growltiger

Just adopted a 1 year old small black lab mixed with who knows what. We got it from a local rescue that drives to the South (he's a Kentucky dog) and brings them back to the twin cities. So far, much like myself, he's enjoying the change and the snow! He's really mellow and doesn't appear to have been too traumatized. Dogs really are great.

Here's part of a Troll sleeve Trond Kjørkleiv is working on. Norwegian mythology, folklore and fairytales are crammed with trolls, so they're kind of a big deal over here.

I've been watching some of the more troll-y threads (and one in particular) - I also applaud and admire the women who are standing up to said trolls. For me, I don't see the point of engaging when all it does is add fuel to the fire and give the troll more stuff to work with. Lately, I am preferring "planned ignore" when it has become obvious that a person isn't going to listen, it takes too much energy to engage.

In my opinion a troll is somebody who upsets people on purpose. Some of the people here seem to lack the social skills to avoid accidentally insulting people. However the outcome is the same either way: people are upset.
I have to say this forum is probably the only forum I've been on that feels this strongly about women's rights without actually being a feminist forum, and that's pretty cool.

I'm taking this over here now because I feel like it. And I'm not talking about anyone in particular so if you think I am don't get defensive or flatter yourself. This isn't about you.
A "troll" is commonly defined as someone who posts sh*t on the internet to get a reaction -- even if it's something they don't believe themselves, e.g. OBAMA = HITLER. It's very hard not to fall into their little traps and, as annoying as they are, I must admit I have a weird respect for them as pranksters and anarchists. They can be pretty entertaining sometimes (though not often) but it's best to ignore them and hope they go away.
Then there's another type of person who makes some kind of inflammatory or potentially offensive statement that they actually do believe. Those people are also trying to stir the pot and get attention – even if it's negative attention, kind of like our six-year-old at times. Those traps are harder to avoid. I think the thing to remember is that some people don't care about having a meaningful discussion or debate – only being "right." And they will never stop arguing until they get the last word. They will never see your point or try to understand your point of view because they don't care. They won't admit they're wrong – ever.
(BTW I've also seen a few "success stories" on here of people who stop being bullheaded and stubborn and actually listen to what other people have to say – other people who know a lot more about the subject than they do. Some people just go away which is fine by me, but LST has also "saved" one or two from getting bad or mediocre tattoos by steering them in the right direction, suggesting artists, etc. Actually, I wouldn't mind seeing a thread just about those success stories, but maybe later.)
I myself have said plenty of dumb sh*t on here and been schooled a couple of times. I've agreed to disagree on a few occasions and always apologized if I offended someone – or at least tried clarify myself if I felt I was being misunderstood.
But really we're all here for the same reason, which is to talk about tattoos, share and look at kickass tattoos, and occasionally debate the finer points of tattoos and tattooing. Preferably in a respectful way without name-calling or singling anyone out.
One reason why this board is so great and different from a lot of others is that we've been able to maintain this kind of intelligent, respectful discourse. In part that's because we're able to "police" ourselves and call out the trolls and the haters when they do rear their ugly heads. There's been some talk recently about this board going negative and scaring some people away. I hope that doesn't happen but that's also part of the process of weeding out. Some people need "tough love" instead of telling them what they want to hear.
If you've read this far, thank you for letting me get on my soapbox for a bit. I've been really proud of the people who've been standing up for themselves and others – some women in particular – and not letting the haters and the trolls get away with their bullsh*t. But at the end of the day, you can try to slap some sense into some people and all you get is a sore hand.

The problem is, The Dude, that you come across as one of those boorish oafs who shouts everyone down and can never be wrong. You made an ill-advised comment, people tried to explain this to you. Instead of taking in what they were saying you attacked them whilst playing some sort of weird victim card. If you'd just tried to engage with people and understand what they were saying, even if you didn't agree, this could have gone a very different way. You could easily have accepted your comment might be offensive, explained why you didn't mean it to sound like that, job done.
A brief aside: calling ladies "shit birds" is a pretty poor example of not being sexist. Just so you know for future.
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The problem is, The Dude, that you come across as one of those boorish oafs who shouts everyone down and can never be wrong. You made an ill-advised comment, people tried to explain this to you. Instead of taking in what they were saying you attacked them whilst playing some sort of weird victim card. If you'd just tried to engage with people and understand what they were saying, even if you didn't agree, this could have gone a very different way. You could easily have accepted your comment might be offensive, explained why you didn't mean it to sound like that, job done.
A brief aside: calling ladies "shit birds" is a pretty poor example of not being sexist. Just so you know for future.
Sent from my GT-I8190N using Tapatalk

The problem is, The Dude, that you come across as one of those boorish oafs who shouts everyone down and can never be wrong. You made an ill-advised comment, people tried to explain this to you. Instead of taking in what they were saying you attacked them whilst playing some sort of weird victim card. If you'd just tried to engage with people and understand what they were saying, even if you didn't agree, this could have gone a very different way. You could easily have accepted your comment might be offensive, explained why you didn't mean it to sound like that, job done.
A brief aside: calling ladies "shit birds" is a pretty poor example of not being sexist. Just so you know for future.
Sent from my GT-I8190N using Tapatalk

Women go to extreme measures to force their bodies to fit some...whatever, some stupid image that mostly males have foisted upon us that we are less, we're unworthy, if we don't look like this specific ideal. Anorexia, bulimia, eating cotton balls, exercising for hours, surgeries, heck yeah body image is a big part of our lives. Our every day lives, it's all around us, constantly. Men telling us what we can/can't do to *our* bodies, actually trying to pass LAWS to govern what males feel we should and shouldn't do..you know what after a while it gets to be a little fricking old. We're told and it's pretty much beaten into us, from a young age, little girls in elementary school, how we don't fit in w/other girls, and it never quits. Until you've been a girl, a girl who doesn't have a "perfect" body, perfect clothes, perfect hair, perfect skin, perfect teeth, a girl who has looked in the mirror and wished she was dead b/c of how she looks and how others treat her, until you've had your body completely taken over and warped from having kids and nursing, I think maybe a person should just shut their pie hole about how women should and shouldn't feel and how body image is portrayed.

I've been reading along and have both agreed and disagreed with various parts of everyone's posts. There are many good points made all around. But after reading this one, I've reached the point of diminishing returns on this thread.
Everyone has their own body image. It's been developed and grown and mangled and thrust upon them over time and circumstances. Body image is not something many people can completely control. Maybe guys handle it better than girls. IDK. Maybe guys don't see it as a big deal. Some do. Many girls do. But to tell someone else what level of importance their own body image should have is insensitive and uninformed, especially since it's not something that is completely under someone's control.
I could give some f'ed up examples of stuff that's happened to me that affect my body image in hard ways and I've worked on that over time. Some things will never go away. I'm now much less "sensitive" to certain things, especially things I now realize people say out of ignorance and not to be hurtful. Why do I "give a flying fuck" as you say, about what people think about my body? I wish I couldn't give a flying fuck, but the point is, it isn't completely under my control. I don't blame most people for being insensitive (unless they are just being a complete jackass) because I don't put out in public why I MIGHT be sensitive.
The point is, you don't *know* other people's stories. Someone's body image of themselves may mean nothing to you, but affects them in ways they may try very hard not to reveal. So don't challenge people on it.
$0.02.

I'm not saying I personally care about your opinions, I'm saying that a lot of other people do and therefore, you should be careful how you say things on the internet. Like I stated in an earlier post that wasn't directed at you per se, it took me a long time to get slightly comfortable with my body. And the fact that you're so nonchalantly passing off body image issues in others, just shows how differently the topic affects men vs. women.
I don't know how this isn't obvious and why I have to spell it out since you've clearly pissed off a lot of people.
I was really hoping you would respond with even a half-apology, and maybe this could become a more meaningful conversation. It's really difficult for me to not sound bitter and maybe that's the reason you're responding the way you are..

Not sure about anyone else here, but I've had to tattoo over too many long-healed upper thigh scars on girls in my generation to gloss over body image issues so easily. Or heard girls that can't weigh more than 125 pounds talk about how they want to lose weight before they tattoo their ribs or belly. Or been asked about covering stretch marks from when they had kids, despite that being a completely normal and natural thing. Etc., etc., etc.
So, rather than think you're entirely the victim and getting attacked here (which I would say has gone a bit overboard, based on misunderstanding of some of your original points due to poor phrasing and explanation), realize that you do have a warped understanding of how deeply body image can affect women who have been conditioned by society to hate their bodies.
Also, you should worry far more about poorly done tattoos than tattoos that don't fit the body.

@The Dude OK I'll give you that you didn't say that you didn't like heavily tattooed people, but I still think you're caring way too much about how others get tattooed. And with that, you are definitely saying some women should get tattooed less and I don't know, maybe I'm wrong, but that's not going to sit well with some people. I'm trying to be nice now and explain this to you, because you seem capable of reason. I'm not siding with some of the people that are giving you shit, so... don't put words in my mouth either. The reason you're getting backlash is because (like I stated in my initial post) body image is a big fucking deal to women because men have made us insecure and scrutinize our bodies throughout history to where we now have an unhealthy disposition to hate our bodies passed down to our daughters and granddaughters and so on. So even if it's not your intention to single out women or agree with the OP or stir up a ton of drama... you did. The damage is done.
I'm just trying to help you see how you could have come across as well, a douche. So that maybe you can continue contributing to this forum in a meaningful way because I have faith that if you stick around you'll see this place is pretty rad and people are genuinely nice and respect each other.
Does that make sense?

A close friend of mine(30 years) was in a serious forklift accident and 8 months later he ended up having a good portion of his leg amputated including his foot (a bout a week ago). A mutual friend saw some FB pics and asked what was up and after hearing the whole thing suggested we do some fundraising. So far we have an email, paypal account and FB page. We've already raised a little cash and on the 22nd some local bands are having a raffle for the cause and hopefully in May we are having true fundraiser with hopefully four bands. We are friends with members in each band. I'm pretty stoked about helping out my friend.. What I think is awesome is my buddy Steven that got hurt is into tattoos, problem is his are all bad except one which isn't great so we are planning to get him a rad tattoo!

Just cause problem #2 is more messed up than problem #1, does not mean that problem #1 is not messed up...

I'm fairly certain that none of the ladies who post on this board give a flying fuck whether toss-pots on the internet think they are attractive or not, based on their tattoos or otherwise.
Also, this argument works both ways. Some men who are heavily tattooed are 'hot', some aren't.
I wonder how attractive the naysayers are? Not very, I'd wager.

What do I have to do to receive that "punishment"?

Oh no! My post definitely wasn't directed at you. It did spark my brain to post what I said, but more because it seemed like a lot of men had been rallying for women the past 4 pages (which is great!) but I felt what I said needed to be said in general so that people don't do the whole "well since I think women shouldn't be victimized for their bodies I'm helping the problem by saying so." It's like racism... there's a difference between saying your not a racist and actually stopping racism. We can't just assume level-headed women are always immune to this type of slander.
I remember seeing a short documentary on rape and one of the interviewees said that she had never met a women who truly loved her self and her body. And that is, unfortunately, so true.
And now I'm jumping off my podium. Commence the troll-bashing! Who the hell starts a jack-ass thread and then abandons it? WTF?!

Turning a trolling thread into something funny/worthwhile...well done, everyone.

I have seen too many knuckleheads on message boards. I suppose it depends on their lack of brain power and Neanderthal value system.

Well, that was a complete fail of a thread! :-/ But, for completeness, I thought I'd update it.
They've raised over £12,000 (>$20,000)! They've done a marvellous job, both the organisers and everyone who donated art. I hope this gets picked up by the UK press, it'll make a nice change from the usual negative focus that tattooing gets.

Well, that was a complete fail of a thread! :-/ But, for completeness, I thought I'd update it.
They've raised over £12,000 (>$20,000)! They've done a marvellous job, both the organisers and everyone who donated art. I hope this gets picked up by the UK press, it'll make a nice change from the usual negative focus that tattooing gets.

@DJDeepFried I read that article and it annoyed me, but I don't completely hate it. I think it's telling that this "existential anguish" he's writing about comes from his Red Hot Chili Peppers logo tattoo, but when he talks about the swallow he got at Adorned, he says simply that he likes it and that it reminds him of the place and time he got it. And sure, he may have had all sorts of pretentious aspiring-writer in his early-20s reasons for getting that tattoo, but when it comes down to it, it's a tattoo of a bird. The "meaning" of that tattoo has probably shifted a hundred times since he got it, which is something you can't say for tattoos that have a very literal meaning attached to them.
I took the survey because the OP seems like she's making a genuine effort to interact with us here--very much unlike other people who came here asking for similar things--but I don't think this line of inquiry is ultimately very useful because it's trying to make generalisations where they can't be made. I don't want to be Captain Obvious here, but not all tattoos are equivalent and looking at tattoos as if a tattoo is a tattoo is a tattoo, which I feel this survey does, (to be fair to the OP, there is some nuance in the survey but the problem with using quantitative methods to explore this subject is that you're going to lose specificities) isn't going to give much useful information. Most of the regular posters here get tattoos because we like tattoos and we like the art of tattoos. That's going to be a whole different thing than somebody who gets tattoos to symbolise meaning. There are a bunch of other things I could get into here but I'm not going to because I'm already bored of writing this.

It's because they didn't get a panther.

I would ignore this tattoo it for now. Maybe see if you can get any of your unused "deposit" back then save up some money and seek out some higher quality artists. It may take a couple months before your have the time and money but you will be much happier with the results. It would be insane to keep returning to an artist after you lost confidence in their ability to design and apply a quality tattoo.