Tattooed Clones

I also want to share Byung-Chul Han’s observations about tattoos.

Traditionally, tattoos meant belonging to a community and a hierarchy. Army tats, for instance. Or prison tats. They inscribe you into an existing order.

But for a neoliberal subject, tattoos are about expressing that all-important authentic self. They have no symbolic power because a symbol has to relate to something outside of the self.

“The neoliberal hell of the same is populated with tattooed clones,” says the philosopher. “Everyone carries their own private space wherever they go.” But instead of retreating into that private space when the public life becomes a bit too much, people turn their private spaces towards the world, and we are left with a bunch of competing private spaces and nothing remotely like an actual public space.

I hope people understand that this isn’t a dig at individuals with tattoos. This is about how all of us relate to the world. We are all neoliberal subjects. Nobody is a very special cookie who is immune. To the contrary, the need to be a very special cookie is the most neoliberal thing in existence.