But I am ridiculous.
These are all just excuses for not doing something that I want to do for fear of judgement. Really, the only reason not to get a tattoo or ten is the fact that they're permanent. But you know, so is cellulite and I've got that too. So, what the hell, right?
But to the point.
Two of the women whom I consider to be my spiritual godmothers of sorts of have been doing a great bit of body mod lately.
Janeane Garafolo via The Sydney Morning Herald
These two, Margaret Cho and Janeane Garofalo, are two women whom I feel deeply indebted to. I consider them to be my own personal feminist superheros. They're both female comics working (and holding their own) in an incredibly male-dominated work environment. Not only that, but they've both thrived. Both Cho and Garofalo have parleyed their position as outsiders into their selling point for more than twenty years. Using their celebrity to make their voices heard, these women are as much advocates as they are comediennes. Cho has long been known as an outspoken ally of the queer community and also frequently speaks on an issue familiar to many women: body image/ eating disorders. Garofalo, on the other hand, practically reinvented herself as a political commentator when she began working as a host at Air America. As an outspoken progressive activist, she's taken a great deal of heat from conservatives including Bill O'Reilly.
Interestingly, both of these women began getting tattoos recently as a reaction to aging (although Garofalo had a few as a younger woman). Cho and Garofalo have both spoken at length about feeling like the ugly girls, if you will, in an environment with seemingly unattainable standards of beauty. So what happens when women who struggle with body image as young women begin to age? Garofalo's been pretty up front about her (mis)adventures on plastic surgery. It seems that when Botox didn't work out as well as she'd hoped, she took to tattoos to make herself feel more beautiful. Cho concures: "To me getting tattooed is a beautiful way to kind of deal with this idea of aging and to decorate myself as I get older."
It seems that for these women body modification is a method of gaining power to feel beautiful and sexy on their own terms. I've come to realize that this is what has attracted me to tattoos as well. Not aging, but rather, the idea of taking my body back after years of feeling less than. Similarly, I got my nipple pierced as a way to feel better about my sagging breasts.
Is this type body modification an exercise in empowerment or a symptom of a greater problem plaguing women's self-esteem? I haven't a clue.
