The Viewpoint article regarding purchasing diamonds for engagement rings was interesting, but neglected some important information that make the debate over diamonds even more complex.
First off, the writer noted that the diamond represented love and tradition. Of course, what she might not have realized is that the diamond represents love and tradition according to the De Beers Corporation, which has a monopoly on diamonds and first started marketing the diamond as a symbol of love. Before that advertising campaign, the pearl was more often used in European nations and the United States for an engagement ring. So essentially, the diamond represents love according to corporate advertising.
Second, we should question, especially at BYU, whether a stone that is not even that precious, but the price of which is kept artificially high by the control of a monopoly, can really be representative of the eternal truth of love. Why do girls compare rings? Why do men feel that their self worth and “ability to provide” is attached to their ability to purchase a large diamond? The diamond myth seems rather to perpetuate materialistic and competitive notions of love, when really love is neither.
Finally, and most importantly, in the present world today, a certain percentage of diamonds in the market are what are called “conflict diamonds,” emerging from areas wrought with war and violence. U.S. government sources have even connected al Qaeda funding to the sale of diamonds.
Since the diamond market is not centralized, and a diamond often goes through a variety of middlemen transactions before it makes it to its intended market, it is incredibly difficult for consumers to know where their diamond originated. Was that diamond responsible for a child getting its limbs cut off? Was it responsible for a farmer being exploited in Central Africa? Why aren’t these the questions we ask when we go diamond shopping at the mall?
In our view, we want someone to love us enough to value all human life, and to see through the trite sentimentally of diamonds.
Leslie Street
Pensacola, Fla.
Katherine Davidson
Toronto, Canada
