Misogynists hate, hate, hate it when women get tattoos. They just can’t all agree on why. The standard misogynist line on tattoos for women is that they are all, essentially, “tramp stamps” – a way of broadcasting that the woman displaying them is a slut, a skank, a whore. You know the drill.
But the “alternative right” racist/sexist/homophobe who goes by the handle agnostic has a rather different take. In a post on his blog Face to Face, he argues that women with tattoos are actually trying to broadcast their Puritan prudery.
Tattoos, you see, are just plain ugly, and help to accessorize a dreary look designed to repel men.
Notice how those girls dress in drab, dark monochrome colors, wear no girly jewelry, and sport flat hair rather than Big Hair. Their sassy, sarcastic, even nasty attitude echos their off-putting look.
Fundamentally, they are part of the larger trend toward drab dressing, and its signal of reluctance to get loose. Their personalities are more anti-social, so they express the neo-Pilgrim style in a more antagonistic fashion than the less abrasive girls in their generation, but they’re both variations on the same theme.
The tattoo-bearers are likely to be man-haters as well.
They are also part of the larger trend among women toward fear of or hatred toward men. …
In such a climate, women will alter their appearance and demeanor in order to deflate rather than excite the male libido. They act like prey trying to give warning signals to potential predators. The tattoo chicks are only the extreme version of this widespread trend. Girls sure don’t look or act as cute and flirty as they used to in the boy-crazy Eighties, when they thought of guys not as predators but as conspecifics who they wanted to court with engaging mating displays.
“Conspecifics” simply means “members of the same species.” Agnostic loves to drop that sciency lingo in order to make his prejudices seem smart.
Anyway, he continues by arguing that tattoos are especially offensive to pickup artistes and other “assertive” dudes.
Off-putting style also serves to filter out the more assertive and independent males, who would rather spend time on a girl who looks cute, rather than settle for one who’s all marked up or not willing to show anything at all. … By inking themselves up, girls ensure that only the guys who are willing to get walked over and slapped in the face will approach them. Why go through the long hassle of having your new boyfriend fixed when you can advertise that only the neutered need apply in the first place?
Ah, but this last bit is perhaps more revealing than agnostic means it to be. Tattoos are an affront to misogynists because they’re seen as too assertive, too masculine – a challenge to traditional femininity, and to men who prefer traditionally feminine women.
Tattoos on women make misogynistic men angry because on some fundamental level these men don’t think women have the right to decorate their bodies in a way that displeases men –or at least their kind of men. It’s the same kind of creepy, possessive anger that many misogynistic men show towards women who cut their hair short. It’s as if these men on some level believe women’s bodies belong to them, and not to the women themselves.
And that’s pretty unattractive.
@katz: LOL! I’ll remember that one next time one of my relatives makes a sexist comment on the subject of housework.
Jimmy Benner:
Jimmy Benner, you sound like a classist asshole.
“I love how many MRAs obviously think their own desires and preferences are universal.”
— Even when they know they’re not.
1. One difference between MRAs and real tough guys:
A. Real tough guys = :
i) into tattoos on women
ii) into women who like tattoos
iii) admit it
B. MRAs = :
i) beset by scary visions in which they’re attacked by tattoos
ii) beset by scary visions in which they’re attacked by dark clothing
iii) beset by disappointing visions in which they’re not attacked by women
iv) admit it by means of long weepy diatribes
v) directed at each other
2. Despite this strongly pointed contrast, MRAs wish to be taken for tough guys
A. Though they admit that this is implausible
i) by means of long weepy diatribes
ii) directed at each other
iii) {universal laughter}
Bon O Bolishus, what an utterly predictable reaction to me posting a picture of the Militant Baker to illustrate this post. Yes, there are countless conventionally hot women with tattoos I could have used for this post, but the whole point of the post is that women and women’s bodies are not public property; they aren’t required to please your particular boner, or anyone’s boner, for that matter.
So I chose a woman who poses in sexy pictures because she enjoys it even though she knows that there are men out there whose boners aren’t pleased when she poses, and that some assholes get mad and have misogynstic rage fits every time she poses. Thing is, Bon, she’s not required to please you. If you don’t like her you can move on.
@bekabot
Wait, I just realized I don’t care what ‘real tough guys’ think either ^u^
I literally lol’d. There’s just so much fail here.
“Wait, I just realized I don’t care what ‘real tough guys’ think either”
No, I know, but there’s a real difference in group preferences; I was pointing it out, that’s all.
(FWIW and from what I’ve been able to gather from their online epistles — directed at each other — MRAs in general seem to be hung up on their idea of the bouncy-highschool-cheerleader type. The type, in other words, they all claim wouldn’t be seen dead with them when they were young; the type they claim is the ultimate end-goal of all masculine aspiration — to get; the type they claim is the ultimate end-goal of all feminine aspiration — to be; and the type they suppose is the type before which all other types bow — though it’s not. But an acknowledgment of the last fact would throw their whole economy out of whack, and they can’t have that. Hence the motivation for at least some of their diatribes, IMO.)
@bekabot
I guess I just don’t understand why you brought it up :/
I think pointing out that some men do find tattoos attractive just kind of derails the whole point which is that it DOESN’T MATTER at all whether a man finds it attractive or not. It’s not like misogynists are happy when women ARE performing their gender roles to their particular satisfaction anyway.
Well…because I saw no real reason why I shouldn’t, I guess. Though it was a fairly cruel observation, which perhaps politesse ought to forbid…but there are lots of observations made at this site which are meaner than mine was. After all…”tracked and mocked.” I thought what I had to say was in-bounds, especially as it wasn’t (isn’t) a prescription for anybody’s behavior. And I still think so, FWIW.
@bekabot
Idk, I just feel that it doesn’t matter whether a man finds x attractive or not. And I’m not inclined to give some men cookies for finding attractive what mra’s don’t.
It’s not like I’m horribly annoyed, just kinda confused, if that makes sense.
Well, this isn’t a cat I’m willing to skin. My comment was basically a reply and it was aimed in a direction I though the conversation might be going.
“I love how many MRAs obviously think their own desires and preferences are universal.”
Response: ” — even when they know they’re not.” — followed by an illustration. (Perhaps too full an illustration.) End of comment. Cookies not on offer to anybody. Not meant as any kind of recommendation. In fact, not much there to inspect.
Just jumping on the Europe Is Not A Monolith Train to say that I’m from Ireland, currently living in Switzerland, and LOL.
D’you know what kind of misogyny Ireland has that the US doesn’t? Try a blanket ban on abortion under basically all circumstances! Hooray! *waves tiny EU flag*
The fact that you view poverty as a mark of inferiority says a lot about you.
@bekabot
K. That makes sense I guess.
@tinyorc
wow 🙁 Course, the US is trying to catch up to that… /i hate america.
And by US I mean the lawmakers/politicians/republicans*, not the lots of decent people in here. Just to clarify.
*though in the totally sucky state of Indiana, IIRC, even the frickin democrats are bro life -_-
I love it when the goobers come here to give us boner updates, like we give an aerial fornication at a undulating pastry.
Dear goobers,
You are the only ones obsessed with your boners. They just aren’t that interesting.
I bet Jimmy makes 6 figures, has a model gf and lives DIRECTLY ON THE MUTHAFUCKIN BEACH!
Same deal there Jimbo. No one cares. Cram your classism up your wazoo, if it will fit in there with your head.
Sadly, I was too young in the 80s to view men as conspecifics I might court with engaging mating displays.
It sounds like such a scientific time. As a modern misandrist I’ve had to go through the trouble of getting to know a man as an individual in order to form a monogamous long term relationship.
I’ll echo several others in saying this line of thinking makes me want a tattoo!
I got a henna thing on my ankle, once. I felt so sexy.
“By inking themselves up, girls ensure that only the guys who are willing to get walked over and slapped in the face will approach them. ”
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SlapSlapKiss
RE: J.J
…that’s actually really cute. In a grand romantic gesture made in the folly of youth sort of way.
I feel the same way. But I also was careful that if hubby and I divorce, my tattoos will still have awesome connotations to them.
RE: Kittehs
hey, Rogan, Sneak, excellent tatts!
Thanks! :B I’m actually developing a magic system right now around geometry, and it gives me giggles to realize that by that system, I’ve got protection works and cleansing circles tattooed all over me!
RE: hookergal
They think their boners are so awesome they can get a discount.
*gag* I don’t know what it is with dudes who can’t get over that their genitals are not the center of the world. (Yes, trans guys do it too.) Dude. We get it. You have genitals. Join the rest of humanity who got this back in toddlerhood.
But in no other job does your enjoyment for it negate payment.
I’ve actually encountered this attitude, and I’m an artist/writer/comic book person. It’s like, “oh, you enjoyed drawing this, it’s for EXPOSURE” and I’m like, “hahaha no.” I’m Poory McBrokeAsserson and have shit for sale that’s as cheap as fifty cents. Bro, if you aren’t even willing to pay FIFTY FUCKING CENTS for my work, you are not worth my time. This is especially irritating when I’m at cons and people flat-out ask me if they can read my shit free online. WHAT ARE YOU AT THE CON FOR? (Yes, I put my comics online for free, but that’s because I do educational comics read by homeless teenagers and people who can’t afford to be caught holding my comics on paper. I don’t do it so you can save a whopping fifty cents, asshole.)
RE: Jimmy Benner
David, you sound poor.
Jimmy, you sound douchey.
@ tinyorc
Or that procedure where doctors broke women’s pelvises as a way to ensure they would still be able to have more babies later, rather than going for the less harmful to the patient option during a difficult delivery. Yep, Europe sure is more enlightened than the US.
(Watch Emma handwave away Ireland and somehow also irrelevant to discussions of misogyny in Europe.)
Waaaaait, is this the same Emma going on about how her kinks = the world’s preferences in the other thread?
No, that’s Emma with an uppercase ‘E’. Emma with a lowercase ‘e’ is the one talking about the ostensible differences between “European masculinity” and “American masculinity.”
@Ally
I was remembering them because their avatars looked different :p Though I can only tell who’s who when I’m looking at them.
I wonder if emma’s ever going to come back here to explain how europe is totally the best, or if she just gave up. Ideally the latter :/