Pro by Kacie Leach
Tattoos don’t have an expiration date; tattoos are not fashion. Tattoos are art, and art ages but never goes out of style. If it’s what you want to do, get a tattoo.
Think of the famous artist Vincent Van Gogh, he died in the year 1890 yet his work is still hanging on walls. His work is appreciated and still seen as beautiful. It’s the same with tattoos: Art does not die, and the canvas does not determine the beauty of the work.
Tattoos represent individuality, and they set apart one person from the next. It’s rare to find two people with the exact same tattoo, and therefore the artwork gives even more originality to a person. You can meet a girl named Ashley almost everywhere you go, but you can’t meet an Ashley with a rose tattoo that incorporates her mother’s birthday on her left wrist just anywhere.
Tattoos are a unique form of expression. The work of art reveals something about you that typically a person wouldn’t know with just the glance of an eye.
The idea that tattoos are not professional isn’t a concern anymore. The people who look down on tattoos are aging, and the more accepting generation is taking over. A new mentality is coming to the professional world, and, before we know it tattoos will be accepted by all businesses.
Say you come across a situation where you’re denied a job due to your tattoos…think about it, if you are qualified for a job, and they turn you down because of a simple tattoo on your body, do you really want to work for someone so closed minded?.
It’s crucial to put thought into anything permanent going on your body, but do you want to look back and realize you lived your life the way you did only because society told you tattoos weren’t acceptable? Not everyone likes the ideas of tattoos, but never let society tell you what to like.
Life is about being free. Risks are a part of life, and, in the end, when we’re all dead and gone, no person is greater than another because of the way his or her body looked. Get inked if you want to, the world is going to judge you whether you do or don’t.
Con by Karen Pegueros
When you were a kid, you absolutely loved those stick-on tattoos. Imagine if you had one permanently printed on your body. Wouldn’t you be mortified walking around with Barney on your ankle? Don’t brand with another one of society’s trends.
Consider fashion, it changes every season, if not every second. Something that was so “in” last week, could be so “out” the next. If you had to wear one outfit your whole life, what would it be? The world never stops evolving, and there is no escaping that because change is inevitable.
That’s the thing about tattoos; they’re forever. Of course, there are those fancy laser and abrasive procedures, but that is extremely expensive and painful. Tattoos never truly come off. There will always be a scar. You might be lucky enough to get the ink off, but the scarring will be there to haunt you.
Another argument is that they are easy to cover up. The old-fashioned trick of, “I’ll just wear long shirts and pants,” doesn’t cut it because you can’t constantly be covered up. Another option could be concealing it with makeup, as if trying to hide that treacherous pimple wasn’t hard enough.
Parents ask “why would you get something permanent on your skin?” They love claiming things like “you are going to regret it when you are older!” Regret might be a little bit of an understatement when your perfect life isn’t all that perfect anymore.
Picture this: your dream job, being ripped from your hands. You had all the qualifications. You were better than any other candidate. You had absolutely everything. Maybe a little too much… one tiny mark on your skin. The interviewer calls and says, “Sorry, we went with another choice.”
Finally, you are putting yourself at risk. Risk of infection from dirty needles that can pass diseases such as HIV, risk of allergies in both regular and temporary tattoos from the ink pigments, risk of scarring from getting a tattoo, or eventually from getting one removed.
Who wants to go through all that trouble for one little drawing of an infinity sign, which by the way, was so three years ago? Think before you ink.
