Unintentionally Fascist Spanish Tattoo
I was looking through the awesome (and probably NSFW) Street Carnage site today and in particular this article called ‘My Unintentionally (Hilarious!) Fascist Tattoo‘ about a guy that spent his senior year of high school studying in Spain. Obviously he really enjoyed his time there and fell in love with the country, so much so in fact that when he went back home to the US and was old enough to get a tattoo, he immortalised his love for the country by having the word España tattooed on his arm in red ink.
What he didn’t realise in his naivety of Spanish culture however is that the word España to 90% of Spaniards and a tattoo of it especially is a fascist symbol. Essentially he has unwittingly made most of the country he loves hate him back. If he took a visit back to Spain now he would find it hard to do some very normal tourist things such as getting car rental or sunbathe topless on a beach because most people would think he is either a member of the Ultras Sur, a violent football hooligan group who use the fascist symbols of nationalist Spain or any other kind of fascist.
The whole interview he had with a Spaniard who explained his unfortunate tattoo is in the link at the top and it’s well worth a read and explains the Spanish political backgrounds quite well. Still though I feel pretty sorry for the guy, it was meant to be a nice gesture that spectacularly backfired on him so now he can’t even holiday, get car hire in Spain or sunbathe.
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Yes, it pays to know your tattoo well before you put it on your skin. My tribal armband tattoo speaks generally for my tribe as a native American and I would never want to mess up with it. Great post!
the word ESPAÑA isnt a fascist symbol it is a word which represents a country, i dont like the guy who wrote it because i dont know why he believes that spain is fascist and in my opinion the friend is very intelligent although there are a lot of fucking people here and crisis