Does anyone else want to kill themselves after seeing people walk around with giant holes in their ear lobes because they think its stylish/rebellious/cool/hip/fashionable/radicle/out of this world/cowabunga dude?

I think it's disgusting. Why. Why do people do these things to their bodies?

Anyone else have conservative values about body manipulation in my generation? Anyone else "dig me"?

My girlfriend had her ears gauged a little bit but she tried to expand them a little bit more this fall. Ended up getting infected and she had to stop gauging them completely.

Made my day.

Can you pass along a message: "HAW-HAW!" just like Nelson from the simpsons?

Something tells me that you really should get out more.

I have my ears stretched to 6 gauge. I like the look despite those that don't.

I also think it's disgusting looking. I wouldn't say anything about it though. If people want to mutilate themselves like that, ain't my business.

I'm the only femme I know without pierced ears. While some of the bigger gauges startle me a bit, I'm fairly used to seeing them, and I do consider some ear adornments to be tasteful or even pretty... I've just never felt even the smallest motivation to jab holes in otherwise perfectly healthy flesh. :-/

I do consider it absolutely revolting the amount of societal pressure that gets put on many little girls to get their ears pierced. Several of my aunts tried on different occasions to get me to sit in the piercing chair when we went holiday shopping without Mum present, and they had to go home disappointed about it. I'm pretty sure Mum herself was ambivalent to whether I got them or not, after about the fifth time she tried to persuade me (at which point I was a preteen and suggested that the leap from ear-piercing to nose and navel wasn't that significant... if she felt like opening that can of worms... which she didn't).

I don't really give a **** about how people look so long as they're kind & don't smell too bad.

Anything larger than about half an inch starts looking kind of gross. But as mentat said as long as you don't smell too bad it does not really bother me.

I don't really imagine that fellow smells terribly good. :-/

I think it's ok, as long as they're not big..
Like this is a about as big as they can get before I start thinking it's gross.

Face tattoos..thats another thing..why...your chances of being hired are so reduced

I'm all for "Let people dress the way they want cause its not actually that big of a deal"

Most kids who get them do it just to for I to the "hardcore" scene. Never was my thing, but then again You wouldn't be able to look at me and tell that I listen to really heavy music either. To each their own but when your ears are so stretched that they look like a cats ******* without the plugs, it might be time to give it a rest.

Who the hell cares?

People try to get into groups all the time. When they're young, get into high school, get a job etc. This is because somehow we feel more comfortable when we can identify ourselves with a group of people. The fact that you don't like this means you want to be identified with a certain group of people as much as people who gauge their ears. In other words: you're doing the same thing. The moment you don't give a **** about how people look but judge them for who they are, you stand above this.

I see where you are going with this. But I have a friend who actively wears gauges and another one who used to but they closed back up. Believe me, I tell him how disgusting I think it is. It's not that I don't want to be associated with certain types of people. My collection of friends is suprisingly unorganized. It's just that I can't see why in someones right mind would they want to stretch out their ear lobes like that. I mean, as the 2nd poster said, what about infection too? Why. Why do people feel they need to stand out physically.

But the people who don't care are also in a group. Fail.

Because it's a way for them to express themselves. Get over yourself.

I am over myself, that's why I don't punch giant holes in my ear for attention.

Have you considered that these people who do extreme things to their body only do it because they are making up for their personalities short comings?

Edit: re infection, small ones can happen, but if you properly clean and care for them (ie anti-bacterial soap and saline soaks daily while they heal) they're liable to heal well in direct proportion to your responsibility and general hygiene.

Yeah, I'm completely grossed out by people who manipulate their bodies. Piercings, tattoos, dying their hair, wearing makeup, working out, eating healthy, &c. In fact if you do anything beyond drinking breastmilk and wallowing in a crib for the rest of your life, I find that manipulation of your natural body and course of development completely disgusting. Who's with me? [Oh wait, babies smell terrible :/]

Why do people wear clothes or get their hair cut/styled? Isn't wearing clothes unnatural and gross?
It is a fascinating anthropological axiom that- even in cultures who don't/didn't wear clothes- every culture has endemic [and often evolving] means of self-ornamentation.

Except for the dark ages and the early 1900s (before which it was a conservative value), piercings of many kinds have been the nearly-universal human status quo (from Julius Caesar's nipple piercings, the Pharoah's naval ring, the queen of Bavaria wearing nipple rings as another ornament in the plunging-neckline era) and often a mark of nobility (easy way to show off wealth for instance), not the rebellious exception. Even in the Bible, eg nose rings were highly attractive on respectable women.

Before you object "this is just about gauging", I wanted to bring up these examples and ask the question: at what point does it start to disgust you? Is the only thing you object to really well-gauged ears? Where do you draw the line? a quarter inch, half an inch, an inch?

Personally I only object to body-mods if people try to explain them to me ad nauseum (eg they're a hipsterzombie). If there's a compelling story or journey associated with something, excellent, I'd probably be into hearing it. However if (as I see on OkCupid from time to time) you spend more time talking about your tattoo/piercings than yourself, I probably already hate both of you.

That said, I have 8 ear piercings myself so far, three of them are gauged small (10 and two 12s) which is nice on the lower lobes since I can just thread dangling earrings through the eyelets instead of swapping them out if I want to wear something else). I would never gauge my ears very large (ie more than an inch probably) since I'd always imagine them ending up getting caught on something, but I can find varying gauges very striking and/or attractive on people.

But my real question is, why even start a thread about it? Are you trying to reassure yourself that you're not the only one with sensibilities, to create a conversation to coalesce and reinforce your intolerances? What are you actually hoping to gain by finding people with similar values? The marriage pool here?


Edit:


Any number of reasons. One is that people take pride in their bodies and their experiences. Some consider their body as a framework/canvas for expression, as an artwork that they can develop through their entire lives. (eg I dated a gal who had a backpiece tattoo that she'd been gradually evolving and expanding for about 6 years). It wasn't really until the Puritan conquest of America (and the Dark Ages before, when even bathing was considered basically sinful due to pride) that the idea that you shouldn't be proud of your body or individuate at all was really popularized.



For example? Please, I want specifics. Just asking a rhetorical question does not in any way lend the expected answer credence. Does wearing polos and khakis and no piercings imply that you /don't/ have personality short-comings? Cos I've met a lot of dudebros and frat boys that lead me to question that premise.

This is a logical structure where the overlap between two opposing AT LEAST SOME groups (ie people who mod their bodies a lot who don't have personality short comings and those that do) can prove that NOT ALL body modders have personality short comings, and it's pretty likely that the ratio of those who do and don't isn't so different from the ratio of non-body-modders with personality short-comings who exhibit their maladaption by playing violent Star Wars games and posting on Star Wars gaming forums for attention or the like (which in no way demonstrates that all people who play violent Star Wars games have personality short comings).

Yeah because there's scientific proof for that. :sarcasm:

You just hate it when people are different, apparently.

Get over yourself.

Who cares, why does it matter.. just saying

You certainly have a very "I'm better than you" mentality.

I'm trying to understand why. Let's take this person for example:



What possible good could come from this? People will claim he is just trying to express himself. How is this expressing something? Why can't his personaility be expressive enough to get his point across? Is this rebellion or something? Is he suppose to go into a job interview with these in and then let his ears do the talking? You can't even take these out either for a job interview like a normal piercing.

If you can explain to me the logic in this, please do now, I really do what to understand, maybe I am missing something crucial about human expression. Tell me about how this contributes to culture. Up above x25064 said you wouldn't be able to tell he was into heavy music. What...are we suppose to tell someones taste by looking at them? Someone's look is suppose to define them? I like the fact that x25064 can enjoy what kind of culture he wants without mutilating himself to cry out "HEY EVERYONE LOOK AT ME I LIKE HARDCORE MUSIC HEY EVERYONE LOOK AT HOW EXTREME I AM". No. He obviously lets his voice do the talking..as it should "I enjoy heavy music".

As I said in a previous post. I have a rising suspicion that people are mostly doing these extreme things to "express themselves" to make up for their lack of personality.

If you check below, I expanded a few quotations of yours already and replied into them. However. In every single situation you're in, in an interview, walking down the street, at a crowded bar, hanging out with professional/hobbyist/musical/whatever circles, is your personality always at full power (or even on at all)? Every time I pass a gal on the street who has a really pretty skirt, she doesn't run across the street and tell me she got it at Target on clearance. Just like every time I see a gal with only her right ear pierced, wearing a black triangle, with a blue star tattoo on her wrist, &c she doesn't need to explicitly tell everyone at the club that she's gay since the people who have a similar grasp of cultural semiotic signaling would pick up on it.

Why would a nun wear a wimple? Wouldn't it be easier for her to just tell everyone in a crowd that she's a nun?

What good would come from wearing a mohawk and safety-pins in your ears? It's an expression of a co-culture that someone clearly takes pride in and is important to them, but also is a compressed signal to others within their co-culture that can develop unity and easy recognition instead of eg having to take the time to explain to everyone they meet the bands they like and hoping eventually someone else will have a similar taste.

What about a guy who wears a Rolex, why would he choose to stand out like that? Or a woman with a Harley jacket?

I know that you might object that these are shortforms, abbreviations of culture/personality and we should spend the time to get to know everyone on a detailed personal level to find those out, but the truth is our brains aren't wired for that, instead they excel in pattern-matching and collating details.

I know that doesn't specifically answer your question about gauged ears, but I hope it gives you some answers that might help you figure it out.


Edit: Also just for clarity, you don't just "punch" a huge hole in the ear. Gauging is a slow and careful process of stretching slightly, waiting for it to heal at the new size, and repeating. It takes time and care.

The day my boyfriend got out of the Army, he went to gauge his ears (small gauges though...I think 2 gauge?) and pierce his chin. It was something he had been wanting to do since his deployment and waited years to get them. I'm not sure his total reasoning behind it, but I know for my piercings (10 all together - 9 ear lobe piercings and 1 nose ring) I got them because I love the way they look on me - not for what other people might think of them or to fit into a particular crowd. I just like the way they look on me.

The larger gauges do creep me out when the jewelry is out though. But to each their own...."Some people juggle geese!"

really most people dress for the group they associate themselves with. bro's, punks, hip hop...ers...?, hippies, "hardcore" kids, rich golfers, bikers. chances are that most of the way someone looks has been built on that. sometimes it is simply for attention, but not as often as you would think.

...having said that, when someone has their ears stretched to the extent of the picture you posted it is gross. nothing to do with my "personal style" or being judgmental, it just looks like their earlobe is going to pop and earblood will go flying everywhere and some will probably get in my mouth as i gasp in horror and then i will vomit. and that's why i don't like it.

My left ear is gauged to a 2 (~¼"). That's where it's staying. My right ear just got re-gauged to a 10 because I was doing a bit of drinking and some chick wanted to put it in me. In fact, she did the other one the first time too.

I don't like anything huge, or anything that really cocks up the natural proportion of your earlobe.

As for why I did it, I really dunno. I saw a guy with em and I was like "Neat" and decided to do it myself. Even on the 2, the hole's not really noticeable if I leave it out for months at a time, but it won't close up. Also, it's never affected me getting a job. They usually only say **** if you have a giant 4oz crescent hanging off the side of your face. Mine are just plugs.

Edit: the downside is if you take it out then swirl your finger around the hole a little and smell it.

edit2: god damnit it was already quoted

~_^

Lol

Let's not overlook the possibility that someone may do something that you don't agree with simply because they like it. There are occasions when people like something that may not be popular & they merely don't care enough to not not give in. I think that the only answer needed here is that people find things appealing & that the people that you ridicule may find you just as ridiculous.

As has been said anything more than about 3/8" is disgusting to me. However, as has also been said, I don't really give a ****.

Realizing that people will dislike things other people do and be vocal about it is a step toward rationality.

People who go around trying to enforce tolerance about everything are kind of annoying.

In other words: tolerate others' intolerance, if you really do believe in tolerance. Otherwise, you're no different than they are.

B-but... Free... if we do that, we destroy a significant part of why many sectors of the Internet still exist... like this one.

Well, we have to stop Couchman from killing himself, you see.

I think they look awful but people can do what they like.

Also about 99% of people with face tattoos or nose piercings cannot pull them off.

Only Darth Maul can as far as I am concerned

And Kat Von D.