For my job as an events coordinator/news editor extraordinaire, I’m in charge of organizing the annual Easter Eggstravaganza on the UM Oval, which is basically a large-scale egg hunt on campus the day before Easter. (Please don’t hesitate to contact me with any of your egg-hunt planning needs! Wait, no. Please do.)
Over the past several weeks, I’ve been ordering candy and small prizes to stuff in eggs for the hunt, mainly online. When a came across a package of 720 temporary tattoos for around 30 bucks, I figured they were a great deal and ordered five packages. And because they were advertised as CHILDREN’S tattoos, intended for use by CHILDREN, it did not even occur to me that some of them may not be appropriate for, you know, CHILDREN. Boy, was I wrong. So very, very wrong.
Based on the following sampling, I’m guessing the folks over at Oriental Trading Co.’s Temporary Tattoo Department aren’t too concerned with quality control.
First off, there were several of these Japanese-character tattoos, but most of them said things like “tiger” or “dragon,” not this:
That’s right — if it weren’t for my observant co-worker who spotted this inappropriateness, the word “sexy” would be plastered across some 6-year-old girl’s arm after she found it in an Easter egg.
Next up, several tattoos that, on their own, might not be so bad, but collectively could maybe, just maybe, encourage grade-school children to take up recreational drug use:
OK, I know that’s actually a palm tree, not a pot leaf, but when combined with a mushroom, some eight balls and three bloodshot eyes (including one that apparently has its own appendages and another with a cracked-out face), you can’t help but wonder if the people designing these things have an ulterior motive or two. I mean really, how many variations of bloodshot eyeballs do you allow in the kids’ tattoo supply before you draw the line?
And then there’s this third and final example, which is just plain racist:
Yep, that’s a Native American with a red face. I’m not even going to start on this one.
Lucky we discovered these early and I could suss out the bad ones before they went into the eggs, or I have a feeling a might not be planning an Easter egg hunt next year. Wait a minute… ahh, screw it.
Squirrel Thoughts 
Posted by Bri on March 28, 2010 at 6:22 pm
Maybe we can send Oriental Trading a complaint and they’ll donate all of our prizes for next year’s hunt. 😉
Posted by LD on March 30, 2010 at 9:16 pm
hahahahahahaha…..I hope you’re planning on keeping all the forbidden ones for us so we can wear them to sweet events this summer!!
Posted by ERIC DAWSON on September 11, 2010 at 2:35 pm
you realize none of these things are that bad.. the eyes aren”t bloodshot there depicted to have blood vessels.. which they really do..imagine that. holy crap. a tree? really? would it be as bad if you were on vacation at a beach full of them? no.. and the eight balls? lets see here, every tough guy from every fifties, sixties, sveneties, eighties, and ninetys, movie is depicted with a TATTOO and shooting EIGHTBALL. potential relation to image when placed on child versus actual image? come one now. and the redfaced indian? its on the front of a pumpkin seed package seen all over the country and enjoyed by millions. not that big of a deal. you are the reason our younger generations spend their lives facebooking and not out having life experiences.. i hope you don”t procreate
Posted by Allison on September 11, 2010 at 3:13 pm
Um, I’m not sure where you’re from, but in Montana, where I live, we have a significant Native American population. From your “pumpkin seed package” reference, I’m guessing that is the closest you’ve come to meeting an actual Native American, and you don’t realize that the “red-faced savage” depicted in the tattoo is considered offensive. There are some other assumptions those familiar with Native American stereotypes could make, but since I’m not interested in perpetuating them, I won’t get into it here.
Also, if your reading comprehension were equal to that of a sixth-grader, you would realize that throughout this tongue-in-cheek post, I was not calling each individual tattoo a blatant drug reference, but saying that, collectively, they looked somewhat suspicious. Judging by your severe lack of basic grammar and spelling skills, though, I can assume you dropped out of school in sixth grade, most likely to — unfortunately — procreate.
Posted by That’s it — I’ve having kids « Squirrel Thoughts on September 11, 2010 at 6:10 pm
[…] But that all changed today. Why? Because I received a notice that some rando by the name of “Eric Dawson” published the following comment on my blog post titled “Hey kids, want some racist tattoos?“ […]
Posted by 2010 in review « Squirrel Thoughts on January 2, 2011 at 10:20 am
[…] Hey kids, want some racist tattoos? March 2010 5 comments 3 […]
Posted by Easter egg hunts = humanity at its worst « Squirrel Thoughts on April 24, 2011 at 3:12 pm
[…] a better shot at getting some crappy Easter stickers and diabetes-inducing candy (and, some years, inappropriate tattoos). And apparently, before I took the helm, organizers would put the bike-winning coupons in special […]
Posted by ‘Sick rat tails’ and the people who search for them « Squirrel Thoughts on June 16, 2011 at 7:58 pm
[…] #5 racist tattoo […]
Posted by Kim at Awkward Laughter on May 16, 2014 at 3:51 pm
Oh boy! I don’t even know where to begin. 🙂