An account of an Okeepa ceremony was posted to a World Wide Web page in August 1997 describing the group's activities and providing references regarding tattoos and body piercing. The initiate or person to be 'tortured' is David, a friend of the tattoo artist. David, who has fasted for seven days with no food or drink, is pierced with 10mm bars. A person who refers to himself as the "shaman" of the experience, marvels that David does not cry out as his body is pierced with great force. As the group continues to pierce David with skewers and string him up on a tree, the shaman sees the pain on David's face as he is strung up, yet David does not make a sound. The shaman remarks that his "respect for the guy quadrupled, and I knew by the end of the ceremony it would increase further." David, hanging from the tree with the skewers in his body, is spun in circles. When an aide steps in to reduce the rate of spinning, David tells her to let go and allow him to spin freely. After letting him hang for a long while, the group brings David down and carefully removes all of the skewers. Miraculously, there is little to no bleeding from the wounds. David is then given glucose and high-protein foods to help him revive (Brighton Body Piercing Studio, [http://www.perforations.com/educate/extreme/okeepa.htm]).

The Lobi women in Ghana and the Ivory Coast and the Kirdi of Cameroon wear lip plugs as protective devices to prevent evil spirits from entering the mouth (Fisher, 1984, pp. 55, 137). Mothers pierce a child's lip with a thorn. The holes are later enlarged with stalks of grass until they are about two centimeters in diameter, and large enough to insert a plug which is usually made out of clay, wood, stone, or metal. Lip plates are usually no larger than three centimeters in width, but the women of southern Chad wear lip plates and plugs exceeding this limit.

The Revival of Primitive Tribal Traditionsl

In some cultures, body ornamentation is an experience that everyone undergoes to mark some stage in life. This commonality is one of the aspects of their culture that binds members together. In modern Western culture, it is difficult to identify any one experience that is universally shared by all members of the society. Perhaps school graduations come closest, but not everyone graduates high school or college. Neither does everyone get a driver's license, get married, or have a child. For some, body piercings or tattoos may provide a sense of entry into adult life and of choosing their mature identity. A tattoo artist with 20 years of experience explains people's fascination with tattoos in this way:

The first doctor raised up between his fingers about an inch of flesh which he cut right through with his scalping knife, the latter being carefully notched in order to make the cutting more painful. . . .The torturers approached and examined his body with scrupulous care. Before the ordeal could end, the initiate had to be, as they termed it, wholly dead, that is, in a faint. (The'voz, 1984, p. 47)

Cultures that practice piercing, scarring, tattooing and other radical body manipulations believe that one is not fully human and cannot exercise the innate abilities that distinguish humans from other animals if the body is not properly adorned or altered. Landow notes that "scarification and other forms of body decoration were traditionally considered marks of civilization. They distinguish the civilized, socialized human body in its natural state and from animals. The Chokwe [who file their teeth to points] say that teeth not filed to points are like the teeth of animals" (1997). The Cadureo Indians say "An unpainted body is a stupid body" (The'voz, 1984, p. 50). The Bafia of the Cameroons say, "A man who is not scarred looks like a pig or a chimpanzee" (Ibid.). From these examples one can see that piercings are more than conventions of physical appearance; they are also symbolic of human abilities. For example, Dogon women wear bro

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