what's the point of (even nice) furniture tattooed on one's body.

Maybe it'd be cool if it was some anthropomorphisized furniture, running into battle while holding a sword over its head.

Hmmm... couldn't find any such images on google....

it has *nothing* to do with providing decoration for all the guys to whom my tattoo says "Fuck me in the ass!!!"

Wait, what?

*do* guys really think that's what a woman's lower-back tattoo means?

From what I can tell, even if it doesn't mean that, it makes many guys think that. However, I have not been able to discern what else (like, say, just seeing a woman from behind) makes these same guys think that too.

I think the furniture tats are going to remain in the "okay, whatever" realm for me. They're too...I don't know. I don't think they look nice, and the jump to meaning is too far for me to make with the wearer.

I don't expect anyone else to dig my tat, so it's not a condemnation of any sort.

From Wiki:

Beginning in the late 1990s the 'lower back tattoo', known in slang as a "tramp stamp", "ass antlers,"[1] or the "back-door bullseye" became popular especially among young women. Lower back tattoos are often oblong in shape, following the slope of the back on either side of the woman's spine. The lower back tattoo is body decoration with the intent of emphasizing sexual attractiveness. Generally, a lower back tattoo will be designed to emphasize the shape and curvature of the female figure. While such tattoos have become increasingly popular and accepted in recent years in many parts of the world especially the west, they remain an object of derision in some quarters. Detractors consider such tattoos in this location as suggestive of promiscuity and an indication of Raunch Culture.[2]

What is "Raunch Culture" and why does it get capitalized?

I was just going to ask that, tommy!

The origins of the term:

Men, you can relax. You are no longer the enemy. Instead, judging by recent events in America, modern feminists have a much shapelier target in their sights - other women. Specifically, scantily clad women who use their sexuality to get ahead. I don't know if this is a PR campaign to get men to finally pay attention to the cause, but it's certainly stirring up trouble.

It all kicked off with the publication of Female Chauvinist Pigs, a rant against "raunch culture" by the New York magazine writer Ariel Levy. In the book, she argues that the recent trend for soft-porn styling in everything from music videos to popular TV is reducing female sexuality to its basest levels. In short: "A tawdry, tarty, cartoon-like version of female sexuality has become so ubiquitous, it no longer seems particular."

Which is all fair enough, until Levy starts to list the ways in which today's women are allowing their sexuality to be sold short. Thongs, for example. Crop tops. Lap-dancing classes. Maxim and FHM. Playboy T-shirts. The word "chick". Levy thinks raunch culture is a feminist movement gone terribly wrong. We are, in her eyes, doing all these things merely to show the men that we are "one of the guys" and "liberated and rebellious". Naturally, she finds this confusing. "Why is labouring to look like Pamela Anderson empowering?"

eta: The rest of the article argues against Ariel Levy and other critics of "raunch culture".

[link]

Urf. I have sleep deprivation cancer this morning.

"Tramp stamp" falls into the same mental arena for me as "wifebeater" -- the literal meanings/origins just don't ping me on any level even if I can acknowledge their unsavoriness intellectually.

I had completely missed any raunch connotations. My thought was that the lower back was a good place for a tatoo because the tatoo wouldn't show with ordinary clothes. In fact, the lower back is about the only place I've ever considered having a tatoo because of that. That's how far out of it I am.