Negative Attitudes Toward Body Piercing Tattoos

In the United States, many prisoners and criminal gangs use distinctive tattoos to indicate facts about their criminal behavior, prison sentences, and organizational affiliation.

This cultural use of body piercing predates the widespread popularity of tattoos in the general population, so older people may still associate body art with criminality.

And some employers, especially in professional fields, believe that tattoos contribute to an unprofessional appearance.  In Western culture, some dress code specify that tattoos must be covered. 

In fact, recently in a California county, public employees were asked to cover up visible tattoos. Therefore, any form of body piercing sometimes can be harmful to a wearer's career prospects, particularly when inked on places not typically covered by clothing, such as hands or neck.

In some cultures, tattoo body piercings still have negative associations, despite their increasing popularity and are generally associated with criminality in the public's mind; therefore those who choose to be tattooed in such countries usually keep their tattoos covered for fear of reprisal. For example, many businesses such as gyms, hot springs and recreational facilities in Japan still ban people with visible tattoos.

Tattoos also can have additional negative associations for women; "tramp stamp" and other similarly derogatory slang phrases are sometimes used to describe a tattoo on a woman's lower back.

Tattoos, particularly full traditional body suits, are still popularly associated with the yakuzza (mafia) in Japan.

At least according to popular belief, most triad members in Hong Kong have a tattoo of a black dragon on the left biceps and one of a white tiger on the right. In fact, many people in Hong Kong use "left a black dragon, right a white tiger" as a euphemism for a triad member. It's believed that one of the initiation rites in becoming a triad member is silently withstanding the pain of receiving a large tattoo in one sitting, usually performed in the traditional "hand-poked" style.

At the same time, members of the US military have an equally established and longstanding history of tattooing to indicate military units, battles, etc., and this association is also widespread among older Americans. Tattooing is also quite popular in the British Armed Forces.