green-street-politics:

ganekhali: White cultures that practiced tattooing before “white imperialism” even fucking happened: Germans

Nords

Picts

Scandinavians

Gaels

Celts Tattooing was introduced as an actual artform in the united states in the 1800’s and came over with immigrants (primarily coming with mob/mafia dominated societies). Indigenous peoples of the Americas already practiced tattooing, well before that. It was a GERMAN Immigrant that became the first “official” Professional tattooist in the United States. It was an IRISH immigrant that patented the first electric tattooing machine and opened the first OFFICIAL tattoo parlour, Located in New York. (Oh look, two people from cultures that practiced tattooing before “white imperialism” ever existed. How fucking shocking.) The original Sailor Jerry tattoos were popular among “Sailors” who were actually usually common fishermen, who were getting their tattoos well before the wars even happened. The Navymen came back from war with TRIBAL STYLE tattoos. The Navymen did nothing more but expose common people to tattooing and help popularize it. Norman Collins, AKA “Sailor Jerry”, WAS one of those “common fishermen”, and WAS a US Navyman who served in the wars. He melded the styles he experienced while overseas with ALREADY EXISTING tattoo imagery in the United States. (Oh, and Don “Ed Hardy” is a fucking thief who attempted to fucking take the credit for “Sailor Jerry”s work when he created Sailor Jerry, Ltd. in 1999.) Those tattoos combined with the ORIGINAL “Sailor Jerry” style tattoos, mixed with tattooing brought back from war, mixed with the Circus and Side Show use of tattoos (the Tattooed Lady, anyone?), mixed with tattoo imagery introduced in America FIRST by predominantly German and Irish immigrants ALL combined into what is now known as “American Traditional Tattoo Style”, which has recently been mixed with Fine Arts education and given birth to “Modern American Tattoo Style”. Anyone have any fucking questions? no questions; just corrections. ed hardy was actually sailor jerry’s apprentice/protégé, however they all still appropriated tattooing from people of colour. the end.

Gee. I wonder how those immigrants from Europe in the 1800’s were introduced and brought those tattoo’s when they arrived in the U.S.?

Oh yeah. From being introduced to them as early as the fuckin 1560’s by bringing in people from the America’s and the islands of the Pacific and South East Asia as slaves, prisoners, and exploiting them, putting them as exhibitions and presents for fuckin Queen Elizabeth I and other white people, which the majority of those people died shortly after. All for the amusement of white people in Europe who took these people from their homes and displayed their bodies and treated them as a thing that wasn’t human.

Hun. That post biyuti was talking about had NOTHING to do with “American tattoo culture” and them bashing on it because that all existed from colonialism. They were talking about white people in general, not your precious U.S. tattoo culture that still was benefited from the exploits from people from the Americas, the Pacific, and South East Asia.

The first tattooing machine was taken from the idea’s of the traditional tapping methods white people saw being used from the people they exploited and studied.

And what you just said about the Navy men?

The Navymen came back from war with TRIBAL STYLE tattoos. The Navymen did nothing more but expose common people to tattooing and help popularize it.

Ya. Red flag right here.

And like Titotito said here,

“Sailor Jerry isn’t that great. He pretty much copied from Japanese tattoo culture, especially the concept of full-bodied tattoos. His style was heavily influenced by tattoo artists Horihide, Pinky Yun, Horiyoshi II, and Horisada…and he was a fucking anti-Japanese racist who wanted to “beat them at their own game.”

So not only did you use and explain a guy who was racist in the first place but you go on saying those tattoo’s were popularized in the west from the same people who took these ideas in the first place.

So no, biyuti never once fuckin “bashed American tattoo culture”, they were saying exactly what they fuckin said, that yes certain groups from Europe may have had tattoo’s at one point in time, but the reintroduction of tattoo’s to the West was from the people they saw in the America’s, the Pacific, and Southeast Asia. It was because of bringing people who were tattooed such as an Inuit man and pregnant woman to London to show them to Queen Elizabeth I in 1577 in which all 3 fuckin died. It was bringing people like Jeoly, also known as Prince Giolo, the first person from the Pacific to be brought to Europe as a fuckin display for profit in exhibitions who was bought as a slave with his mother from Miangas Island near the Sarangani islands of the Philippines (which Miangas was originally a part of the Philippines before it became a part of Indonesia in 1928) and brought in Europe. In 1692 he was dubbed “The Painted Prince” who after a few appearaces in exhibitions for showcasing his tattoos he died of smallpox soon after. It was from fuckin making these people like a fuckin sideshow and specimen for fuckin white peoples fuckin entertainment that reintroduced tattooing to the West. And that was all before the fuckin 1800’s like you keep claiming and saying that “American tattoo culture” started out.

This isn’t about people saying tattoo’s were in just one culture or one part of the world alone, or denying that some groups from Europe had tattoos. What we are saying and what that whole post was about is that the reintroduction of tattooing was from people white people saw and met and brought to Europe as prisoners/slaves from the Pacific, America’s, and Southeast Asia as a fuckin circus act in which many of them died for the benefit of white people. That post had nothing to do with fuckin Irish, German, etc. immigrants coming here in the states and creating “American tattoo culture”, like that fuckin exists.

So sit the fuck back down and stop pretending you know shit and bringing in a topic of a discussion that had nothing to do with how tattooing started in the U.S., but how tattooing in the west was reintroduced to white people by the exploitation of the tattooed people they met from the America’s, the islands of the Pacific, and South East Asia.