Question:
She held her arm at the elbow, forearm facing up. With the black arm
of the machine in hand, Anne Pilat traced the tattoo on
She's forearm. The laser flashed.
"How does it feel?" Pilat asked.
"It hurts," Maria said. She didn't pull her arm back from the laser
wand.
Maria wore a black T-shirt decorated with "2000 Bebe" in sparkling
letters. Her mother sat in a nearby chair. She had her graying hair
pulled back in a braided, looped ponytail.
Everyone wore the protective eye gear required with laser use. The
tinted glasses and the black arm of the machine made the scene seem
bizarre, as if Pilat were performing some futuristic ritual.
Maria held out her right hand, where a tattoo marked the space between
her thumb and index finger.
"These hurt a lot," Pilat said. "When it's close to a bone without much
flesh, it's more painful." Maria concurred.
"I want a better job," Maria said, explaining why she was having her
tattoos removed. "Later on when I have kids, I don't want the kids to
have tattoos. I was a gang relater. I'm not with that no more."
She gripped her hips and moaned. Still, she said getting a tattoo is 20
times more painful.
"We're almost done," Pilat said. They weren't. Maria had tattoos on her
shoulder, hip, a finger on her left hand and both ankles.
"Mas?" her mother asked incredulously.
"She only knew I had one tattoo. She didn't know I had so many," Maria
said. A friend told her and a girlfriend about the Tattoo Removal
Clinic at La Clinica and they decided to sign up. This was her second
session.
"Last time she was jumping all over the place. You're doing good,"
Pilat assured her. After the treatment, the area around each tattoo was
red.
"So you have probably 12 more times," Pilat said.
"How many?" Maria asked.
Once a month, the pediatrics department at La Clinica turns into a
tattoo removal clinic that is part of Alameda County's Project New
Start. Clients between the ages of 18 and 25 come every six to eight
weeks; it can take a year to 18 months to have their tattoos removed.
The laser beam breaks the color into smaller particles that are
excreted through urine. With each treatment, the tattoo fades.
"It's our small part. As tattoos go away, they become more a part of
the mainstream and move away from the self-destructive behavior of
gangs," explains Dr. John Pescetti, who volunteers to run La Clinica's
clinic.
The process is expensive. Private practitioners charge between $300 to
$500 per square inch per treatment. Participants in Project New Start
receive the treatments in exchange for 50 hours of community service.
They also have to be working, in school or taking care of small
children at home. They are assigned a mentor to help them stay on
course to change their lives.
Removing a tattoo may be symbolic, but it's a proxy for the process of
pulling away from a gang and starting a new life. A person has to be
committed to stick with the painful procedure over several months.
Countywide, an estimated 1,000 clients have gone through the experience
since the program started 10 years ago.
Pescetti calls program founder Adriana Alvarado the mother hen, "the
shepherd. She finds the clients and the clients find her."
Alvarado laughed at the description but grew serious when she talked
about the young people getting their tattoos removed.
"I've seen an immediate effect when the tattoos are gone. They can go
back to society without being viewed as an outcast. When they first
come in they hide their hands. If they have something on their neck,
they have clothing covering it. I watch their demeanor change, how they
hold themselves as the tattoos fade," she said.
She started the program after witnessing the difficulty of one young
man who was in and out of juvenile hall. He had tattoos on his hands
and forearms.
"He asked how he could change his life with those. People were always
going to think badly of him."
She observes the same things as other violence-prevention advocates -
young people who have dropped out of school, have no marketable skills
and extremely low self-esteem.
"Literacy is a factor. They can't read or write beyond where they
stopped in school. They say the schools are run down, there is not even
any toilet paper. No one cares. It's a systemic problem. They don't
have a support system with family. They go to the next thing that seems
good to them. Gangs are a friendship base circle," Alvarado said.
Given those cards, if someone wants to change, Alvarado said she wants
to help them.
"I'm a firm believer in minimizing as many barriers as possible to them
changing. Whatever keeps a kid from moving forward, we need to address
it. There are too many kids with lost opportunities. If that's what
Miss Shepherd means, (referring to Pescetti's nickname), then I guess
he's right."
But like most people in her line of work, she's experienced some
heart-breaking losses. In a 1 1/2-month period this year, two clients
were gunned down and killed.
"They were both making huge strides to change their lives," she said.
One had moved out of the county. The other had completed training in
carpentry and dry wall and joined the union. Both were killed when they
returned to Oakland, probably by rival gang members who hadn't
forgotten their pasts.
"We pulled other young people together after the murders. We mentioned
everyone's safety is at stake. We tell them they have to change their
attire. Move. Change their associations. It's sad but they can't go
back to their old neighborhoods." From:
http://www.orovillemr.com/news/bayarea/ci_4195256
Thankfully, my tattoo choices have never had a negative impact on my
life - so far as I'm aware - and, from the article, I'm more inclined
to suspect that self-destructive behavior, a lack of a diploma,
possessing no marketable skills, and having low self-esteem are all
greater dangers than any tattoo or the scrunched up look of some member
of so-called society. That $300 to $500 (per square inch?) might be
better spent on a U-Haul to move AWAY from a bullet-ridden neighborhood
or a tutor to help them learn how to read.
I understand the danger of gang-related crime, however, imo, that
danger is less about tattoos and more about associations and, yeah,
frigging bullets.
Otoh, if someone decides to remove some ink for whatever reason that's
certainly their choice.
Any infomation?
Answer:
- I think that it's wonderful that there are selfless people out there
dedicated to improving the lives of youth. I love the tattoos that I
have too, they reflect my values, my family, my spirituality. However,
if I had been involved in a gang lifestyle where I got tattoos, I would
certainly be grateful to have them removed. Regardless of what
"society" thought, I imagine that those tattoos would haunt me of a
probably violent and degrading past for the rest of my life. Kudos to
that clinic!
- Wonderful perspective, rocket girl. Enjoyed your words. And, if I
haven't already, welcome to rec.arts.bodart.
You added your comment at the top or above the original post. I have no
problem with reading things that way, but I've seen people comment
negatively on posting that way. Some call it top-posting (as your post
appears at the top, right?). Standard convention typically recommends
bottom-posting (or placing your comments at the bottom).
You're posting from Google groups, right? The following image may be of
assistance:
That's an image, just a picture, but as you post from Google just click
on the "show options" link and NOT the "Reply" link and then add your
comment at the bottom of the post. (How confusing and unnecessary was
THAT?
