Cut your hair, ya damn hippie!

@boomerang,

boomer, I would say no for several reasons. First, I think that age 11 is too young to be making decisions about altering a body part. Hair dye is one thing. It washes out, grows out. But a piercing may not grow over.

If nobody else had a pierced ear, would he still want it? If so, then it clearly means something personal and specific to him. But wanting it because other people are doing it doesn't seem like much of a reason to me.

My fthird reason is personal. I had my ears pierced when I was in my mid teens. A doctor did it. I wore only gold posts in my ears. I had one disgusting infection after another. Soaking my ears. Seeing yellow pus oozing out of the holes. Yuck. Unlikely? Yes, but when you mess with body parts, you never know.

My final reason is goofy. I would worry that the next request would be a tattoo. That would be an even bigger no than the piercing.

3 Replies

@Roberta,

Quote:

My final reason is goofy. I would worry that the next request would be a tattoo. That would be an even bigger no than the piercing

Not sure about OR, but most states dont let those under 17 get a tattoo even with parental permission, so that tattoo is not going to happen anytime soon.

1 Reply

@hawkeye10,

Quote:

My final reason is goofy. I would worry that the next request would be a tattoo.
That would be an even bigger no than the piercing

hawkeye10 wrote:

Not sure about OR, but most states dont let those under 17 get a tattoo even with parental permission,
so that tattoo is not going to happen anytime soon.

Yeah, if ALL tatoo artists CARE about that law.

David

1 Reply

@OmSigDAVID,

Quote:

Yeah, if ALL tatoo artists CARE about that law.

Here in Olympia there are only a few who will break the law, and they charge heavy for it...almost double the standard rates my kid tells me. He decided to wait, because we dont trust the quality of the work that he would get on the black market.

1 Reply

@hawkeye10,

DAVID wrote:

Yeah, if ALL tatoo artists CARE about that law.

hawkeye10 wrote:

Here in Olympia there are only a few who will break the law, and they charge heavy for it...almost double the standard rates my kid tells me. He decided to wait, because we dont trust the quality of the work that he would get on the black market.

That 's a fine idea,
almost as good as remaining clean.

I was only supporting freedom of personal autonomy over your own body
at any age.

David

1 Reply

@OmSigDAVID,

Quote:

I was only supporting freedom of personal autonomy over your own body
at any age.

Tattoos are yet another area where our youth have lost rights and autonomy over the recent years...It used to be that if they could talk their parents into it then they could get one, but no more.

1 Reply

@Roberta,

Roberta wrote:

But I think I'm the only one here who doesn't take a casual view of a piercing. If I were the parent (good thing I'm not), I'd say no.

Exactly what my parents said lol. They made it clear to all of us that there would be NO piercings or tats as long as we lived under their roof (excluding pierced ears for us girls when we were teenagers). They were united and firm. My brothers begged lol. No dice.

We're all in our 30's now and no one has unusual piercings. One brother did get 4 small tats. We all survived without (much) psychological damage lol.

1 Reply

Boom, I think a lot of us - not all - here are talking with cautioning of various types, with a lot being about his age. Cautioning too strong a word, I suppose. We are just saying what we think, which is what you asked. I'm not going back to find what you said, but I don't think you can generalize that those who disagree or somewhat disagree think people who full pierce or tattoo are not worthy of respect - we haven't approached that discussion. To speak for myself, I think that some of those can get there - wacko as an immediate take - but even when it is full bore, is not necessarily self hating, probably mostly not. And also may be.

I'll pull a disagreement with msOlga, who may know better than I do, re a united front meaning that the child gets that the parents agree. There is another kind of united front, in that the parents may agree to support the one of them who foot-drags. Depends on the marriage. Mo surely knows Mom gets his viewpoint but the rule hasn't moved, yet.

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It may be a regional thing too - Oregon is kind of a last hippie state and I think that you can get away with a lot more than in some other states.

I just asked Jane, who is a sophomore in high school, if the boys in her school wear ear rings and she said that the majority of guys have no piercings at all. So this is Southern California....

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@CalamityJane,

A friend of ours (husband and I) called the county I later moved to, Humboldt (moved not for that reason) the last gasp of the counter culture.

I am sympathetic to a lot/not all of humboldt/portland/seattle views, as I perceive of them taken as, at the same time I was a foreigner there about as much as I am here in new mexico... that is, somewhat.

I'm sympathetic to Mr. B's take right now.

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@hawkeye10,

DAVID wrote:

I was only supporting freedom of personal autonomy over your own body at any age.

hawkeye10 wrote:

Tattoos are yet another area where our youth have lost rights and autonomy over the recent years...It used to be
that if they could talk their parents into it then they could get one, but no more.

Well, a kid 's body does not belong to his parents; his body is HIS.
The Supreme Law of the Land is the law of supply & demand, i.e.:
if the kid can raise enuf cash to get a willing artist, then he can get the job done
and face vengeful consequences.

In my opinion,
NO person shoud mutilate his own body,
but every person has the natural right to do so,
the natural right to engage in self-destructive activity.

It is not likely that I 'd hire him if I saw that, but still . . . .

1 Reply

@Irishk,

Irishk wrote:

Roberta wrote:
But I think I'm the only one here who doesn't take a casual view of a piercing. If I were the parent (good thing I'm not), I'd say no.

Exactly what my parents said lol. They made it clear to all of us that there would be NO piercings or tats as long as we lived under their roof (excluding pierced ears for us girls when we were teenagers). They were united and firm. My brothers begged lol. No dice.

We're all in our 30's now and no one has unusual piercings.
One brother did get 4 small tats. We all survived without (much) psychological damage lol.

Your post makes me feel very ambivalent n morally conflicted.
It is terrific to not
be a parent.

David

1 Reply

@OmSigDAVID,

I get that. And I didn't even go into all the rest of it lol. The main thing is, we look back and find a lot of it hilarious now. Our parents do, too. Of course, not so much at the time. Being a parent is a tough job and not one that comes with a manual, so I think not all that easy at times. Maybe not everyone is cut out for it.

0 Replies

@CalamityJane,

CalamityJane wrote:

It may be a regional thing too

that could well be. You don't see very many young men with piercings here - tends to be in the 25+ group. Even with young women it's not as popular here as it was 30 - 40 years ago. Most multiple ear piercings (or remnants of them - half grown over etc) that I see are on men/women between 50 and 60.

~~~

Not everyone's holes grow over easily if the piercing is no longer desired. My pal Y had piercings that never healed properly, so she gave up on trying to wear earrings. She's had problems regularly for decades as the holes didn't close back up - she keeps getting minor infections and has some decent scar tissue built up around the holes.

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Hey, boomer, how's it going?

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@boomerang,

U have indicated that Mo is very honest.

It appears that he is very desirous
of making a STATEMENT about himself,
holding himself out to the world in some particular way.

Has he revealed what this IS ?

Did he tell u the reason that he wishes to present himself
that way? What image does he wish to project ?

David

2 Replies

@boomerang,

People with long hair

Jesus
Mohammed
Ghenghis Khan
Richard he 3rd
G A Custer
James Hetfield
Michelangelo
Bob Marley
God

Smile

0 Replies

@OmSigDAVID,

Awesome! I have been having the same thought regarding image. I went on to wonder if changing the image might not take longer than healing the piercing, should he change his mind.

1 Reply

@roger,

Somewhere in this thread
there is a picture of a singularly deformed fellow.

It is beyond imagination how long it 'd take him
to be restored to normal, if he tried. Its a shame.

I don 't wanna know what mental infrastructure produced that result.

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Somewhere along the track of this thread we seem to have lost sight of boomerang's initial request.

Which was:

Quote:

In the 1970s when I was in high school parents and children warred over hair length. Some of the cleanest cut kids were the biggest stoners, troublemakers, rebels I knew.

Now Mr. B and Mo are at war over Mo wanting to get his ear pierced. Mr. B is dead set against it. Dead set.

I don't get it but because I think it's important for parents to stick together I've told Mo no too. Privately I've intervened in Mo's behalf. I don't think it's a big deal for a kid to have a pierced ear... he'll get bored with it and won't even seem to matter.... chances are he'd let the thing heal up and the whole thing would be over with.

This battle between the two has gone on for year but has recently hit new heights. I worry that when Mo hits 18 he'll come home with his face pierced a hundred places -- or worse.

To be honest, I cannot understand why Mr. B is so stubborn about this. He can't even explain it to me and I'm patient and willing to listen. He just thinks it's "wrong" and that isn't like him.

Can anyone explain?

I don't wish to offend anyone, but airing our personal biases about piercings, tattoos, etc, wasn't the intention of this thread at all.
And I don't know that our personal opinions about these things are of much relevance or help.

Boomerang, I'm hoping that you are not too upset about the (mis)direction this thread has taken.

But I wouldn't blame you in the least if you feel offended.

1 Reply

Cut your hair, ya damn hippie!

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