Is Body Piercing Or Getting a Tattoo a Morally Neutral Act?
To permanently or semi-permanently mutilate the body without a good reason is wrong. Sure, kidney transplants from live donors involve mutilation, but most would say that the reason is a good one, to save a life. As long as free and informed consent is given, it doesn't harm the donor in any serious way.
If it's your son or daughter who would like a tattoo, you have to ask why they want one. Simply to get a tattoo for reasons of vanity or to fit in with a certain crowd are probably not good reasons for anyone. (It is common for those in the military to have tattoos.) Having your ears pierced, however, is socially acceptable in our American culture, even for men (my twenty-two-year-old son has had his pierced). Tattoos that do not disfigure the human body, especially the face, seem okay as well. (My eighteen-year-old son has two tattoos on his arms.) More invasive and face-altering body piercings do not.
Nonetheless, even though cultural factors play a large role here, serious questions of a moral nature must be asked by anyone thinking of getting a tattoo or body piercing. Here are six of them for consideration.
First, could the money I am going to spend on a tattoo or minor body piercing be better spent on something else more essential for me or others?
Second, are there any risks to my health posed by these procedures? Ask yourself if the basic goods of health and bodily integrity are at stake with these actions to modify or enhance the human body (as they can be, for example, with breast augmentation surgery and bariatric surgery).
Third, what are the possible effects on my future employment if potential employers frown on or ban tattoos because they believe it will hurt their business or for other reasons?
Fourth, what does my tattoo or body piercing say about my moral character as a person? In the recent past, most people who had tattoos in our society were members of gangs or in prison. Even though the stigma of having a tattoo has largely worn off, still, for many people, tattoos bring a host of negatives. These negatives could very well increase — and the tattoo would be morally wrong — if it is sexually explicit, glorifies violence, is satanic in nature, or has a message that is crass or crude. If this is the case, then rather than communicate God's love, the tattoo could lead others into sin and thus seriously compromise the holiness and evangelical witness to which all Christians are called.
Fifth, unless I am able to get my tattoo removed later on if I so desire (a painful and expensive procedure in most cases), what is it going to look like on my body when I'm old? The question of beauty and aesthetics is not only for later in life but also for right now — although most people probably don’t want to think about a tattoo grown old!
Many see in the increased phenomenon of tattooing and body piercing a glorification of "thug life" as well as a de-beautifying of our culture, even though those who get tats see them quite differently, even as an art form. Of course, a person could also rightly get a tattoo to cover up a birthmark or other bodily "defect," somewhat similar to victims of breast cancer who have breast reconstruction surgery after a mastectomy. In the latter case, the doctor is correcting in human nature what disease had corrupted.
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