I know Jesus said that he was bringing a new law

but even he might be scratching his head about this one.

A friend "liked" a post on FB this morning that I couldn't respond to because I'm not a friend of her friend.  Which is another reason FB is fucked up, but that's for another day.¹

The post was a picticle² that said, "Sometimes the nicest people you meet are covered in tattoos, and sometimes the most judgmental people you meet go to church on Sundays."

Isn't that special.

I don't get the tattoo thing.  I mean even from a general cultural standpoint I don't get it.  The only people -- other than sailors, who are a bit of a breed apart -- who used to get tattoos were thugs, gang members, and prison inmates (I may be repeating myself), and now it seems that not only are young men tatting themselves up, but nearly every young woman under 21 (and many of them over it) proudly sports a tramp stamp somewhere.³  But the ones that truly get me are the ones you see where some young athlete has branded himself with crosses and other religious symbology and text...when we know that Jesus, being Jewish, would have been well aware of Leviticus 19:28:

Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the LORD.⁴

Yet today even Jewish young people are now inking themselves in this barbaric manner, which of course is why Jewish Scripture inveighed against it -- the Philistines and the Caananites undoubtedly did that sort of thing to show how rough and ready they were, you know, being barbarians.  Plus, you know, the whole Auschwitz thing.  Although when I think about it, I doubt that many of the young Jewish people today have ever actually met a Holocaust survivor.

I do know perfectly nice people who have tattoos, but that doesn't mean I have to pretend that I think they're the greatest thing since sliced bread.  And being me, the folks I know who have tattoos are generally aware of my disapprobation of same.  Does that make me judgmental?  I don't think so, regardless of the attitude such people take that sort of goes, "If you don't do it, you can't understand it."  I understand it, all right.  I really don't need to walk a mile in your shoes to believe that it's goddamn foolishness to decorate yourself with ink that doesn't come off.⁵

The prevailing mindset these days is "anything goes".  If you like it, do it.  If it feels good, do it.  The old civilized culture that some of us still remember has been marginalized by the radicals who have taken over our schools and universities and newspapers and television.  The rot has even reached into our churches and synagogues because today's clergy are the product of the radical march through the institutions that has taken place since the late 1960's, with no end in sight.

If you think that because I don't like your tattoos, that makes me judgmental, too fucking bad.  I'm a representative of a better time and I say you are a barbarian.  Enjoy those tats when you get old and they fade and sag.  And don't come crying to me if you end up with hepatitis C from a dirty needle, or can't find a job because nobody will hire you due to your visible tattoos.

Meantime, if you notice me gritting my teeth a bit while smiling when you show me your latest inking, now you'll know why.

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1 Briefly, why does FB tell me that friends of mine have made comments on other people's walls when I'm not friends with the other person?  Do they expect me to click the "Add Friend" button mindlessly, even if I don't know the person and don't have any interest in being that person's friend?  God, I hate Facebook.

2 I'm operating under the thesis that a "picticle" is something like a "listicle", in other words, as a listicle is a bullet-point list that poses as an article ("Ten Weird Things..."), so is a picticle a picture with editorializing (or moralizing) text overprinted that speaks ex cathedra from the poster's navel, and stands in place of making an actual argument with actual words and actual people who disagree with you regarding the subject at hand.

3 Including one of my nieces, who found out too late that the tattoos she had precluded her joining the Air Force, because they were too visible even with clothing.  She's now a paramedic in training and I could not be prouder of her, but because of the tats, several years of her life were spent aimlessly between the Air Force refusal and her deciding to get into EMS.

4 Of course, in context, the next verse is "Do not prostitute thy daughter, to cause her to be a whore; lest the land fall to whoredom, and the land become full of wickedness."  To which I can only shrug, and murmur, "Too late..."

5 Well, not without some really expensive treatments, anyway.  I keep thinking I should open a chain of tattoo removal salons...in about 10-15 more years I'll bet they will be damn profitable.