Bad stigma on people with tattoos

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I have many friends from the punk community and the arts community. Most of them have tattoos all over their bodies. So, when an entrepreneur called me to collaborate on an artistic-looking café, I immediately found two of my friends to work on this project. My two friends are carpenters and mural painters. Both have tattoos that fill their bodies.

The location of cafe to be built is in a small town where some of the people are very religious. On our way to the site, we asked one of the residents to find out more about the location of the project that we were going to work on. But the residents we asked looked scared and pretended not to know. Along the way in that place, I noticed many cynical glances and was also disgusted seeing my two friends.

But there is one resident who is about 18 years old. He seemed friendly and kind, he questioned the purpose of our coming to their place. I also explained to him that we would be working on a café located in the area. The young man was willing to take us to our destination. There, the cafe owner was waiting for us. He smiled and was excited about the work on the cafe to be built.

When after arriving there, I asked the young man who escorted us about the local people looking unhappy with our arrival. Then the young man replied in a friendly manner, that where he lived, many residents were not familiar with the art of tattooing. There, tattoos are still considered a person who commits a crime. So that anyone with a tattoo will be suspected and alerted. People fear they will be robbed, stolen, or other crimes. I think that is the wrong view.

Tattoos in Indonesia are part of culture and customs. Although not all regions make tattoos a custom and culture, in some areas such as Kalimantan and Mentawai, tattoos are an inseparable culture. For the Dayak people, tattoos are part of a person's body. Some of the functions of tattoos for the Dayak community are as a sign of ownership, amulets resisting reinforcements, to an appreciation for someone's services. And for Dayak women, tattoos are a symbol of maturity and readiness for marriage. There is also a special motive for the leader of the Dayak tribe as a marker that he is the leader of the traditional group.

During the New Order government, from the 1980s to the 1990s, the police and military often shot and killed people with tattoos because they were considered criminals. In the end, people who have tattoos remove them by ironing their skin. Although many criminals use tattoos on their bodies, people who have tattoos do not necessarily commit crimes. Maybe this is one of the reasons why the people at the project site where the café will be built saw my two friends become afraid.

But this is the era of post-modernism, they are too backward in their thinking to consider identical tattoos as a crime. In 2022, tattoos have become a person's lifestyle. Tattoos become an expression of someone with artistic value. In big cities, there are also many places where tattoos are made and that is even more so. One of my friends also works as a tattoo artist. With the art of tattooing that he mastered, he was able to support his family and also help people whose economy was difficult. Don't think of tattoos as a crime or a crime anymore. Tattoos are an art born of culture. It's time we change the negative stigma against tattoos.