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Sarah
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Grace
It was bugging me the whole time that in a World where if you get an infection you will probably die that people are tattooing themselves?!
Joshua Walker
Toward the end Kirsten was discussing how she carried those she was forced to kill with her forever and I believe that this was the physical embodiment of that. I did not think this was in any way a badge of honor, Kirsten doesn't seem like she enjoyed the killing so I cannot see her marking herself as a shrine to the act.
Melanie
If you have killed someone, you have already been deeply marked by the act. To me, the tattoos seem to be a way of making visible the invisible wound; the body is altered to reflect that the soul has been altered. Kirsten in particular carries these memories and feels the echoes of their deaths with her.
S Walker
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Kim Horner
Kirsten did not feel anything was remotely honorable in killing. It was an act of self-defense, but remember the Symphony's Star Trek inspired motto that to survive was not sufficient: Having killed and survived, the killer felt it necessary to commemorate the death with something artistic. It also served as a warning--less aggressive than displaying the actual weapons--to those who might attack someone so marked.
Lori Sue
Kirsten's modesty regarding the tattoos, coupled with the brief but sober explanation of them when she is reunited with her dear friend Charlie, suggest to me that it was an act of acknowledging a life, important enough to remember, even though it was necessary to take. Maybe it was a way to keep sane, by expressing it openly, without words, and still not keep it a secret, avoiding shame. I liked how easily this element of conscience, the awareness of good and evil was seemingly never discussed or obsessed over -- it seemed to be understood among all of the survivors as a foundational belief of their new world.
The truth is written on our hearts...Romans 2:15
The truth is written on our hearts...Romans 2:15
Victoria Hess
I would guess it is only a tradition in places. We just didn't get to see everyone's arms in this piece. To these people it was a badge of honor. Such an act has to be accepted with honor, or else it could fester with shame and pain. Still, K. admits the impact of each death on her.
David H.
Much like a rite of passage, these tats are meant to be a symbol of the baggage that we all carry and a means to identify others with the same burdens.
Sharon
I wondered this too. It seems incongruent. But maybe to differentiate between those who died from the flu and those who were killed. Numbering off those who survived, but then died?
Jquick99
Yeah, it’s like…I just killed someone. Quick, where is the closest tattooist? Then, doesn’t like looking at those rememberences (sp?).
Kumari de Silva
Well the story didn't exist in a vacuum, it was supposed to pick up right where our world left off. in our world pretty much all of Kirsten's adults would have tattoos, so why wouldn't she want one? In marking her kills she's making a personal decision, we don't know if that is a common thing anywhere outside of her social circle. Lastly, ancient Hawaiians and Native Americans tattooed themselves apparently without dying from infection. I don't know anything about tattoos on the mainland USA but in the South Pacific traditional tribal tattoos would often cover the whole body. So it must be possible to do without a modern needle kit
Ufuk Cetincan
Every culture will create their own tradition, no matter how weird it sounds. Our world - present and past - is full of them...
Anna
I thought about this, too, I wondered if it was some sort of social law that almost required you to be transparent about the lives you have taken. It sort of reminded me of the Walking Dead, with the three questions Rick must ask everyone before taking them in, one of those questions being, "How many people have you killed?".
Chris Rigby
It wasn't a general thing. AFAIK it was limited to the Symphony, perhaps inherited from a community they'd passed through? You would want people - who might be bandits - to know you're not someone to be messed with.
Sabrina Gutierrez
This part of the story really didn't make sense to me. If she didn't like killing, why did she get them? Was this some sort of social code that it was required to tattoo yourself every time you killed someone? I wish there was some backstory to this, otherwise it seems like an unnecessary undertaking for someone who doesn't want to kill in the first place.
Margaret
Isn't this what gang members do - they tattoo different icons to represent people they have killed. I read about one prisoner that tattooed tear drops on the side of his face.
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