Tattoo. What a loaded word it is, rife with associations to goons, goofs, bikers, tribal warriors, carnival artists, drunken sailors and floozies. – Jon Anderson, “Epidermal Dalis,” Chicago Tribune, 6 October 1994

There is no “underground” community, no dark den of drunken sailors initiating themselves into manhood via cheap, ill-conceived exercises in bodily perforation; it’s just a group of people who delight in using their bodies as billboards. – Joanne McCubrey, “Walking Art: Tattoos,” Mountain Democrat Weekend magazine, 199

A man without tattoos is invisible to the Gods. – Iban Proverb, as quoted on vanishingtattoo.com