“The colonizer instilled in the colonized inferiority and the lack of self-worth by diminishing the significance of their culture and histories. Although colonized people may experience either conscious or unconscious oppression, some members of these groups may have more relative privilege (due to their gender, sexuality, social class, and socio-political status) over groups with even less power, which transforms alternate modes of colonizer-colonized relationships (Allen 2005; Memmi 1991). Chicano tattoo artists belong to a colonized group, but as men, have more relative privilege compared to their Chicana clients. This type of privilege exacerbates a colonial, patriarchal, and heteronormative oppression within the Chicana/o community by expanding oppression in the tattoo parlors of East Los Angeles.”

I chose this as my MVP because I think it provides a good theoretical framework for understanding the rest of the article. It helps explain why Latina women receive such pushback from their own communities when they try to obtain tattoos. It is a well-known fact that children who were abused growing up all too often go on to abuse their own children. I think it helps to understand the community in question as being a “colonized” community – just as a country can be colonized, so too can a people. Instead of banding together to battle against the oppression of their colonizers, some members of the community respond by oppressing others through the same model. Living in a hierarchical, artificially-constructed caste system, created and sustained by abuse, people wield whatever power they have to maintain a sense of agency and self-worth. Though regrettable, this is a clear and understandable pattern, and served as a useful lens for me through which to view the text.