Kirby ends his article by saying, that his interviews changed his views on tattoos. What he once thought could ruin a person's chances of landing a distinguished job, or that a person with a tattoo is a criminal or belongs to a gang. Is now seen as a "canvas" that's used to tell a story that their words cannot say, or some people just get tattoos to memorialize a loved one's passing. He now admires the designs he sees inked onto people's bodies. Most people agreed with Kirby's points. .
I did some interviews of a few people with tattoos. I wanted to see if people's views and reasons for getting their tattoos have changed since 2006. I interviewed 10 people from ages 19-47 and asked questions to see what the purpose of people getting their tattoos was. Of the 10 people I interviewed, 3 young females' ages 22, 20 and 19 one male from Chicago and the other 6 were males 30-47 year olds from the United States. For my survey, I asked people face to face questions and texted some friends about their views on tattoos and how they affected them. From my interviews, I found that the reasons for getting tattoos have changed tremendously from Kirby's findings. I found it interesting when Kirby interviewed a girl named Jodie, who was "the most heavily inked". Jodie was going through emotional problems and used tattoos to escape from her life pains. In my research, I found that over half of the people I interviewed had emotional attachments to their tattoos that in some way helped them release their pain (interview). Kirby's point about Jodie supports my research (Survey).
Another idea that I found interesting in Kirby's article was the fact that in the 20th-century tattoos meant that you belonged to a world populated by crooks"(Kirby 694). Of the 10 people, I interviewed 2 males got their tattoos for gang related purposes (interview). They got them to signify their brother hoods of their gangs.
