The Confused History of Prison Tattoos

Although the majority of people with tattoos have never seen the inside of a prison in real life, and never would wish to, there is nonetheless a history around the tattoo which links several designs to the prison community. Different sections of the community may be represented by different tattoos – and the really confusing part is that similar tattoos can mean radically different things to different people.

A spider web tattoo, for example on one’s arm, can mean any one of various things. Most innocently it means that the bearer is stuck standing still in time while life goes on outside, but it can also mean an addiction to drugs. Additionally, it is a popular tattoo among members of the extreme racist Aryan Brotherhood. A fellow white supremacist gang, the Aryan Circle, often have tattoos bearing the number 13 (“A” being the first letter of the alphabet and “C” being the third). It is, however, also worn by some Hispanic gangs, thus creating some confusion.

Of course the best solution to this problem of confusing ink is to stay far away from prison, but it is important to remember that however cool your tattoo may look to you, there may be a person to whom it has another meaning. By no means everyone with a spider web tattoo is a racist, and not everyone with a “13” is a gang member – 13 is after all also considered to be a symbol of bad luck. But how much of a chance you get to explain your tattoo depends on whom you are explaining it too.

The Teardrop Tattoo And Its Various Meanings

One of the most controversial parts of the tattoo world is that of the teardrop tattoo. This look is worn by a number of people, but is most commonly spoken about due to its connections with imprisonment. Even within the prison system, the teardrop tattoo has a number of meanings and if you have one, it is worth being careful about who you speak to because there can be confusion over what it means. Explaining it may work, but remember that if someone has been to prison they may well have been there for a reason and not be terribly impressed by your explanation.

Usually, at least outside the prison system, the teardrop tattoo is given to symbolise the loss of a person close to you. However, its prison meaning, and one that extends to the outside due to the presence of former prisoners in the community, will often be that the bearer has killed another person. More than one teardrop beneath your eye means more than one kill. Whether the teardrop is filled or not also affects its meaning. An empty tear can mean an unsuccessful attempted murder, or that a loved one has been murdered. A tear that is full at the bottom and empty at the top means that the death of a loved one has been avenged.

For such reasons as listed above, it is perhaps unwise to get a teardrop tattoo underneath one’s eye. Additionally, it is particularly unwise to get one in Australia, as this kind of tattoo is often forcibly given by other inmates to convicted child molesters.

Where Is The Best Place To Get A Tattoo?

When it comes to the question of adorning your body with a tattoo, there is no doubt that it causes interesting debates both with other people and inside your head. Especially if it is your first tattoo. The question you will be asking yourself is “where do you make the first mark on a blank canvas?” and there is a lot to take into account when deciding this. First of all, your body is generally split into two distinct parts – the area covered by clothes most of the time, and the bits that people will see.

The area of your body which is usually covered by clothes is – for many people – the safest part to have tattooed. Going for a job interview or getting married, or any other such formal occasions – could make you curse the decision to get a tattoo on your neck or on your face. For many, the first tattoo will be one on their shoulder blade, their back or their chest. For those with exhibitionist tendencies, the tattoo being seen is more important than anything – but then again, the area not covered by clothes will usually be larger.

As a compromise between hidden and blatant, the biceps are often a place where a tattoo will be seen by those who should be seeing it, hidden from those who should not, and a pretty conventional place to get one. Most people on the pro-tattoo side of the line agree that the bicep, upper arm area is as good a place as any to start.

Know What It Says Before You Tattoo It

If there is one thing worse than getting a tattoo that you grow to hate, then it must be getting a tattoo that you think is absolutely perfect right until somebody tells you that it is spelt incorrectly, and/or means something radically different from what you thought it meant. This is something that has happened to more people than enough when they get a tattoo in another language, and even though the majority of the people around them will never be able to tell that it is wrong, for them and the percentage who do know it is at best a standing joke.

The best celebrity examples of this mistake include the tattoo Britney Spears has had on her torso, supposed to depict the Japanese symbol for “mystery”. The perils of poor translation are exemplified perfectly here, for what it actually says is “strange”, which sounds a bit less cool. If you want to get a tattoo of a Japanese symbol, ask someone with a grasp of the language (if you do not have a friend who can read Japanese, ask around on a suitable Internet forum) to translate for you.

Other misspelled foreign language tattoos include David Beckham’s tattoo on his right arm, which spells “Vhictoria” in Hindi. Unfortunately his wife’s name is simply “Victoria”. Hayden Panettiere meanwhile has a tattoo on her back saying “Vivere Senza Rimipianti” – which would mean “live without regrets”, except that regrettably the Italian word for “regrets” is “rimpianti”.

Twilight Tattoos – The Lion Fell In Love With The Lamb

Unless you have been living under a rock for the last two years, it will be hard for you to have escaped the book and film that has been the subject of conversation both positive and negative for much of that time. Twilight, the book by Stephanie Meyer, has become absolutely enormous and has spawned a crowd of fans who go beyond the normal realms of obsession and come out the other side in their own reality. These people are known as “Twi-hards”, and they have been known to immortalise their love for the story by getting it indelibly inked on their skin.

As Twilight has been both a book and a film, there has been no shortage of possible subjects for a tattoo. The popularity of the book inspired the film to be made, but it was the release of the film that saw the fan-base rise both in number and obsession. The results are tattoos with quotes from the book including “and so the lion fell in love with the lamb”, a reference to the story of the book’s central characters, a vampire and a late-teenaged girl.

There is an interesting story to all of this. Twilight and its sequel books are absolutely the kind of story which grasps an audience in its spell and keeps them spellbound for months, even years, but is scarcely present in those aged thirty-five and above. So as the next few decades pass, it will be interesting to see the reactions of those who realize they don’t actually like Twilight that much anymore.

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