Unpopular opinion: store-bought piercing needles are safer than sharpened safety pins

Had a convo with my buddy Jake from Austin last night who swore by using a sterilized sewing needle for his earlobes. He said it's cheaper and he's done it 12 times without infection. But I've always used proper hollow piercing needles from a shop and I feel like that jagged edge on a pin causes more scarring. What's your take on the whole safety vs. cost debate for home piercings?

4 comments

4 Comments

leehall1mo ago

Well hell, I've got about as much experience with home piercings as I do with precision roofing work, which is to say none at all. I tried to pierce my own ear with a thumbtack back in high school and ended up with a lump that looked like a second ear lobe for about three months. Your buddy Jake sounds like one of those guys who could probably perform surgery on himself with a pocket knife and a bottle of whiskey and come out fine, but for the rest of us mortals who bleed if we look at a paper clip wrong, I think spending the extra five bucks on a proper needle is worth not having to explain to a doctor how a safety pin ended up in your cartilage.

john_fisher1mo agoMost Upvoted

explaining to a doctor how a safety pin ended up in your cartilage" - that's a sentence no one wants to say out loud. Solid advice.

phoenix_bailey1mo ago

Flip it around and ask yourself how many sailors pierced their own ears with sewing needles and fishing line back in the day without a single infection. A clean safety pin that's been passed through a lighter flame is basically the same as a sterile needle if you're not an idiot about it. Maybe the real lesson here is that we've gotten too soft as a species, not that Jake was wrong.

barbara_grant41mo ago

You're close but a lighter flame doesn't actually sterilize anything. Burns off some surface gunk but leaves residue. Real sterilization needs heat high enough to kill spores, like an autoclave. @phoenix_bailey talking about sailors not getting infected - selection bias there. The ones who got nasty infections just aren't around to tell the story. Proper piercing needles are hollow ground too, cuts a clean channel instead of tearing tissue like a safety pin does. Less trauma means faster healing and less scar tissue.