What you seem to be describing seems, to me, to fall into two "tattoo-person" categories. Type one is the steroid-riddled chav meathead. Type one goes to his local high street scratcher, and either has a blocky black tribal sleeve to accentuate his monstrous arms or a black and grey religious-themed piece to emulate his favourite footballer. Usually an angel across his shoulder blades, or clasped hands with a rosary and "only God can judge me" written underneath. Type one also includes the kid with a single tattoo on his shoulder blade, usually a tribal sun or a panther's claw. Whenever he goes to a nightclub or party, or the sun comes out for ten minutes, he takes his top off to make sure everybody can see his amazing tattoo. (Think along the lines of Justin Bieber)
Type two is the beard and man-bun hipster. Type two likes to buy Skin Deep magazine and goes to tattoo conventions so he can find the absolute perfect artist that will tattoo his gypsy woman portrait or fox smoking a pipe just the way he likes it. He has neo-traditional style tattoos with bold lines and strong colours, and they extend onto his hands, neck and sometimes face so everyone can see how edgy and unconventional he is. Closer inspection will reveal, however, that there are no tattoos on his back, sides, stomach or legs, or anywhere that they can't be seen at all times. Type two's tattoos are all very vibrant and fresh looking, this is because he embarked on a gruelling schedule to get the heavily tattooed look in less than 12 months, and none of them have had time to begin fading. Despite this, he claims to have been into tattoos before it was cool.
What these two demographics have in common is the matter of image. They wear their tattoos like a peacock, strutting around displaying how hard/fashionable/edgy they are to everyone that will pay attention and preferably those that don't as well. Tattoos aren't the cause of arrogance, but they can be a product of it. An accessory, a big colourful badge; LOOK AT ME YOU LESSER BEINGS, LOOK AT MY BRIGHT COLOURS AND CHEMICALLY ENHANCED MUSCLES!
You'll probably find that the type of gent you're looking for, tattooed but not up himself, won't advertise himself as such. His tattoos are something he enjoys, they don't define him and he couldn't care less if other people like them or even notice them. As such his username won't be MUSCLESANDINK and his profile won't say "heavily tattooed tattoo fan into tattoos and tattoo related things." So, yeah, good luck with that, on reflection...
(As an aside, despite the above, I'm not generally into labelling people. But if people will insist on sticking labels on themselves...) |
