Ask HN: Tattoos | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Tattoos

4 pointstaigeair6 comments

I am puzzled why so many people have tattoos. It's an interesting phenomenon to me. I am surrounded by people with tattoos and really do not understand the appeal. To me tattoos are what farmers use to keep track of their cows so that if they get lost, farmers can claim them. The nose piercing thing also perplexes me. I'm not saying it's good or bad, but like Snapchat, I don't get it.

I wanted to see the percentage of tattooed people by country on a map, but don't think that data exists so I thought Instagram hashtags might be a good proxy.

Here's the map I made: http://keyhole.co/realtime/nGDKOQ/tattoo

View on HN

Very nice, you should change the title to "Tattoos by Countries Map".

Re tattoos, I don't know why so many people are doing this too. Sometimes I think it must be a huge misunderstanding: I observe tattooed people longer and more intense because every time I think 'why'. Why did they do this. Often the tattoos are ugly, faded, huge and then I stare even more and longer. And I guess that tattooed people misunderstand my staring and think I am attracted to them and affection must be the reason I watch them. Since many will watch them they must think, wow my tattoo makes people look at me, I need more tattoos.

On the other side they make people look at them and maybe that better than nothing or no attraction and maybe this initial slight disgust could turn into demands the longer you watch because you discover other beauties of the person.

It seems addictive because people who have one often get more. I guess it's about making a statement mostly...

Not for me, unless you count making statements to myself.

Why do people do anything they do?

The answer to "why" will be as diverse as the people that have them anyway--I have mine because I like them and they're meaningful to me.

It's just a marking on your body. It just looks cool if you do it right. That's it. There's no deep evolutionary reason you seem to be looking for. Same with Snapchat. It's fun and effortless. That's why people do it, to send silly pictures for silly reasons and to have silly, harmless, fun.

I'm the "I don't get it" group as well. I'm also am surrounded by friends and peers with tattoos but I have no desires to get one.

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