13 ms·

Diamonds are a scam and an ethical minefield, but I disagree with the notion that women are brainwashed or shallow for wanting one. It’s not about the diamond.

by jl6 3y ago

Diamonds are a scam and an ethical minefield, but I disagree with the notion that women are brainwashed or shallow for wanting one. It’s not about the diamond. It’s about wanting a man with enough resources to waste on a diamond. A diamond’s lack of intrinsic value or utility is a feature. The waste is the point. In a sea of potential mates, finding one who can throw away $3000 as though it were nothing, is a great filter.

tomp 3y ago
This sounds like a sensible argument unless you think about it for about 5 seconds. In reality, most of those women absolutely wouldn’t want said man to literally burn $3k or even $20k. Absolutely 100% brainwashed.
- jl6 3y ago
  Are you completely sure? https://caratsandcake.com/articles/wedding-fireworks-wedding-sparklers https://caratsandcake.com/articles/wedding-fireworks-wedding... “Wedding fireworks can cost anywhere between $3,000 and $25,000, according to Theiss—it all depends on timing and the size of the show you want. The more common range is $3,000 to $5,000 for weddings.”
  - tomp 3y ago
    Exactly. I probably spent $20k this year on vacations (for me and my extended family). Buy experiences. Money well spent. Not diamonds and other ego-inflating stuff. It keeps the negative flywheel spinning faster and will hurt you long-term.
  - 8organicbits 3y ago
    What's the objection here? A large party with a hired pyrotechnic specialist giving a performance using expendable supplies is going to cost some money. Is this an arguement against large parties in general?
    - kalleboo 3y ago
      It's a joke - fireworks burn. They're replying to someone talking about "literally burning up money"
- hnbad 3y ago
  I love how both of you are basically just arguing about different ways of how women have no agency. "Those women" are definitely "brainwashed" but phrasing it that way is very condescending. It's called advertising and culture and you're not immune to propaganda either. Some women genuinely value conspicuous consumption as a status symbol the same way some men do. Some women believe diamond rings are a must because "that's the way it is" and they don't want to be outsiders. Some women just like sparkly shiny things. Calling any of this "brainwashing" makes it sound like this is odd or noteworthy: you only think so because you're appaled by this particular example but you're likely ignorant to the myriads of ways you yourself hold irrational, toxic or even self-destructive values and beliefs due to your upbringing and the culture you exist in. Yes, diamonds bad. But women who want diamonds aren't exceptionally shallow or odd as humans. They're just shallow and odd in people you are aware of and find distasteful.
  - ironcurtain 3y ago
    [dead]
globular-toast 3y ago
Yeah, it's not brainwashing. That's hilarious if people think any marketing company would go to the effort to brainwash people, if such a thing is even possible. Marketing companies leverage what is already there. Car companies didn't brainwash men into wanting "rugged", "angry" looking "trucks". They merely recognised the slightly pathetic tendency for some men to want to make themselves look bigger and tougher. It's the same with diamonds. They work because there is some underlying seed of possibility and they have simply been the best at exploiting that.
- dustypotato 3y ago
  The difference being: Another person doesn't have to pay for it
  - globular-toast 3y ago
    You think men buying rings for women is a selfless gift? They are buying them for the same reason they buy the trucks and many other things: it's for sex.
- ragazzina 3y ago
  >That's hilarious if people think any marketing company would go to the effort to brainwash people, if such a thing is even possible. Marketing companies leverage what is already there. Just compare today's problems with problems from 200 years ago and you'll see how many of them were created ad hoc.
pas 3y ago
> It’s about wanting a man with enough resources to waste on a diamond. well yes, but not really. it's about showing off. it's a status game. which is fine for a certain degree. "we are social animals", etc. status is intertwined with a lot of very pragmatic interpersonal things (peer pressure of conformism, reciprocating gifts, respecting each other, not being late or too early, taking turns to speak and listen, remembering birthdays, remembering who remembers our birthdays) and community-wide trust (who can ask you a favor, loans, borrow your car, who do you work with). but there are much better signals for "who do you pick as a mate" than "how many carats does this diamond is?", of course arguably a lot of people are not really good at picking up on those interpersonal signals, so ... they recruit the community through these reflective signals.
iteratethis 3y ago
So, you basically confirm that said women are shallow.
derbOac 3y ago
I don't think it's really about either of those things all the time (although I'm sure it's all sorts of things at different times for different people). From my experience with my wife, I think it was much more practical. Really for her I think it was mostly like "I want to take this seriously and am going to be wearing this ring (or displaying something) all the time and so want to be sure I know what it is and that it's durable." She doesn't really wear jewelry at all except for her wedding and engagement ring, so she just hadn't thought about engagement rings or jewelry very much period. A diamond was a known quantity, something she could trust, something neutral in color, durable, and so forth. The metal artist that we went to really liked moissanite but at the time it was the first we had heard of it. At the time synthetic diamonds were more something on the horizon than something you could actually buy. I think if she had known about moissanite earlier and had time to get familiar with it she probably would have been happy with it.

by jl6 3y ago

tomp 3y ago

This sounds like a sensible argument unless you think about it for about 5 seconds. In reality, most of those women absolutely wouldn’t want said man to literally burn $3k or even $20k. Absolutely 100% brainwashed.

jl6 3y ago
Are you completely sure? https://caratsandcake.com/articles/wedding-fireworks-wedding-sparklers https://caratsandcake.com/articles/wedding-fireworks-wedding... “Wedding fireworks can cost anywhere between $3,000 and $25,000, according to Theiss—it all depends on timing and the size of the show you want. The more common range is $3,000 to $5,000 for weddings.”
- tomp 3y ago
  Exactly. I probably spent $20k this year on vacations (for me and my extended family). Buy experiences. Money well spent. Not diamonds and other ego-inflating stuff. It keeps the negative flywheel spinning faster and will hurt you long-term.
- 8organicbits 3y ago
  What's the objection here? A large party with a hired pyrotechnic specialist giving a performance using expendable supplies is going to cost some money. Is this an arguement against large parties in general?
  - kalleboo 3y ago
    It's a joke - fireworks burn. They're replying to someone talking about "literally burning up money"
hnbad 3y ago
I love how both of you are basically just arguing about different ways of how women have no agency. "Those women" are definitely "brainwashed" but phrasing it that way is very condescending. It's called advertising and culture and you're not immune to propaganda either. Some women genuinely value conspicuous consumption as a status symbol the same way some men do. Some women believe diamond rings are a must because "that's the way it is" and they don't want to be outsiders. Some women just like sparkly shiny things. Calling any of this "brainwashing" makes it sound like this is odd or noteworthy: you only think so because you're appaled by this particular example but you're likely ignorant to the myriads of ways you yourself hold irrational, toxic or even self-destructive values and beliefs due to your upbringing and the culture you exist in. Yes, diamonds bad. But women who want diamonds aren't exceptionally shallow or odd as humans. They're just shallow and odd in people you are aware of and find distasteful.
- ironcurtain 3y ago
  [dead]

globular-toast 3y ago

Yeah, it's not brainwashing. That's hilarious if people think any marketing company would go to the effort to brainwash people, if such a thing is even possible. Marketing companies leverage what is already there. Car companies didn't brainwash men into wanting "rugged", "angry" looking "trucks". They merely recognised the slightly pathetic tendency for some men to want to make themselves look bigger and tougher. It's the same with diamonds. They work because there is some underlying seed of possibility and they have simply been the best at exploiting that.

dustypotato 3y ago
The difference being: Another person doesn't have to pay for it
- globular-toast 3y ago
  You think men buying rings for women is a selfless gift? They are buying them for the same reason they buy the trucks and many other things: it's for sex.
ragazzina 3y ago
>That's hilarious if people think any marketing company would go to the effort to brainwash people, if such a thing is even possible. Marketing companies leverage what is already there. Just compare today's problems with problems from 200 years ago and you'll see how many of them were created ad hoc.

pas 3y ago

> It’s about wanting a man with enough resources to waste on a diamond. well yes, but not really. it's about showing off. it's a status game. which is fine for a certain degree. "we are social animals", etc. status is intertwined with a lot of very pragmatic interpersonal things (peer pressure of conformism, reciprocating gifts, respecting each other, not being late or too early, taking turns to speak and listen, remembering birthdays, remembering who remembers our birthdays) and community-wide trust (who can ask you a favor, loans, borrow your car, who do you work with). but there are much better signals for "who do you pick as a mate" than "how many carats does this diamond is?", of course arguably a lot of people are not really good at picking up on those interpersonal signals, so ... they recruit the community through these reflective signals.

iteratethis 3y ago

So, you basically confirm that said women are shallow.

derbOac 3y ago

I don't think it's really about either of those things all the time (although I'm sure it's all sorts of things at different times for different people). From my experience with my wife, I think it was much more practical. Really for her I think it was mostly like "I want to take this seriously and am going to be wearing this ring (or displaying something) all the time and so want to be sure I know what it is and that it's durable." She doesn't really wear jewelry at all except for her wedding and engagement ring, so she just hadn't thought about engagement rings or jewelry very much period. A diamond was a known quantity, something she could trust, something neutral in color, durable, and so forth. The metal artist that we went to really liked moissanite but at the time it was the first we had heard of it. At the time synthetic diamonds were more something on the horizon than something you could actually buy. I think if she had known about moissanite earlier and had time to get familiar with it she probably would have been happy with it.