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Thank goodness, maybe I’ll finally be able to buy a diamond pickaxe for what few emeralds I have. I’ve been having to use stone tools in this economy and I’d really like some obsidian for a nether portal.
I’d really like some obsidian for a nether portal.
Water and lava buckets, you peasent
They said they were using stone tools. You think they’d have spare iron lying around for a bucket?
Name checks out…
if you want to go to hell, just wait.
All essentials are going up but at least some useless luxury items are coming down.
We’d much rather spend money on fabulous vacations or boring mortgages.
Nothing says “I love you” like a detonation nanodiamond
Paying overprice for a lump of carbon is insane.
Prices are so bad that De Beers is for sale?! Wild.
Prices are so bad that De Beers is for sale?!
BHP’s bid for Anglo American, which owns De Beers, is playing a role too.
Good. Fuck rich people.
Fuck De Beers.
Lab-grown rocks
When I was getting married a few years ago, I remember thinking fuck real diamonds lab-grown are literally the same thing. I remember getting some push back from some weirdos about how “real” diamonds are some how better or how people will think I’m a cheapskate or how people will feel bad for my wife…
Well, fast forward a few years and literally nobody cares, thinks about, or has said anything negative about my wife’s ring. We are both 1000000% happy and satisfied with the decision to buy lab grown.
I’ve unfortunately lost my wedding ring in palladium. My wife is planning to offer me a new one but this time I want a steel ring made by a local jeweler.
Not because it is cheaper but because I am using my money in the right place.
Precious metal/stones is a social flex saying “Look ! I can afford the labor of X African slaves that have worked in the mine to extract this mineral” (plus the ecological impact of mining)
I’d rather spend money to buy the labor of a local artisan than buy African slave labor through a myriad of intermediaries
I gave my wife an engagement ring with natural diamonds, but it belonged to my great-grandmother who died in the 1940s, so I didn’t feel that there was an ethical issue.
We decided on some cheap silver rings. We really didn’t want to carry around something extremely valuable everywhere. Go swimming and lose 5000€ in the lake? Do some yard work and lose your diamond ring there? Getting mugged and the robber is getting something really expensive? No, thank you.
Expensive wedding rings & jewelery did make sense in the past when women were not allowed their own money, bank accounts etc. as a way to escape an abusive husband. Pawn your expensive wedding ring, get cash for the getaway. But we’re not living in the 50s, my wife has her own bank account, is earning her own money, so no need for something like that.
We did the same. Some silver bands from a local artist.
Paid off when one was lost. The artist was still available for a new order.
When it’s time for children I recommend lab grown as well!
fuck children too
please don’t
Username checks out
Phrasing!
username checks out.
Why don’t you have a seat right over here.
We said fuck diamonds entirely, even lab grown, and even had to go out of our way to find something that didnt have diamonds on it somehow
I got us bare tungsten carbide bands. If “Diamonds are forever”, then tungsten carbide is 9.5/10ths of forever, and it’s the whole band instead of just a small easily-detachable part of it. More practically, it won’t get beat to hell like the white gold ring from my first marriage. Plus, if I ever need a really strong connector for jury-rigging something, I’m now carrying one with me at all times!
Tc won’t scratch, but it is brittle though.
So are diamonds, but hey - don’t pollute my symbol with your facts! As far as romance is concerned, hardness == durability, end of story :P
We have tattoos.
Fucking noice, dude. 👏 Honestly, yeah, why even diamonds. They brainwashed us good.
Mostly because they dont get scratched. Theyre pretty neat. Not blood diamonds though, those are a crime against humanity.
Women love diamonds for their wide range of industrial applications.
Like making pickaxes and mining obsidian?
Geoffrey Farrow at Raphael, a jeweller on the other side of the street, can only just bring himself to sell lab-grown diamonds. “They are synthetic,” he said. “Lab-grown sounds exotic, but it’s created – they make it by the buckets. There’s no history to it. The price is going to go down further and further.”
I find that a very interesting perspective. I prefer the idea of something we made with human ingenuity as opposed to some thing you dug out of the dirt, probably with a shoddily-hidden special history of slavery and tears, and before that, just sitting in the ground like a bunch of other boring things. The history of a lab-grown is entirely mine and my hypothetical partner’s to create.
If I was a diamond person anyways. I’d be more worried about losing the expensive ring somehow and worrying over it, and would much rather buy the cheapest thing that can still socially function as “look, I am married, don’t hit on me!” without having to wear some ugly shirt that says that. Ideally both me and my hypothetical partner would just forgo expensive rings (and don’t get me wrong, I’m adamantly not a T-shirt and jeans person, I like to dress up, I have just never been a ring person) and spend it on something else we would both like.
For those who do not share my opinions on wedding rings, which is valid, I am also glad to hear lab-grown prices are down so people can still get that ring they love without breaking the bank and without supporting De Beers.
While violence behind diamond mines is real and should never be forgotten, don’t be obtuse. It’s not some thing you pulled from dirt.
It’s still beautiful. It’s still a gem. It’s still something that naturally formed over millions of years in the crucible of fire and pressure beneath our crust. That history is astounding and something people can marvel at.
Don’t begrudge Geoffrey Farrow his wonder at the world around him.
P.s. Fuck De Beers. Fuck the false scarcity. Fuck the slavery and violence and exploitation of nations the diamond trade relies on.
I suppose I’m probably the most anti-nature environmentalist. Protect this because we need it to live, and animals need it to live. But I really personally hate nature, it doesn’t bring me pleasure. I have been to some of the wonders of the world and was not floored, breath not taken away. “Checks out, let’s move on.” (Why’d I go to see it then? Someone else with me wanted to see it :P I’m a lot more interested in history that directly involves humans or something once living. For me, dinosaurs and artifacts of early human civilization are cool, gems are not.) I don’t marvel at it, and any reason to dismiss something made with cruelty is something I’ll eagerly jump on, even if it’s definitely not a popular perspective. To me it really is an overvalued thing you pulled out of the dirt, no matter the facts behind how it formed inside the dirt.
Disclaimer: I don’t say this to be contrarian, I am really not the type. Popular ≠ bad and I’m not some special unique snowflake, I just have some quirks where I have a different opinion, as does everyone else! I don’t like nature, others don’t like chocolate. I think most people have at least one unpopular preference/dislike, this is mine.
Diamonds are worthless outside of industrial uses.
I disagree. They ARE pretty. Just not as pretty as a rose or a sunset and yeah best used as industrial tooling.
I would rate them above roses personally. Below a good sunset though; nearly nothing manmade beats those
Pedantry because funny: Diamonds and Roses aren’t man made either. On a more serious note, some things aren’t beautiful because they last but because they are fleeting.
Ain’t that the truth
Lots of diamonds are man made, and most people can’t tell them apart from natural diamonds, especially without a microscope.
Any rose you buy at a florist or other store is the product of centuries of selective breeding by horticulturists. So they are, in that sense, man-made. And now they’re getting into genetic modification.
In fact, if you bought someone a dozen wild roses, they might be disappointed.
Really, virtually anything plant-related you can buy in a store is a human creation at least in part. We don’t think of flowers we tend to grow and buy as domesticated, but they are.
Good sunsets are frequently man-made too, the most beautiful red glowing ones own their look to dust - air pollution.
The same can be said for precious metals as well except precious metals can’t be manufactured. Their natural scarcity gives them some value beyond their utility.
Diamonds however are not scarce.
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I like how they sparkle, but I would rather get a perfect diamond for that made in a lab.
I see the beauty in mathematically perfect lab-grown crystals and natural gems made over millions of years, so I don’t really mind either kind.
You should mind the latter kind because it is extracted via human suffering and death.
Artificially expensive shiny rocks less valuable than advertised.
Fun fact, reputable pawn shops don’t pay for gemstones because they’re effectively worthless. They only pay for previous metals. If you sell a wedding ring they’ll only pay you what the metals are worth.
Not really. They will pay you as little as they can get away with. Often that’s the value of the metals.
Precious metals*
Lol
The longer I live, the clearer I see that the beliefs of my youth were just capitalist lies.
