By Kevin Krolicki
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The attacks that shocked America sparked old-fashioned patriotism this weekend as people lined up to have the American flag inked into their arms at the world's largest tattoo and body-piercing convention.
On Hollywood's famed Sunset Strip, American flags were flown on cruising cars, draped across the front of the Palladium convention hall and featured in the most talked-about tattoos at the 10th annual Inkslinger's Ball, a raucous gathering to which thousands of "body art" practitioners come to see and be seen.
"It's one thing to fly a flag at home and another to get it tattooed on your body," said Ron Young, 41, the master of ceremonies for the event. "It makes a real statement."
One middle-aged woman chose a tattoo of the Stars and Stripes with the black outline of a jumbo jet and a yellow rose in memory of the thousands presumed killed when hijacked airliners crashed into the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. Another man opted for a simple motto: "Remember the Day."
At the Beachin' Tattoo booth, the special tattoo on offer featured an "American shield" flanked by fearsome snakes.
Young, originally from New York, said he was moved by the sacrifice that firefighters and police made by rushing in to help at the time of the attack, even at the cost of their lives.
"I feel a lot of frustration here because anyone who has been tattooed or pierced in the past 12 months can't give blood," he said.
RED CROSS IS BENEFICIARY
Young, the singer with the Hollywood-based hard-rock band Little Caesar, has Asian-inspired tattoos over his back and both arms. Later, he urged the crowd of black-shirted and barebacked enthusiasts to contribute to the American Red Cross by bidding at a charity auction for an electric tattoo needle.
Lee Hanna, a soft-spoken tattoo artist with mutton chop sideburns, had already done several flag-themed tattoos by midday Saturday, the second day of the convention. When one man asked for "a real patriotic symbol," Hanna improvised a pattern featuring two flags, an eagle, a rose and a panther.
"We were getting people gathered around while I did the tattoo saying, you know, 'Way to go, very patriotic,"' he said.
Several dozen in the crowd with tongue piercings answered a call to talk to forensic anthropologists about their metal barbells and rings. Two researchers from Arizona State University drove to Los Angeles to gather data they hope will be useful in the grim work of identifying bodies in New York.
"If we can help in solving one missing-person case, it will be enough," said Kristen Hartnett, a graduate researcher.
While forensic experts know a lot about how other kinds of habits, such as smoking a pipe, affect the teeth, no one has studied the telltale marks left by increasingly popular oral jewelry, she said.
Others were more interested in vengeance than closure. At one booth, Chris O'Hara said he had sold about 100 black T-shirts emblazoned with the New York skyline and the message "The Only Good Terrorist Is a Dead Terrorist."
Even at a convention given to the unconventional and peopled by pink-haired punks and ponytailed bikers, the mainstream patriotic sentiments should not be surprising, Young said.
"These are people who more than others understand the meaning of liberty," he said.