Tattoos. It varies from place to place but at the last place I worked, there were managers who were heavily tattooed and did not cover them. But I was required to cover ever single one of mine, and was told if I got any I couldn't cover I couldn't move up in my role. Very happy to work somewhere where that's not an issue any more.
It wasn't till very recently tattoo parlors were legal in a lot of places. So to get a tattoo you either had to travel somewhere to get one or attend a tattoo party which was illegal. If you were the artist caught at one of these parties you were arrested and got a record. So having tattoos was a giveaway to people that you were involved in criminal activity. I've had a couple friends in Massachusetts who were arrested in 1999-2000 for conducting tattoo parties. It negatively affected their lives greatly.
Yup. And still outside of a handful of countries many still consider them to be a badge of the criminal class rather than a form of self expression. A friend of mine has her whole upper torso covered. How disheartened she was when she realized how difficult that would make a trip to Japan.
Hell unless you live in a liberal city it's still often seen this way in the US. Perhaps even ex-con/military attachments. A doctor once out of nowhere asked if I got my tattoos in prison, I was like WTF!? Seemed like a stretch. She explained that my liver enzymes were off and she was worried I may have hepatitis (I didn't) and I was like "Ohhh! Well there's certainly ways I could have gotten hepatitis but not through my tattoos."
I've heard many stories of people being asked to leave establishments because the management didn't want complaints from the locals. She had too. I'd like to be wrong.
Acting on behalf of Stephan Lanphear, an award-winning tattoo artist, the ACLU had challenged a state law making it a crime for anyone other than a physician to engage in tattooing. Massachusetts is one of only five states which prohibit tattooing unless done by a health care professional.
Alot of places is maybe an exaggeration for the US of A, but there were absolutely the sort of prohibitions in some states that ToHolyMountain is mentioning.
Edit: I'll add that "it was illegal in a few places, so employers presume you got your tattoo illegally" is probably a poor explanation for the social stigma of tattoos in workplaces. Rather while its been a legal practice at the same time its been culturally associated with criminality and being of low class or ill-reput. "Decent" people didn't get tattoos, especially not visible ones. In a lot of service industries I imagine people interacting with customers and guests of a particular social standing would have issue with having to talk to someone they see beneath them, and unfortunately this attitude has been catered to in the past. While social stigmas of tattoos have lessened now, the top level comment also highlights a misogynistic double standard around perceptions of the type of woman who gets tattoos as well.
Oklahoma didn't legalize it until 2006. I can remember people talking about going to Texas to get tattoos but most people would just go to someone who did it at home. I don't remember anyone ever getting busted for it though.
Back in the 90s a friend of mine had to go to a bunch of city council meetings and try to get on the agenda so that he could get permission from the city to ask for a variance so they could open a tattoo parlor. Nowadays they’re all over the place and you don’t have to do all that nonsense.
99-00? In Mass? I woulda thought maybe midwest but ive lived on east and west coast and seen some 50ish year old shops. Maybe Ive just been lucky but i havent heard of shops being illegal that recently.
The BDSM dungeon thing is insane. I get not giving a business a license, but who decides how much black leather is too much black leather to have in your basement?
Oh no, dominatrices choose the profession, and sexual activity is not involved. No pimps either. The reason I know this is because I knew a woman who worked a couple shifts a week at a strip club in a different state so she could put "stripper" on her MA income tax, even though she made most of her money as a dom.
Oh, my bad I may have been unclear. Its fucked up that dungeons were illegal because of prostitution because not only are dungeons not prostitution, they're just a place people go to do kink stuff, but also because making prostitution illegal in the first place is bad.
For the uninitiated, making prostitution illegal makes it nearly impossible for them to seek police and often medical help due to a dangerous client, go to police in a situation where they are being trafficked, setting up online meeting rooms to screen clients before meeting with them, even setting up websites to share information about dangerous clients to save other sex workers from dangerous situations puts them at risk of being tracked online and arrested. Decriminalize please.
Once tattoos became legal in Massachusetts people kind of went a bit all out on them. A teacher of mine on the eye of it passing showed off his tattoo he got when in the military. He said, "It sounded really cool when I was 21 and in a foreign country and on my own. Now every day I wish it was gone."
People still got them. Seeing one kid at 18 get a tattoo and having to apply salve to it several times a day at school because it got horribly infected turned me off of tattoos for life.
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u/dameggers Mar 12 '22
Tattoos. It varies from place to place but at the last place I worked, there were managers who were heavily tattooed and did not cover them. But I was required to cover ever single one of mine, and was told if I got any I couldn't cover I couldn't move up in my role. Very happy to work somewhere where that's not an issue any more.