Ladies and the Tramp Stamp

Carol O’Brien, 43, leans over a round, glass table in her laser hair and tattoo removal studio, Smooth, on 58th Street and Lexington Ave. She points out examples of “tramp stamps” in a tattoo magazine, hoping that the women who wear them decide to look her up one day, agreeing to pay $400 for each of 10-20 removal sessions.

The calendar over the table reads “April 25” (it is April 15). O’Brien’s light auburn hair is vintage Cathy Rigby as Peter Pan. Along with a pink knit sweater, black pants and velvet orthopedic shoes, she wears a matching pearl necklace and earrings set with a Gucci watch. She flips through pages of dragons, dolphins and koi fish designs with burnt-rose-colored acrylic nails. Today she wears a white lab coat and a nametag, even though she sees all clients herself. Eight years after opening Smooth, business is going well – later that afternoon 50 Cent will come in for another laser session; the rapper and soon-to-be film star no longer wants to endure four hours in the make-up chair to cover his extensive body art.

Although O’Brien admits to an unruly adolescence, sometimes she can’t understand what her 30-something “tramp stamped” clients were thinking. “You’re not in a tribe—we’re not in Africa,” O’Brien said. “Stable guys are looking for stable women to have a family. That sign of rebellion now is absolutely the wrong message to be sending.”

She cringes at the idea of a woman at the hospital ready to deliver her baby, but unable to earn the doctor’s respect because he keeps staring at her tattoo.

Removal treatments are more costly and more excruciating then the tattoos themselves – the lower back is the source of many nerve endings and not a lot of fat, plus the laser hovers right over the bone. But some women make it a priority and commit to the cycle of treatments. In 2004, Spice Girl Geri Halliwell laid to rest the black panther on her lower back after six years.

Over the course of several weeks (if the client can afford and withstand however many it takes), O’Brien uses progressively smaller laser heads that deliver increasingly higher amounts of energy. On the first visit, O’Brien wields a tool the size of an erasure to heat the ink molecules under the skin until they explode and dissipate. Right before finishing a job, O’Brien gets the deepest, darkest, oldest ink out with a laser resembling a pen point. The results are mixed – some clients leave O’Brien completely unmarked, others with what looks like white etching, bruises or even an overly diluted water color painting on the skin.

Articulate, well-educated Jane Hollister1 thinks women could learn to embrace the “tramp stamp” label. In 2001, as a freshman at the University of Chicago, Hollister got a tattoo where her spinal cord begins. The current New York University graduate student and editor at the Penguin Group now displays seven total designs on her moonlight-colored skin. Each represents “renewal, rebirth and regeneration.”

Today Hollister evokes images of Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s – tailored black dress, upswept chestnut hair, delicate petite frame. Her coat and flats match her dress; the outfit accented with a pearly watch and crimson scarf. Over drinks at the West Village bar, Daddy-O, she describes her back tattoo and when she gesticulates, flashes of wrist ink come into view. Hollister spent six months drawing versions of her “tramp stamp”—an “ouroboros” (a snake eating its own tail). She got the tattoo shortly after her parents divorced.

The year Hollister decided on this tattoo, she also decided to start stripping. Too young to bartend and with school bills mounting, she felt she had no other options. Here in New York, she continues to work at a strip club twice a week. Hollister says this choice, like her tattoos, lets her exercise control over her own body.

“Men have always been allowed to have a certain attitude and a certain sense of humor when it comes to their libidos and sexual desires, while women are supposed to treat their bodies like sacred vessels,” Hollister said. “My worth is not centered in the idea that I’m keeping myself virginal and flowery and saving myself for someone.”

Hollister regards the “tramp stamp” label as standard male-chauvinism, but insists she and her peers can reclaim the derogatory term so that men cannot use it to separate the nice girls from the naughty girls.

The tradition of feminists regaining ownership of formerly offensive language goes way back. Lisa Jervis and Andi Zeisler founded Bitch magazine in the mid-90s, asserting that women could take pride in the “word that rhymes with witch.” Inga Muscio argued in her 2000 book Cunt: A Declaration of Independence that women could even revel in the c-word, which most still consider taboo. Recently, the team behind Jezebel.com emulated their feminist sisters by rescuing that disparaging term from male critics. An ongoing movement continues to rid “feminism” itself of a lingering connotation of radicalism and negativity.

Carol Sternhell, an NYU journalism professor who founded the undergraduate women’s studies program in the College of Arts and Sciences (before it became integrated into the Gender and Sexuality Studies major), encourages women to find new, empowering meanings for insults of the past. While she understands the rationale for taking ownership of “bitch,” she does not see the positive in “tramp.”

“‘Bitch’ is someone who’s tough and is going to stand up for what she believes in, but ‘tramp’ is only about sex,” Sternhell said.

According to Sternhell, although “slut” is often used as a synonym for “tramp,” she believes that women could reclaim that in a valuable way. Sternhell says “slut” simply means having pleasure, as in “I’m a slut for ice cream.” But Leora Tanenbaum, author of Slut! Growing Up Female with a Bad Reputation, makes a case for society finally retiring this word, since reclaiming it could inadvertently lead to more “slut-bashing.”

“I know that some women like to use ‘slut’ ironically, but too few people are in on the joke,” Tanenbaum wrote in an e-mail. “I would say that ‘tramp’ would be a better term to try to recuperate because it’s so dated it’s kind of campy. Enough time has passed since ‘tramp’ was used in the way that ‘slut’ and ‘ho’ are used today that there is some humor in it, so I think that more people would recognize that using it as a badge of honor is a form of critique.”

In a table at the front of her book, Tanenbaum compiles a list of 28 “Negative Expressions for a Sexually Active Woman,” including “whore,” “hussy,” “vamp” “wench” and yes, “tramp.” Tanenbaum struggled to come up with any corresponding descriptions for men. That’s because our culture traditionally idolizes men who sleep around. Tanenbaum’s “Positive Expressions For a Sexually Active Man” mentions “studs,” “players,” “Don Juans,” “Romeos” and “stallions.”

People assume they know something about a woman’s libido based on whether she sports a “tramp stamp.” No equivalent “stallion medallion” exists among men. “Stallion medallion” does not even work as an adequate analogy since “stallion” is complimentary, unlike “tramp.” The presence of the “tramp stamp” expression reinforces a truth that men and women must live by different sets of rules.

Men can get away with calling a woman out on her “tramp stamp” because they are expected to be crude, immature, goofballs. But for women to really achieve equality, they need to demand respect in all situations, even at happy hour. The least women could do is to refrain from using unnecessarily derogatory language when talking about one another (better yet – stop talking behind each other’s backs).

To any girl considering a lower back tattoo, know that going under the needle invites the world to criticize. No matter how much you regret your decision one day, and all the days after that, “tramp stamp” sympathy is hard to come by.

1 Name has been changed