When we move in circles of tattooed people or those associated with the industry, nobody asks such questions. A tattoo must be done according to art and look good on the body, it may - but doesn't have to - conceal a story.

At some point, something happened that provoked us to make the decision to get it done. Choosing a studio, a tattoo artist requires preparations, so we have everything thought out, we look for arguments "for" from family and surroundings, until we ourselves start to believe that we must have it! And about the first one, we can talk for hours. The next ones arise on occasion, often just because we liked them - and that's it.

Tattooing has a long history, and over the years, it has acquired meanings that served as information carriers about the tattooed person. No matter how much we try to avoid the ideologization of tattoos, there are motifs that carry a specific and established symbol. We have religious, nautical, tribal, and animal designs, as well as those infamous ones reserved for prison tattoos. Even religious tattoos themselves are complex phenomena, desired in some countries and prohibited in others; and although they are chosen by adherents of a specific system of values, how do we understand the fact of having them when that faith clearly prohibits permanent marks on the body?

The richness of symbols in tattoos clearly gives us room to develop the topic. However, remember to check whether the motif chosen by you - perhaps entirely by chance - does not have a meaning that could be stigmatizing or simply inconsistent with your intention!