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.
Superdrops: it’s a reference to this epic FeMRA temper tantrum, which has become part of WHTM legend.
Who’s got a welcome package for our new members? We’re burying these poor folks in in-jokes.
Damn, now I definitely have to go out and get a few tattoos. MRM members just make me want to get those tattoos even more than I did.
Honestly tho, it’s really funny and sad how they like to project their sexual preferences onto EVERYONE they consider to be male. Like honestly, I could go around saying “guys who are taller than 6 feet are ugly and trying to turn me off” or “if you don’t have brown or black eyes you are deflating my libido and that’s bad.” But I don’t, because I realize, hey, preferences.
Granted I’m not really talking from a sexual angle here, I’m asexual after all, I find certain things more aesthetically pleasing than others.
HEY DUDES WHEN ARE U GONNA STOP WEARING SOCKS WITH SANDALS, IT’S REALLY A TURN OFF AND I WISH YOU WOULD STOP BEING SUCH A PRUDE. WHY CAN’T YOU WEAR A NICE SUIT JACKET AND MAKE MY LADY PARTS TINGLE THE WAY YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO??
Well…. that certainly was… interesting.
You know, the reason I come to this site and the reason I hate MRAs so much is that they make reasonable people who point out places where feminism might have overshot the goal a little look like goddamn loons. Top that off with a healthy helping of hate, a fuckton of control issues, all wrapped snuggly into a “woe is me” victim complex blanket…
Just disgusting.
Feminism overshot it’s goals?
*headesk*
*repeat*
SuperDrops,
If you are aware of MRM and still think women have come too far, I really don’t know what to say.
@lea
Man, I missed the part of SuperDrop’s comment where zie said feminism overshot and “look a little like goddamn loons”
gahhhhhhh.
::/
Seconding your headdesk.
@seraph4377
“it’s a reference to this epic FeMRA temper tantrum, which has become part of WHTM legend.”
Thanks for the link, seraph. I must have missed it in my welcome package.
This is… I’m searching for the right word, and somehow no superlative seems adequate enough… unsurpassed? Epic, yes — but so, so much more.
Oh, man (sighing in utmost awe)… Behold the power of “The fastest growing consumer product category: scented candles. SCENTED FUCKING CANDLES,” ruining lives and civilization since 200 A.D.
The absurdity of MRA is inspiring. Sometimes.
@Buttercup Q. Skullpants
“Reading this, I’m tempted to get a tattoo of a scented candle that smells like a hard chair, and then walk into a bar and see if its force field actually picks PUAs up and flings them backward against the wall.”
That’d be a sight to cherish! Like the Telekinetic Coffee Shop prank, only for real:
If I already know exactly where this thread is about to go, does that mean I’m psychic?
I kinda wanna photshop a tiny fedora on his head now.
http://www.hswlt.org/assets/images/closeup/bs_loon-162×118.jpg
Ducks look awesome in hats.
P.S. @seraph4377
I’m fairly certain — like 99.9% — that Andie of the Scented Candles fame is not a woman. He may say otherwise, but this is most likely a dude writing whaaa?
So do geese.
http://ducksindiapers.com/menagerie/photos/birds/geese/DInahCowboy1_2012-02-15.jpg
http://workingwings.com/menagerie/photos/birds/cowboygoslings.jpg
http://workingwings.com/menagerie/photos/birds/goslingwitch.jpg
Wow. Such wrong, very fucked, much off.
@seraph4377
Thank you for linking that. I’d seen the scented candles references around, but hadn’t read the original rant before. That is the most hilarious manosphere rant I’ve seen yet. xD
Love the clockwork wings Hyena Girl!
I also may have let out a tiny high-pitched squeal of joy a bit when I recognized the Mucha tattoo in the article photo. 😀
RE: leftwingfox
That was the first thing I thought! “Aha, I spy Alfonse Mucha there!”
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.
Yeah, weirdly enough I’ve also noticed that girls back in the Eighties reacted differently to me expressing interest as they would now should I be foolish enough to try. Back then, of course, I was a teenager, and now should I come on to some girl, I’m a dirty old man pathetically and inappropriately hitting on someone way too young.
Which is why I’m happily married to someone of my own age and quit attempting to chat up teenage girls two or three decades ago.
I wonder why agnostic hasn’t?
@ LBT Awesome tattoos!!! I love them!
RE: Luzbelitx
Thank you! We designed them ourself, and I’m really pleased with them. It’s funny, I’m not geometrical at all in my normal art, but apparently all my tattoos are!
I have exciting ideas for future ones. Tattoos are fuckin’ BOSS.
emma – what makes you so sure Andie is a dude? If it’s because you don’t believe a woman would be that ridiculous with the misogyny and the buzzwords…we only wish. There are some definite, 100% confirmed female MRA’s who are at least that bad.
You’re welcome to all.
@tedthefed: Another thing that just occurred to me: “game” is dependent on the idea that women are completely pliable. Women just change themselves to fit whatever situation; that’s femininity.
Seems to me game is based on the idea that women are prizes given to mark skill in manipulation, a technical capability to play the “black box” well enough to score Teh Sex.
If a women has the temerity to tattoo herself, why, it lowers the value of that prize! How dare she!
@seraph
But most MRAs are dudes, so it’s not a weird assumption. :/
PIATOR – A desire for inappropriately young women, or even girls, seems to be part and parcel of the whole MRA gig. You missed NWOSlave, who regularly argued that age-of-consent laws were both misandry and aging feminists’ plot to remove women who were more sexually desirable than themselves from the dating pool. His preferred age seemed to be 14.
I am now acquainted with the story of the scented candles. I laughed so loudly my dog came up the stairs and looked at me like ‘Mommy, why? Biscuit?’ My dog is not a deep thinker.
Apparently my lack of tattoos means I’m attracting these guys. Ew. Still not getting tattoos anyway, because there is nothing that means so much to me that I would want it on my skin. I do, however, like pretty and meaningful tattoos. (LBT, yours are pretty cool and actually have meaning to you and aren’t out of a book that you looked through while drunk.) I had an ex who wanted me to tattoo his name on me somewhere. Yeah, glad I’m outta that.
But seriously, SuperDrops, feminism hasn’t reached its goals when there are still enough men to lap this crap up.
I wear makeup and ‘girly’ clothes and perfume. I’m exercising more. I like to dress up and I like bags and shoes and stupid girly magazines. And it’s all for me. I put on cute clothes and makeup because it makes me feel better and it’s fun. I don’t think ‘Hey, random men will approve of this outfit!’ Barf. I will be ready to let feminism go when there is no question that women have agency. (And about ten thousand other things.)
And I like scented candles.
I just bought a Tyler scented candle in Cowboy, it smells like pure leather. So good:http://www.tylercandles.com/candles-11oz.htm
I can’t wait to get back to Seattle, there’s a new tattoo shop that opened after we left and they’ve done beautiful work on some of my friends. New ink ahoy!