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Comment by zaat | Hacker News Reader

All in all this is pretty hilarious and funny, however

>More recently, in what is no doubt a manifestation of the desire to fit in with the majority, even dark-skinned minorities, whose epidermis is unsuited to tattooing, are having themselves tattooed in ever-larger numbers.

smells a bit racist and ignorant to me, I mean, tattoos are part of African tribes culture for at least few millennia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_tattooing#North_Afr...

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No, I think stating that dark on dark is hard to see is just stating facts. As a former tattoo artist, I can tell you that the more pale, the better the tattoo and especially colors show up.

But comparing modern men to tribesmen, that might be a little...

>I think stating that dark on dark is hard to see is just stating facts. As a former tattoo artist, I can tell you that the more pale, the better the tattoo and especially colors show up.

Well, obviously, but this is slightly different in content than "unsuited to tattooing", which is false as the rich history of African tattoos shows, and very different in connotation, which was my point.

> But comparing modern men to tribesmen

I didn't make any comparison.

Also, the whole thesis of the article is that tattooing is a symptom of some societal problem, so naming that cause as "a manifestation of the desire to fit in with ... dark-skinned minorities" seems to imply that wanting to be like black people is wrong somehow.

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