The term “California license plate” is slang for a lower back tattoo, which is popular in California. Despite being stigmatized, the lower back is a sensible place for a tattoo as it provides a good canvas and is less prone to stretching. The placement of the tattoo is also perceived as sensual, and many women find it sexy. However, the stigma associated with lower back tattoos has led to derogatory terms such as “tramp stamp.” Custom designs and off-center tattoos can help avoid this stigma.
In addition to being used to describe a mandatory placard for all vehicles registered in the state of California, the term “California license plate” is also used to talk about tattoos placed on the lower back of women. Lower back tattoos are especially popular in California, which explains the origins of this slang term; there are also a variety of other colorful and less polite slang terms for lower back tattoos. In many communities, lower back tattoos are heavily stigmatized, as people draw conclusions about the wearer’s morality and creativity.
Placing a tattoo on the lower back is actually quite sensible. The lower back provides a great canvas, creating room to work on a big project, and is less prone to stretching and sagging, so a California license plate won’t buckle with age. Lower back tattoos also tend to stay sharper for longer, because they are less exposed to sunlight than arm and leg tattoos, depending on the fashion trends followed by the tattoo owner. The California license plate is easy to hide even with strategic garments.
Even the placement of a tattoo on the lower back is perceived as sensual by many people, especially when a tattoo is customized for the woman it is applied to. The lower back has a variety of luscious, flowing curves that can be accentuated with a well-designed tattoo, and this no doubt explains why many women perceive the California license plate as a “sexy” tattoo.
In the 1990s, California license plates began to proliferate among young women, as tattoos in general became more socially acceptable. Lower back tattoos were especially common on actresses, cropping up regularly in movies and on television. As a result, many people began to deride such tattoos as prosaic and traditional, and the idea that a California license plate meant a loose woman began to proliferate. Some of the less glamorous slang terms for a lower back tattoo, such as hobo stamp, slut label, bugle horn, or bullseye, reference commonly held beliefs about the morals of women with lower back tattoos.
The California license plate has also been further maligned due to the fact that many women choose to get flash tattoos such as lower back tattoos, rather than designing custom tattoos for themselves. Butterflies, fairies, flowers, Celtic knots and pseudo-tribal designs tend to proliferate on the shoulders of young women in urban areas, leading to great derision, even when those symbols have personal meaning to the wearer.
In fact, having a tattoo on your lower back says essentially nothing about your morals: A California license plate can appear on a devout Christian wife and mother just as easily as it can on a casual-minded fraternity. For people considering a lower back tattoo, there are several ways to avoid or lessen the California license plate stigma. Off-center tattoos often look much more visually interesting and less obvious, for example, and a custom designed tattoo can also help create the imagery of a deeply meaningful and personalized tattoo. Particularly large custom projects also tend to avoid being classified as “tramp stamps,” because they indicate a deep level of commitment and thoughtfulness.
Incidentally, this wiseGEEK author’s favorite slang term for a lower back tattoo is the German arschgeweih, which translates politely as “hind horns.”
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