The T stamp…(What you call me?)

That’s right today we’re talking Tramp Stamp… the notion that any women (or man!) who has a tattoo on the lower back is a Tramp! 

"What you call me? what ya, what ya... what ya call me? ”  - Otis Redding!

My inspiration for this post …an article in Femail with the heading: ‘Nice Tramp Stamp Cheryl!’

Cheryl Cole's Back Tattoo Design

The article was referring to Cheryl Cole deputing her new lower back tattoo at the National TV Awards which took place a few nights ago.

Cheryl had on a dress, which was designed to flaunt that butterfly/tribal tattoo to perfection (and good for her!)… But does that make her a tramp?

Well… the comments on Femail ranged from ‘tramp stamp’ and ‘why do women defile their bodies with hideous tattoos’ to ‘stunning’ and ‘the tramp stamp was a degrading headline’

I got to agree with that last comment because I do not believe in anyway that just because someone has a tattoo on their lower back it automatically makes them a tramp… that term is so old fashioned anyways… who uses that term anymore?

Also whether someone is a tramp or not is really defined by their behaviour rather than their choice of body art.

Although I must admit in my time I have seen some questionable lower back tattoos (Backsh*ts and No entry come to mind! :-D), which may send out a certain message about the person …

*The no entry tattoo was on a guy who could shake his booty with the best of them! lol (I thought my eyes were deceiving me at first!) :-D

Now whilst I can’t speak for those people’s choice of tattoos, I will say that all of us here at the BDSS have been inked at some point in our lives… some of us have more than one tattoo and in fact two of us have one on our lower backs… does that make us tramps? I think if you have read the BDSS the answer should be a resounding NO! (Hopefully our writing does not scream – she’s a Tramp!)

Anyhow, I did a little research (via Google) on this term tramp stamp and I can’t say that I came up with anything interesting, other than some people say the terms stems from a time Celtic’s use to brand bad people and it was mostly ‘whores’ who where branded. Others say it was a popular term in the 90’s and apparently many people chose to get a tattoo on their back because the skin of the back is unlikely to stretch ((unless you are really unlucky!)

I definitely did not find anything to suggest there is a correlation between ‘stamp’ and (tramp) behaviour.

Although there was some insinuation that those who get tattoos on their lower back are asking for people to look, you know - drawing the attention to the area then the booty of course!

Now clearly Cheryl’s dress was designed to show off her tattoo for the occasion and it worked judging by the article in Femail.

Me in my every day life (and about 10 years after getting my tattoo) I can’t say that I dress to show it off or not… I dress for comfort mostly.

Also when I think about why I chose a back tattoo the main reason (and remember I was about 19/20 at the time) was about having a tattoo that was a reasonable size and that I could cover up. My arm was not an option because well… they are quite muscular and I was not trying to draw attention to them. Also my stomach was not an option… because well I’m a mother…

  

… So anyways BDSS now you know my secret, my name is Si and I have a tattoo on my lower back… what you call me?

Also do you have a tramp stamp or back tattoo? What do you make of tattoos in general -defiling the body or self-expression?