A Word on Self Awareness

Disclaimer: This is a special Knucklehead post, as we probably won’t ever know the outcome, it’s more of a cautionary tale than an admonition of Knuckleheadedness. As such, we won’t be naming the people involved.

We recently had a client schedule an appointment to get some symbolism from his ‘favorite childhood video game’ on his forearm. Everything seemed to be normal until Will noticed the collection of symbols he wanted (as sent in an email after the appointment was set) were Satanic in nature.

Everyone take a deep breath here.

Now, at Lighthouse Tattoo we pride ourselves on tattoo shops being one of the last bastions of free speech in this country. You can come in here and be yourself, without fear of someone mistreating you (as long as you don’t mistreat one of us). That being said sometimes people come in and get super evil-looking stuff tattooed on them and we have no problem whatsoever doing that. We also understand that secular Satanism is a movement that’s been gaining steam for some time, as an alternative to religion, and in some cases, a send up of its abuses.

However, we always ask two questions of ourselves before tattooing anyone: 1. Does this person know what they’re getting (i.e. do they understand what the subject matter is and that tattoos are permanent by nature). and 2. Will it cause them undue harm?

That first one is pretty easy, most people know what they’re getting and that tattoos are for life unless you go through a painful and expensive removal process. The second question though, requires a little more analysis.

At Lighthouse Tattoo we work with the understanding that the process of going from being a non-tattooed person to a tattooed one is an inherently harmful thing. Mainly because people with tattoos don’t care if you don’t have any, but sometimes people without tattoos don’t like it if you do. We also understand that most people get that this could be a mild inconvenience and with the progression of tattoo acceptance socially and in the workplace, most folks have already taken that into consideration by the time they hit the door. The problem occurs when people who lack experience or an appropriate level of self awareness decide to push the edge of what is socially acceptable, causing themselves unforeseen negative consequences for doing so clumsily. You can push the edge of society’s norms, but if you don’t really know what you’re getting into, you can set yourself up for a lot of frustration moving forward, and once again, tattoos are permanent.

Snap back to the situation at hand. A young man wants some images from his ‘favorite childhood video game’ that are all considered Satanic in nature. When this was brought to his attention he didn’t even balk. He merely stated that he wanted the images because they were a part of this video game. That, folks, is a lack of awareness about the facts. We declined to do the tattoo and refunded his deposit. He sent his girlfriend to pick the money up an Will gave her a little free advice:

‘If your boyfriend played a video game with a bunch of Nazis in it, we wouldn’t tattoo a swastika on him just because of that. Those images, though they are contained in his favorite game, are still considered Satanic by the vast majority of folks who will see it on his forearm, and that is going to cause him about the same amount of trouble as getting nazi swastika would. We would do the tattoo if he wanted to get it some place he could cover it up with clothes a bit easier, but doing that on his forearm is just asking for trouble.’

and it is.

Either homeboy here hates the church and religion and everyone who believes in that stuff and may be the next mass shooter; or he’s tired of the oppressive violence conducted by the world’s major religions and wants to let everyone know it; or he loves the Dark Lord for some reason (could just be a Slayer fan, I dunno); or he genuinely only wants the tattoo because he liked the game.

Either way, after being counselled about why that is a bad idea, if he doesn’t want to move the tattoo to a less visible area of the body, we don’t want him in here.

These are the images the young man wanted and where he wanted to put them. From top to bottom: The three-crone moon; an inverted cross; the whore of babylon; the Satanic Cross; and the Baphomet Pentacle. Don’t try to argue with us, we know what they are and what they represent to most people and that ain’t good.

For the sake of not stirring up any other problems, we will say that we looked up the game and it did use all of these images. We won’t name it here but the game was developed as a send-up of the abuses of religious teaching and its oppressive culture, it’s also deeply violent, not unlike the religions it seeks to decry.

<<To the young man who wanted to get that tattoo: We hope you’ll reconsider your decision to put something that could be so potentially harmful to you in such a visible spot on your body. If you’re reading this and change your mind, we’d love to hear from you. If not, try to understand at least why we said ‘no’, and that it’s not a reflection on you personally, but out of a desire to not cause someone undue harm.>>

A Conversation About Racism

The above emails were written to us a couple of days ago and as unsurprising as it is to be confronted with such ideas it was still quite startling that this person would be so upfront and defensive about their ignorance.

We decided not to ignore this, but to confront it. Not with anger or aggression, but with compassion. This is the only way someone can expect to change the hearts and minds of people so entrenched in an ideology, which is the point here.

Our feelings about race within the shop may be a bit more nuanced between the individual artists, but the grand theme being that racial superiority doesn’t exist; that racial discrimination of all types is wrong; that these things are self evident and thus don’t usually require significant discussion between intelligent people; and that the rhetoric about using violence to have your ‘voice heard’ on any side of the argument isn’t even a thinly veiled threat-it’s just a threat, to assimilate ideas or suffer the consequences, which we also feel is wrong.

Confronting racism is important to us, as it should be to everyone. How we do that matters as much as the fact that we do it. Without compassion, even for those we disagree with, even starkly, we lose the argument. Here’s to hoping this man and so many others can start to see the error in their ways. Have a great day!

Better Luck Next Time, Brooklyn!

Will doesn’t normally do walk-ins. As our founder and one of the best tattoo artists in the state, he is usually far to busy. But after a last minute reschedule due to an untimely death in the client’s family, and being short0staffed on what is typically a slow-ish day, Will put in a full shift of walk-ins on a Monday. Out of the 5 tattoos, Miss Brooklyn Dye was one who came in with her gentleman friend to get an eye in her elbow ditch. The gentleman wanted to get a name he’d gotten at a shop in Hendersonville touched up, and add a tribal bird to his shoulder. That just about where things stop being normal.

After doing Brooklyn’s tattoo (followed by comments of ‘this is the best tattoo I ever got’, and ‘we’re definitely coming back here’), Will stopped briefly to eat some sushi that had been delivered. You see, tattoo artists don’t have a set lunch time, so we have to eat when we can. As Will had been tattooing all day, and it was about 6:30 in the evening, he scarfed down a couple rolls while putting the finishing touches on Brooklyn’s buddy’s stencil. It’s at this point that they announce that they have to pick up their child from the sitter at 7:30 and they would like to schedule his appointment for another day.

A brief tangent here: It seemed a bit odd that they said they needed to leave, as Will had already informed them the tattoos would take until about 8pm to complete. We remember this because we had another couple come in to get tattooed about five minutes after this couple did, and they left without setting an appointment once they found out an artist wouldn’t be available until 8. Otherwise, we could probably have done their tattoo…

Nevertheless, we had them fill out a deposit slip, which informs all new clients of our deposit policies in case they try any funny business later (and boy DO they!), took an $80 deposit, which is deducted from the price of the scheduled piece, gave them a $100 discount from the price they were going to pay for having Will do the tattoo, as he charges significantly more than any other artist at the shop, and bid them adieu.

Here’s where the wheels fall off.

That Wednesday, the day of the guy’s (who shall go unnamed until he too tries to trash our business online) appointment, 12 minutes after the appointment was scheduled to begin, we get a phone call. It’s Brooklyn on the line and she lets us know she needs to reschedule the appointment.

Ahem.

If you are calling to reschedule your appointment AFTER the appointment was supposed to begin, that’s called MISSING your appointment, and you will most likely forfeit your deposit.

Funnier still: They actually weren’t going to have to forfeit their deposit you see, because Matt had inadvertently locked himself out of the shop while taking out some recently delivered boxes! It’s why we didn’t answer the phone, he was actually waiting outside for Will to bring him another key to the shop.

So what’s the problem you ask?

Well, Brooklyn called the shop the next day and tried to reschedule, we hadn’t checked our messages yet, so we had no idea why they hadn’t shown up, just that they didn’t. While on the phone with her we were trying got figure out if they could come in that evening or maybe if Matt could get them in some other day when Miss Brooklyn couldn’t keep her mouth shut. You see, Kelly had told her that missing an appointment means that she’d lose her deposit and Brooklyn couldn’t contain her frustration long enough for us to try and help her out so she got rude. As a matter of fact, she said that Will was being rude by eating in between tattoos and she decided to take a tone with Kelly that just wouldn’t do.

To whit: If our artists take the time to eat their food while it is fresh it isn’t being rude, it’s just being hungry. If you take offense at that, it’s probably your problem, not ours. It’s routine practice at tattoo shops across the land for artists to eat when they can, sometimes eating quickly in order to get to the next tattoo in a timely fashion. Will finished his meal in less than ten minutes.

We don’t owe you anything if you don’t show up on time for your appointment Brooklyn, but we would have gladly worked with you if you would have allowed us to do so. However, once you decide to personally attack one of us by calling us rude for eating, you’re done. Trying to hurt our business by calling your tattoo ‘fairly nice’ and trying to make it look like you’re doing us a favor by leaving us a 1-star review on Google (you can’t leave a 0 star review) all because you have poor time management skills, an entitlement mentality, and a general disdain for people who eat, well, that’s just being a Knucklehead. Enjoy, dummy!

Good 'Ol Joe

FEBRUARY 17, 2021

In the tattoo business we get to meet a lot of characters. Not bad people mind you, but some interesting folks nonetheless. But some people take the cake and not in a good way. We call those people Knuckleheads. We had previously discontinued the Knucklehead of the Month award out of a desire to promote positivity, what we discovered was that we were only removing a positive public service by reminding people what real assholes look like. So, without further ado:

Joe got tattooed by Deuce back in August-ish. He swung back through for a touch-up in November and liked the finished product so much he scheduled to have another cover-up done in December. But Joe had some issues with his lady you see, and while she showed up for her appointment that they booked together, ol’ Joe no-call, no-showed. SMH. Well, with that sort of behavior comes the forfeiture of the deposit that was left to hold the spot, which is the entire reason we take deposits in the first place, some people just can’t be trusted and since it’s impossible to know who can and can’t be by looking at them, we take deposits from everyone. Just in case.

Here’s where it starts to get asshole-y: Two months after missing his appointment good ol’ Joe saw fit to leave us a negative review online talking about how we aren’t clear on our deposit policy and we’re unprofessional. First, everyone who books an appointment at Lighthouse Tattoo has to read and sign paperwork disclosing our entire deposit policy and how someone can lose that deposit (being a no-call, no-show is at the top of that list), and second, professionalism is a spectrum. This is a tattoo shop, not a mortuary.

  1. Since Joe wasn’t on time to his appointment, Deuce (his artist, try to keep up) called him twice with no answer or call back, and emailed him wondering if he was going to be able to make it. Good ol’ Joe didn’t respond. For that, Joe’s deposit gets paid entirely to Deuce to help offset the $120 he just lost because Joe didn’t show up. You try going to work and making $120 less than usual and see how you feel about it, it ain’t good.

  2. The lack of professionalism Joe is referring to is the fact that Deuce and Will, his fellow artist, had recently taken a motorcycle trip to Key West FL, got pretty smashed every night, and were reminiscing about their recent once-in-a-lifetime vacation together. The conversation at the time was light and entertaining, with Joe commenting about how cool such a trip was (and it was, we strongly recommend it). However, we would contend that this wasn’t unprofessional at all, it was just something to talk about to take our clients’ minds off the discomfort of getting tattooed. This same thing occurs in every tattoo shop everywhere all the time.

It should be clear by now that good ol’ Joe is only mad because he forgot to call us when he knew he wasn’t going to be able to show up for his appointment and is mad because he lost his deposit. Obviously, right?

Here’s the stupid thing: Joe says he missed his appointment because he got the ‘Rona. Well, that gets you an exception with regard to our normal deposit policy, so even if he forgot to let us know (due to getting really sick really quickly) we would have worked with him so he didn’t have to lose his deposit. It’s something that we’ve done on a monthly, if not weekly basis since May. It’s a damn pandemic people, we’re in this together.

The other stupid thing is that instead of contacting us and speaking with us directly, good ol’ Joe just decides to go online and try to hurt our business by publicly talking shit. Even though it’s been TWO MONTHS since he missed his appointment, we could have worked with him. Until, that is, he decides to publicly disparage our business. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me, y’know?

We have enclosed his recommendation as left on Facebook, as well as Will (posting as Crystal Roberts Wood, his wife’s account) and Deuce’s responses. Joe mentioned he is a member of the Iron Order, a group of guys who ride motorcycles together who have a reputation for not understanding how the world works and generally aren’t respected by other bikers, so Will mentions that as well, whilst referring to good ‘ol Joe as a pussy, which it’s Will’s personal belief that’s exactly what he is. A decent person would have called and let us know that they wouldn’t make it. A decent person would be fine with forfeiting a deposit if they forgot to contact us, in order to help cover the artist’s losses due to their own oversight. A decent person would have contacted a business directly in order to negotiate some sort of mutually beneficial deal to continue the relationship. But Joe did what a full grown pussy would do: He cried about it on the internet, all the while re-writing the narrative to absolve himself of any responsibility for his own actions.

That behavior is why he is permanently banned from Lighthouse Tattoo.

Way to go Joe. What a knucklehead.