Who is to blame for minors getting piercings and wearing studs and rings?

Expert: This behavior should be included in the governance scope of "bad behavior"

At the end of November 2023, 15-year-old Xiaochu from Guangzhou, Guangdong, got a navel piercing with a friend at a shop specializing in piercings. However, after some time, Xiaochu noticed pus forming at the piercing site, and the area around the piercing remained red. The shop owner claimed it was a normal reaction.

After a hospital examination, the doctor told Xiaochu that the wound had suppurated because proper protective measures were not taken after the piercing. This made Xiaochu feel aggrieved, because the piercing technician had not clearly explained how to care for it.

In recent years, many minors, like Xiaochu, have been keen on getting piercings and wearing studs and rings.

Because she felt that the older boys and girls around her dressed very fashionably, Xiaochu had always envied them. An older girl close to Xiaochu got herself a lip piercing on her 14th birthday, and afterward got a piercing every year on her birthday, either wearing a ring or a stud. She told Xiaochu: "Getting a piercing doesn't hurt at all, and it makes you look cool."

Last year, Xiaochu finally made up her mind and, accompanied by friends, got the first piercing of her life.

Similarly, 14-year-old Li Xue (pseudonym) from Shangrao, Jiangxi, was playing a game with friends at a gathering. After losing, according to a prior agreement, she got a metal stud pierced through her tongue at a roadside tattoo and piercing shop. A few days later, she felt that the screw under the tongue stud had become somewhat loose, so she tightened the tongue stud herself. But not long after, she felt pain and discomfort in her tongue. She tried many ways to remove it but could not, and was very frightened, so she told her parents and they took her to the hospital.

Li Xue's parents told the reporter that they went to a local dental hospital, where the doctor administered local anesthesia before cutting and removing the tongue stud. The wound was somewhat inflamed, and she recovered only after taking oral and topical medication for a period of time. Afterward, Li Xue was criticized by her parents and regretted it very much. If treatment had been delayed any longer, it would not only have led to infection but also left difficult-to-remove marks.

This year, 15-year-old Zhou Lili (pseudonym), a girl from Tianjin, has parents who are both in business and therefore cannot accompany her year-round. Zhou Lili usually communicates little with her parents. She has loved Korean dance since childhood and enjoys watching girl groups dance. She often "stays" in the dance studio, and when she saw her favorite stars with navel piercings and nose piercings, she came up with the idea of "learning from them."

So Zhou Lili found a tattoo and piercing shop near her home and also got a navel piercing, thinking that it would make her look better when dancing in her dance outfit.

After getting the navel piercing, she felt some itching at the piercing site and did not pay much attention at first. But within a few days, the skin around the navel stud began to turn red and ache faintly. When her parents found out, they scolded her severely. Afterward, she was treated at the hospital for more than a month before recovering.

The reporter's visits found that most shops offering tongue and lip piercings had posted signs at the entrance or on the counter stating "No tattoo or tongue piercing services for minors," and many businesses also ask consumers whether they are adults before providing such services. However, some shop owners said bluntly: "Although most of the time we check ID cards to see whether consumers are adults, sometimes when we're too busy we can't be 100 percent sure, and moreover some people 'break the rules' to make extra money."

When the reporter asked what harm piercings can bring to the body, He Bing, a piercing technician in Nanning, Guangxi, told the reporter: "Piercings do bring some harm to the body, and the degree of wound healing varies with individual constitution. A piercing is actually making a hole in the body with a needle and then inserting a decorative object made of different materials. Generally the wound will bleed, and if it is not properly cared for later, it is prone to inflammation and suppuration."

Su Su, a piercing technician in Xi'an, Shaanxi, told the reporter that the pain of piercing varies by body part. For example, a tongue piercing is more painful than a lip piercing, and a through-and-through stud is more painful than a vertical stud, especially during the recovery period. "Some adults can't stand the pain and come running to the shop every day after getting pierced, saying they regret it."

Su Su said that if the piercing has been in place for only a short time, it can still recover, but if it has been there for a long time or has been stretched, it will leave a permanent mark that is difficult to recover from.

Ms. Li is the parent of a high school student in Jizhou District, Tianjin, and also an educator. She believes that getting piercings on the body is merely a form of behavioral rebellion and has no aesthetic value. If one wants to express a certain tendency or personality, it can be done through clothing and accessories; there is no need to use forms such as tongue piercings. Relevant departments should regulate and rectify shops that provide tongue piercing, lip piercing, and other services to prevent minors from being deceived.

Ms. Li believes that parents should also communicate calmly with their children, pay attention to cultivating healthy aesthetics in daily life, and guide children to demonstrate their strength and personality through more meaningful things.

An HR staff member at an internet company told the reporter that the company's culture is free and open, and it will not refuse to hire applicants because they have "tongue piercings or lip piercings." However, for positions that require meeting clients daily and contacting and communicating with different clients, the employee's image will still be considered. If the piercing site is too obvious, the company will consider not hiring the person.

It is understood that China already has relevant regulations on minors getting tattoos. In June 2022, the Office of the State Council Leading Group for Children's Protection issued the "Measures for the Governance of Tattoos on Minors" (hereinafter referred to as the "Measures"), which clearly stipulates that no enterprise, organization, or individual may provide tattoo services to minors, and may not coerce, induce, or instigate minors to get tattoos. Professional tattoo institutions, as well as medical and health institutions providing tattoo services (including medical beauty institutions), beauty and hairdressing institutions, and social organizations, shall clearly indicate in prominent positions that they do not provide tattoo services to minors, and shall require minors to present identity documents when it is difficult to determine whether they are minors. However, there are still no clear documents regulating minors getting piercings and wearing studs and rings; it relies only on the professional ethics of piercing shops and supervision by families and schools.

Regarding the issue of minors getting piercings and wearing studs and rings on their bodies, Jiang Xiaoxian, associate professor at the Law School of Xiamen University, told the reporter that from the perspective of objective behavior, acts such as lip piercings and tongue piercings also receive widespread negative social evaluation and fall under "bad behavior" in the Law on the Prevention of Juvenile Delinquency. Therefore, acts such as lip piercings and tongue piercings should be jointly included in the governance scope, and active measures should be taken to protect the healthy growth of minors.

Zhang Jinghui, director of Beijing Junyong Law Firm, believes that both families and society have the obligation to guardianship and education of minors, and should combine "guidance" with "blocking" to protect the physical and mental health of minors. Minors are persons with no or limited capacity for civil conduct, and getting piercings and wearing studs and rings clearly exceeds the scope of minors' understanding and rational judgment, and should be prohibited.

In Jiang Xiaoxian's view, although the Law on the Protection of Minors does not explicitly prohibit minors from getting piercings, the mainstream view in society holds that piercings harm both minors themselves and social groups, contravene the "principle of the best interests of minors" in the Law on the Protection of Minors, and fall within the category of minors' "bad behavior" in the Law on the Prevention of Juvenile Delinquency. Therefore, it is necessary to regulate them.