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You know how the song goes, “tat-tat-tatted up, tat-tat-tatted up,” when I was younger I really used to like that song. However, as I age and mature with each pressing day, I can’t help but think about the coonery that is with our black celebs and their hideous body art.

I mean you have rappers like Gucci Mane who can barely close his mouth without his tongue playing peek-a-boo through his under bite walking around with a tattoo of a ice cream cone on his entire right cheek. Then you have R&B singers like Fantasia walking ’round getting a married man’s name tatted on her collar, and then NBA players like Kenyon Martin getting rapper and ex-girlfriend Trina’s lips tattooed on his neck and then trying to cover it up with what looks like a McDonald’s Big Mac’ after their break-up. Lest we not forget Young LA following behind Gucci Mane and his stupidity and getting a duck tattooed on his cheek.

Our fascination with tattoos is definitely not new, but it seems more like a fad than a true art form as of late. In my opinion, the actual art form of the tattoo has gotten lost somewhere along the road. I believe this fascination started on the west coast with rapper Tupac  (in the event of getting mass tats all over the body, or at least showing them ) and then East coast rappers like Eve and singers like Faith Evans and migrated South with Master P and No Limit, Three Six Mafia and The Cash Money Millionaires. It seemed as if more athletes began to follow suit with this new obsession with a massive amount of tattoos as well. Then you had Lil Wayne start getting all these crazy face tats, which I initially thought was to cover up his unattractiveness (but we won’t go there), which in turn opened the doors to a new form of idiocy and started a brand new fad.

Personally, I equate the whole tattoo fad with the gold and platinum grill fad, when there seems to be such a massive following of these different celebs following suit and eventually you get the regular “average Joe” type of people with regular 9-5’s trying to hop on the bandwagon. What these people don’t realize though is that these types of things generally work out more in your favor if you carry some type of status or clout or at least can write their own checks. Don’t get me wrong though, I actually like tattoos…when they truly have a deeper meaning than what meets the eye and not just something representing something for the moment.

But, I can say that like the whole grill fad, this too shall pass because nobody stays young forever and these people have to get old, gray, and wrinkly. More sooner than later that cross on Weezy’s  face will begin to look like the letter ‘T’ and that ice-cream cone on Gucci’s face will begin to melt while that  “Burrr” going across his cheek will start to look more like “Blurrr,” while Young LA’s duck will soon be walking in it’s own little puddle on his face.

While I find this fascination to be a fad, I’m curious to find out your take on it.

So tell me, tattoos, are they just a fad or truly an art?

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The grand return of the Melanin Awards amplifies and honors the finest Black-owned beauty brands with honest reviews, and discusses the evolution of beauty in Hip-Hop culture.