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Diamonds Are Bullshit

blog.priceonomics.com

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Re: Diamonds Are Bullshit

#181

Post by StavrosK »

Helianthus wrote: post #135
rayiner wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It irks me a little bit that the issue is painted as one of "reason" versus lack thereof. There is a rationality in adhering to social convention. My wife is a diamond nerd, as well as one of the most rational people you'll ever meet, and she'd explain it this way: the diamond is a test that serves various useful purposes from the perspective of the woman: 1) It demonstrates the man's ability to provide; 2) It demons…

This is stressfully dehumanizing and is one of the reasons we have the term "heteronormativity."

Eh, it's not that unusual. It is rational and well-accepted that men also pick suitable women for mates by whether or not they have child-bearing hips and are good cooks.

Re: Diamonds Are Bullshit

#182

Post by mikeash »

Zimahl wrote: post #134
jamesaguilar wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Karma be damned but women as a whole are swayed more by marketing then men are To make a claim like this, I'd normally expect data, not a bunch of anecdotes. Men I know are highly swayed by marketing as well. They want expensive cars, tools, games, alcohol, and other toys. It is hard to reason about the degree to which each is influenced solely from the products that are marketed to them. It is quite a stretch for…

Think of how men are marketed to and you'll see the difference. It's not a name brand or a lifestyle, almost everything marketed to men has some sort of pragmatic function to it. Be it the big F-150 that can tow a ton, to the comfortable (yet fuel efficient!) 4-door sedan. Sport cars might be an exception for most men (although not for me). As much as you don't need it, a $2000 60" HDTV is still more functional than…

> As much as you don't need it, a $2000 60" HDTV is still more functional than a purse that costs the same amount of money.

Are you serious? Is this a joke?

A purse actually serves a useful function. It doesn't serve $2000 of function, but it's useful in that it lets you carry around important items.

A TV serves no useful purpose whatsoever. None. Zero. There is nothing useful in your life that the TV lets you do.

I think your bias might be showing here just a little bit.

Re: Diamonds Are Bullshit

#183

Post by jlgreco »

quadyeast wrote: post #153
rayiner wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't qualify (3), which is a very important one. I've got a daughter. She's only 4 months old, but I've had occasion to think a bit about this. I would not want her to marry someone who wasn't willing to give her a ring? Why? Reasons (1) and (2) I mentioned, sure, but also reason (3). It is the mark of a sensible man that he cares what other people think about him. People who buck social conventions sometimes b…

how about a '$3k donation to redcross' and buying a fake diamond so that all her friends will think you are still part of the herd?

Maybe the Red Cross can start making some sort of low-cost jewelry (perhaps similar to those yellow rubber wristbands?) that, while cheap in material cost, signify that the wearer donated a very large sum of money to the organization (or someone did so in their name).

Re: Diamonds Are Bullshit

#184

Post by rayiner »

erikpukinskis wrote: post #165
rayiner wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Honestly, I find the notion of "man as provider" to be perverse, but if I buy into your worldview for a moment... Why? It is, to this day, even in the U.S., the dominant arrangement between men and women, especially in the context of relationships that result in children. > The need to demonstrate your social standing to other people is the result of low self-esteem. That are very pragmatic reasons to invest in sig…

>Why? Because I advocate relationships where contributions are granulated and distributed according to participant interest, not participant gender. Monolithic roles like "provider" (and the concomitant role of "consumer/sex object") of are inherently coercive. Because they're monolithic and tied to gender. I think that kind of coercion is perverse. > That are very pragmatic reasons to invest in signals of social sta…

> Because I advocate relationships where contributions are granulated and distributed according to participant interest, not participant gender.

Okay how do you distribute child-bearing according to participant interest? How do you distribute child-rearing according to participant interest, bearing in mind that an infant just wants to suck on a breast and doesn't care about your views on gender roles.

Re: Diamonds Are Bullshit

#185

Post by Retric »

mech4bg wrote: post #143
InclinedPlane wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but there are different ways of signaling such things. If someone is so tradition-bound they themselves don't value the relationship itself higher than some specific traditional signaling method then that's typically a strong indicator of their lack of commitment to the relationship. tl;dr if a woman will only love you / stay with you when you buy them expensive things they don't actually love you.

It's easy to say that but that's not how human nature works. When you buy things for other people, it is generally a positive for your relationship with them. In general, they are happier and think better of you. Getting upset about it and saying they don't 'really love you' is not true and not super helpful. Human nature is very hard to change, no matter how intelligent / introspective we become. Do you never buy yo…

Human nature only talks about the average, I know a few people that dislike expencive gifts as it makes them feel obligations that they dislike. Gift giving is a vary cultural activity which makes it seem a lot more innate than it is because most people you interact with share the same bias.

Re: Diamonds Are Bullshit

#186

Post by Zimahl »

jamesaguilar wrote: post #145
Zimahl wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Think of how men are marketed to and you'll see the difference. It's not a name brand or a lifestyle, almost everything marketed to men has some sort of pragmatic function to it. Be it the big F-150 that can tow a ton, to the comfortable (yet fuel efficient!) 4-door sedan. Sport cars might be an exception for most men (although not for me). As much as you don't need it, a $2000 60" HDTV is still more functional than…

Again: would you like to provide anything other than anecdotes? These are worthless to me (and demonstrate your biases fairly obviously, see next paragraph). I'm amused at your implied claim that men aren't advertised to in fashion, since I can barely turn on the TV or radio without hearing an ad for Men's Wearhouse. Disney absolutely sells the prince metaphor to little boys too, and the fact that they grow into men…

You are stretching on all of you examples.

The Men's Warehouse commercials are as I described before, they talk about looking good for a function - work but life also. This is the pragmatic men's marketing. It's not the 'expensive so it must be good' branding that is on a lot of female products.

When was the last Disney 'prince' movie? Aladdin? Lion King? Meanwhile, Disney has now deemed Mulan and Tinker Bell as a princesses, there is now an African-American princess (Princess and the Frog), they added another pretty, white princess (Rapunzel from Tangled), a Scottish princess (Brave) and Disney is adding a hispanic princess[1] (although light on the hispanic). Girls have been sold the knight in shining armor. Boy could care less about princesses they just want be an action hero.

Diamond advertisements that talk about 'investment' are for men, but there aren't many of those. It's all about 'forever', 'love', etc, which are emotional pleas to women.

And the Superbowl has A TON of women watching[2]. It's sexist to think otherwise. The NFL is openly courting women as a way to increase viewership[3].

[1] http://www.examiner.com/article/disney-s-princess-sofia-the-...

[2] http://jamiedunham.wordpress.com/2013/02/03/marketing-to-wom...

[3] http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/sports/football/nfl-hones-...

Re: Diamonds Are Bullshit

#187

Post by princess3000 »

Zimahl wrote: post #134
jamesaguilar wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Karma be damned but women as a whole are swayed more by marketing then men are To make a claim like this, I'd normally expect data, not a bunch of anecdotes. Men I know are highly swayed by marketing as well. They want expensive cars, tools, games, alcohol, and other toys. It is hard to reason about the degree to which each is influenced solely from the products that are marketed to them. It is quite a stretch for…

Think of how men are marketed to and you'll see the difference. It's not a name brand or a lifestyle, almost everything marketed to men has some sort of pragmatic function to it. Be it the big F-150 that can tow a ton, to the comfortable (yet fuel efficient!) 4-door sedan. Sport cars might be an exception for most men (although not for me). As much as you don't need it, a $2000 60" HDTV is still more functional than…

> Think of how men are marketed to and you'll see the difference.

Keywords being "marketed to." Marketing is a perverse beast and should not really be taken as proof of anything. I mean, the DeBeers story which eventually lead to the article here is specifically about how you can create, from whole cloth, a societal tradition simply with quality marketing.

I think you assume masculine things are functional while feminine things are not but that's not entirely true. You're completely overlooking, say, cleaning product and vacuum cleaner ads directed straight at women, and that masculine marketing is just as vapid in as many ways (e.g. Monster Cables, energy drinks). While diamonds don't really "do things" in the way that a car or a TV does, there are incredibly rational social reasons for buying the former and incredibly irrational, marketing-driven reasons for purchasing the latter.

I also think it's incredibly silly to assume we can learn anything about how men and women are wired by looking at marketing. A century or so ago pink was a color for boys and blue was for girls, and at that time you could have made some assumptions about what each sex innately prefers and you would have been just as wrong.

Re: Diamonds Are Bullshit

#188

Post by Helianthus »

StavrosK wrote: post #181
Helianthus wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is stressfully dehumanizing and is one of the reasons we have the term "heteronormativity."

Eh, it's not that unusual. It is rational and well-accepted that men also pick suitable women for mates by whether or not they have child-bearing hips and are good cooks.

Excusing childish behavior by calling it rational doesn't make it less childish. Relationships or hook-ups might _start_ on factors like that, but they don't survive if that's what constitutes the substance of it.

And if the _symbol_ of your supposedly permanent commitment is a diamond, that says something very cynical about that marriage.

I'm sure there are good marriages with diamond rings involved. I'm pretty sure those marriages aren't successful because of that, but rather in spite of it.

Re: Diamonds Are Bullshit

#189

Post by InclinedPlane »

mech4bg wrote: post #143
InclinedPlane wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but there are different ways of signaling such things. If someone is so tradition-bound they themselves don't value the relationship itself higher than some specific traditional signaling method then that's typically a strong indicator of their lack of commitment to the relationship. tl;dr if a woman will only love you / stay with you when you buy them expensive things they don't actually love you.

It's easy to say that but that's not how human nature works. When you buy things for other people, it is generally a positive for your relationship with them. In general, they are happier and think better of you. Getting upset about it and saying they don't 'really love you' is not true and not super helpful. Human nature is very hard to change, no matter how intelligent / introspective we become. Do you never buy yo…

Infidelity is also human nature. Is that also just to be expected in a relationship?

If someone isn't willing to compromise in the face of reason (e.g. "we can't afford an expensive wedding or a ring", or "I'm concerned about supporting conflict in Africa and supporting the diamond cartel") then I'd say the relationship is probably not strong enough to last.

Re: Diamonds Are Bullshit

#190

Post by lionhearted »

rayiner wrote: post #133
clicks wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) It demonstrates the man's ability to provide; 2) It demonstrates the man's willingness to forgo the other things he could buy with the money for a gift for her that does not directly benefit him in any way; and 3) It demonstrates to the woman's peers her husband's social standing. To play devil's advocate here: If you substitute 'ring' with 'a $3k donation to redcross' you could still potentially qualify all of th…

It doesn't qualify (3), which is a very important one. I've got a daughter. She's only 4 months old, but I've had occasion to think a bit about this. I would not want her to marry someone who wasn't willing to give her a ring? Why? Reasons (1) and (2) I mentioned, sure, but also reason (3). It is the mark of a sensible man that he cares what other people think about him. People who buck social conventions sometimes b…

> Do I want my daughter to be with a man that is willing to create headwinds for himself out of foolish principles and refusal to conform?

On the one hand, I admire you saying that outright.

On the other hand, isn't it somewhat true that the vast majority of backwardness and oppression in the world stems from that same doctrine?

The desire for a short timescale pragmatic conformism seems to be a partial cause of much of the world's problems throughout history.

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