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WTF, Richard Cohen?: Irrelevant Fashion Advice Edition
By Ned | July 22, 2008
You know how sometimes a skilled writer will begin an essay by writing about something that’s somewhat interesting but doesn’t seem particularly significant? And then will expand on that idea and connect it to something much larger and more important, so that by the end you see both topics in a whole new light? Well, Richard Cohen’s a terrible writer, and that’s not what he’s doing here.
Tattoos are the emblems of our age. They bristle from the biceps of men in summer shirts, from the lower backs of women as they ascend stairs, from the shoulders of basketball players as they drive toward the basket, and from every inch of certain celebrities. The tattoo is the battle flag of today in its war with tomorrow. It is carried by sure losers.
About 40 percent of younger Americans (26 to 40) have tattoos. About 100 percent of these have clothes they once loved but now hate. How can anyone who knows how fickle fashion is, how times change, how their own tastes have “improved,” decorate their body in a way that’s nearly permanent? I don’t get it.
See, you would think from that lede that the whole column was just a rant about how tattoos suck, but if you keep reading … it’s just a rant about how tattoos suck. In the Washington Post. For some reason.
Johnny Depp once had “Winona Forever” tattooed on his shoulder but changed it to “Wino Forever” when his relationship with Winona Ryder turned out to last somewhat short of “forever.” Angelina Jolie once sported the name “Billy Bob,” for Billy Bob Thornton, but, since she began a relationship with Brad Pitt, has had it replaced with the global coordinates of her children’s birthplaces. She is also emblazoned with the legend “Know Your Rights.” The British writer Simon Mills likens that to a sign hung in small-claims court.
David Beckham has turned his body into a billboard of Hebrew, Chinese and Hindi characters, not to mention a semi-nude representation of his wife. Victoria Beckham, the aforementioned semi-nude, is graffitied with Roman numerals and Hebrew lettering. As for the conspicuously tattooed Amy Winehouse, her lyrics bespeak an intelligence that someday — if she has a someday — will cause her to wonder why she never gave that day a thought.
The amazing thing is that somebody - probably not Cohen himself, but some poor schmuck WaPo intern - had to actually research celebrity tattoos. For a Washington Post column. But what’s even more incredible is that we’re probably seeing more care and diligence in digging up the facts on this topic when we’ve ever seen from Cohen on less explosive subjects - Iraq, for example.
WTF, Richard Cohen?
Topics: The Media |