Are hooks pierced though muscle?
NO! Skin is very resilient, holds a lot of weight and heals very quickly. Muscle on the other hand is a very fragile tissue that tears easily and does not always heal correctly. In addition, if hooks tear out, damage to skin is easy to heal and not particularly dangerous, whereas healing torn muscle is much more significant. What about just putting the rope through the piercings? Flexible materials are not a suitable substitute for hooks or other rigid structures. Materials such as rope will tighten around the piercing, causing the skin to be pulled to one point and rip. More rigid items such as hooks are definitely better choices unless the goal is to tear free (for example in a ball dance or Sundance-type ceremony). In addition, doing this would result in major contamination of the rigging system, on top of the fact that there isn’t really any way to sterilize rope. Stick to hooks! How long can I leave the hooks in for? This would depend first on the material of the hooks. Most stain
