist individualism, just like the trend in the last couple decades for parents to invent utterly ridiculous names for their kids.
The inks have unknown effects. I have a tattoo. I would not recommend them considering long-term lymphatic and mutagenic properties. Eh.<p>You feel good at first, more aligned with your mind, then you realize you could have just put a poster on the wall that doesn't come with the risk of cancer or autoimmune disease.<p>Not to be unkind, but I believe this is very similar to other irreversible decisions folks make. We're all suckers, trying to make ourselves feel better through deals with the devil.
Reminds me of this Rob Delaney tweet from 2011(!):<p>>A neck tattoo used to say "Watch out, motherfucker." Now it says "I'd love to read you a poem about my vegan bicycle!"<p><a href="https://twitter.com/robdelaney/status/64775497468485632?lang=en" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://twitter.com/robdelaney/status/64775497468485632?lang...</a><p>Though now I think even that hipster association is gone, tattoos are just another aspect of fashion these days.
the graph shows it is still a class system where tattoos cement the wearer into a lower caste, as in likely harder to traverse the socioeconomic classes with them than without<p>formally educated people with the associated support system to get the degree are the least likely to have tattoos<p>while all their bastards and the alt single parent that both get ignored forever get and have tattoos, should be a much larger population, which tracks