We actually had an interesting thing about the healing period. When I finally said ok it was the beginning of summer and we told her sheād be out the whole swimming season with fresh pierced ears. She thought over that one for a week until she said she still wanted it. That was a big point for me to realize she really did want them.
As for the influence, I understand that we donāt want kids doing it because theyāre told they āhave toā. Iāve heard someone ask a girl once why she didnāt have her ears pierced and ādidnāt she want to look like a girlā. Thatās obviously the influence youāre talking about. It gets more murky if they want it because their friends or family has it. That kind of influence occurs in teens and adults too. Something like āall my friends have their cartilage piercedā. Itās hard to say if they want it on their own or theyāre told to do it by peers etc. This gets into defining consent and other difficult subjects but I will say that I would draw the line at someone that understands the process and still wants it without being pressured. We all are influenced on our decisions every time we make them. Regardless of their reasons they have decided they want it now.
The material does play a big role there, and the slight oval shape on the internal side of the base also helps a lot fight the bacterial build-up.
Itās the same thing at my home country.
Even a bit worst in one aspect:
Itās forbidden by law to do any piercings on anyone below 18 years old.
Althoughā¦
Not even with parental consent. I find it outrageous that a parent is not allowed to consent with its 16yo who wants a nose stud or a helix piercing. Thereās just so much wrong with thatā¦ but this is another topic.
Piercing guns are not considered ādoing a piercingā, so they, and only they, are allowedā¦
you can still pierce girls lobes, even as young as 1 hour hold. But boys lobes are still considered piercings in most places.
Those double standards just drag everything backwards!
Glad to hear it though!
so many places would not pass the quick cash.
Thatās the tricky bit.
That was actually a brilliant approach!!
Well played!
Thatās pretty much the most stupid law on piercings I ever read aboutā¦
I had my first two piercings done when I was 16 and 17 years old, so Iām fine with doing stuff on well-informed teens with parental consentā¦
And differentiating between boys and girls here ist just ridiculous
Really agree with you - she realized that she had to make some sacrifices for it, and it was still worth it. Nice idea to see how serious she was
My body mod artists does piercings for young children (doesnāt use a gun) and he really changed my mind about the whole thing. We talked it over after one of my installs and I reflexively felt that children canāt consent, but he had some good points. He does a similar routine to what locutus mentioned where he asks the kid separate from the parents, but if they agree he goes through with it. He said he feels the bar for consenting to something pretty reversible like a common piercing was pretty low, so children are qualified. He also mentioned harm reduction, because heāll do it safely and if he doesnāt theyāll just go to the mall down the street and have it done with a gun. Iām inclined to enable anyone to do anything they want with their own body, so this worked for me.
I donāt have anyā¦external piercings? Just implants. I did have a question about the tools. If you donāt use a gun I figured most artists would use some kind of metal clip with an alignment hole and a thick needle. When my partner had her 3 helix spikes done though our guy used what looked like a 10cm long length of wire that was about 1.5mm thick, freehand. It was a dull copper color. What was that? Does anyone know the alloy composition? Pure copper would be too soft.
I am a firm believer that everyone should be allowed to do what the heck they want with their bodies, given that they understand the consequences and donāt harm others on doing so.
Up to a certain age, kids are literally unable to understand consequences. (check the āMarshmallow testā if you fancy), although that might class them as infants, I still think itās a good point to make.
That said, my points with children being able to consent or not has nothing to do with believing they are unable to consent.
After that infant age, there is another stage where kids are still behaving reflexively, so āseparating them from their parentsā looks like a good Idea, but never makes any difference:
Kids have low filters, so if a kid does not want something, it will be obvious no matter if they are in front of the parents or not.
If you separate the kid to askā¦ if they are already autonomous enough to tell you they do not want itā¦ they also understand that telling you in private, and then you refusing, is the same thing as telling you in front of their parents. Kids are smarter than most people think and they can see the obvious fallacy there.
up to the tween stage most of what a kid āwantsā is actually what the parents want (or what they believe will make the parents happy). only when they get through (in most cases, past) their tweens (11-13) is that they will start wanting things for themselves. before that itās mostly reflective
Given the last pointā¦ I then wonderā¦ By piercing a 9 yr oldā¦ am I really helping that kid do what it wanted??
That sounds like it makes senseā¦ but there is another issue with this logic.
The piercing experience might seem reversible, but not exactly the case:
First, If you wear a piercing long enough you will never get rid of the scar or actual hole for the rest of your life. And I had my fair share of patients (I actually graduated as a Psychologist and had mostly late teen patients before giving up on the career for unrelated reasons) that resented those.
Also, there are piercings you might want to do later which you canāt do because you had another piercing done there before. (similar to doing a silly tattoo on a small part of your back that will later prevent you from getting a backpiece that you want)
And lastly, depending on the kid, itās age and the parental situationā¦ The piercing in itself might be reversible, but the emotional scarring is not. Even if you apply pain mitigation, the healing process might be another world.
That one is his strongest argument. And I totally agree with that!
but thenā¦
I gotta bring back one of @Comaās great arguments:
If a piercer does something and that fucks up and ends in the media, the whole body-mod community can suffer the consequences, leading to stricter laws and less freedom for everyone else.
So picture this scenario:
That kid has a bad healing, or an unknown allergy, and the parents are relapseā¦ so we end up with such a bad reaction and bad aftercare that the kid ends up in ERā¦ someone in the family gets outraged and has some media contactsā¦ (might even be someoneās mother-in-law who is blaming the other parent for it and escalate things in spiteā¦ whatever)
Next thing, we have a PR shitstorm. Quite easy to spin the āevil piercers ruining childrenās livesā angle hereā¦
So in order to avoid one kid from getting a piercing done in a hair salon, now we get thousands of people who cannot find people to help them express themselves, because it became illegal.
Slightly exaggerated, but possible nevertheless (and I had seen similar scenarios almost happen quite a few times).
Itās the old ethical dilemma:
If you spare the life of a man who then immediately kills 3 peopleā¦ how responsible are you for those 3 deaths?
Derraily much? XD
In short, I do agree with your friendās arguments, and I donāt judge him badly. He gave it some thought (which is more than most people do), so kudos!
I just add a couple of steps beyond that logic, and probably just because I also have quite some experience with another field (Psychology) that piercers are not expected to have. So I canāt judge him for that.
You sure overestimate piercers!
There are 2 main techniques:
āAmericanā: You have a needle which is usually slightly larger than the piercing, and then you place the piercing immediately behind it, potentially threading it inside the needle.
āBritishā: You have a cateter needle which is the same diameter needle as the piercing. You pierce without the piercing. then remove the needle, leaving the cateter through the hole, then stick the piercing a bit inside the cateter, and use the cateter as a guide.
then you might either place a metal tube behind the pierced area to āreceiveā the needle (common for the lobe, nostril or penis, for example)
Or just some specialist ātweezersā to hold both sides of the pierced area without risk to your fingers getting in the way (lobes, nipples, tongueā¦). Sometimes the tweezer might even have a railing tube system, most commonly used for septum, although so many piercers have never even seen it before (and that shocks me)ā¦
I was initially trained using cannula/catheter needles but did learn the American way too. Dunno if itās just cuz I was used to it, but it did kinda prefer using catheter needles for most things! Alsoā¦ was there a time when those American style needles were re-sterilized and re-used or was that just myth?
I also prefer the Catether approach.
It might cause the whole process to be a bit slower, and you do have 2 passes (needle first, then jewel)ā¦
But you have a much higher risk of misaligning the jewel from the needle, on the american way, which might absolutely fuck up a piercing, leaving the pierced with a hole and no jewelry thereā¦
And I already saw that happening on an Ampallang (male genital piercing) twiceā¦ (not me performing)
Also, I dislike the American approach becauseā¦
ā¦That was not a myth.
Even today, many studios stil re-utilize the needles. they were way too expensive to throw away on the nineties, and even now-a-days many studios opt to save some pretty pennies.
Especially if they also misalign the needle and you end up with a piercing poking the hole from inside, getting everything bleeding and swelling faster than you can appreciateā¦
Iāve witnessed my fair share of steel needle horror stories to appreciate that technique!
Alsoā¦
Kinda sad-funny that Brittain was such an exponent in body modification on the 70s through the late 90s, to the point that the most widespread method is commonly referred as āthe British methodāā¦
Yet now UK is literally the worst country to get any body mod done in the entire non-arabic world. (not sure if thatās the correct term in English, btw)
Yikes. Definitely had the catether approach used for my apadravya, but boy I can imagine it being horrific to have gotten it done the American way and having it come out janky because of it
An American style piercing that goes well is better than a British one that goes well (less swelling, faster, less pain)
But an American piercing that goes wrong is hideous, while a British one that goes wrong is usually very manageable.
And American applications do go bad waaaaaaaaaaay more often as well!
Actually, most people do that by accident in the industry.
It depends a lot on the placement and the person.
That is quite a common technique actually, and if the skin is stretchy enough youāll most likely not have any issues.
Personally Iām not a big fan, because I like to let a fresh wound bleed out and I like to allow for all the secretions to flow out (which is harder on a plugged hole).
That might give the impression of a worst healing process but itās actually the opposite.
Althoughā¦ that trick is used quite often. Sometimes Iāve chosen that due to some very particular scenario as well.
The biggest problem with piercing guns is that they canāt be properly cleaned, though no part of the actual gun goes through your ear, any blood that gets on it can only be wiped off, but the gun can not be sterilized.
- mine / most high quality labrets are like this, more of a football shape than a flat disk
