Monday, June 11, 2007

Diamonds Are Forever   [Jonah Goldberg]

Dude, I'll check out the piece at Slate, but the diamond engagement ring thing is a social convention that will never, ever, ever, ever die. If it was a fur coat, there might — might — be a chance at killing the tradition. But not the rock. Looked at objectively, it's an absurd custom. I remember talking with the Fair Jessica about it. She was far less invested in getting a diamond engagement ring than most women. She understood how silly it is to spend huge amounts of scarce just-starting-out resources on some crystallized coal. And it wasn't even the money for me. I heartily offered to buy the equivalent amount of stock in De Beers. It's just absurd to lock up precious resources in something you'll never sell — hence the genius of the diamond business. But, at the end of the day, no one will believe you that you didn't get the rock on principle. Her friends won't. Your friends won't. Her family won't. No one. In the spirit of misery loves company, your guy friends — who are deeply invested in defending their decision to get the rock for their wives — will give you a brutal time about how cheap you are. Her friends are similarly invested. Everyone is.

A few people will refuse to do it on principle, but their heresy will only reinforce the custom. A few men will decline because they simply can't afford it. But if they ever find themselves living more prosperous lives they'll atone at the jewelry store eventually.

The diamond is the modern updating of the mastodon hide and the shiny rock. It's a sign, a ritual, a public declaration of commitment grounded in ancient custom and instinctual drives older than democracy, monotheism and the wheel. Of course, it's irrational. Chesterton may have been wrong that the purely rational man will not marry, but surely the purely rational man would never buy a diamond engagement ring. But we are not purely rational creatures. Diamonds are forever. Period.

Update: Of course, there are exceptions — and more power to them — but they will always prove the rule. From a reader:

Jonah,

Maybe I'm the exception that proves the rule, but my wife of 11+ years
wears a simple gold band, very much like the one I wear.  She has always
been quite adamant about me not spending a great deal of money on a
rock, and since we were starving students at the time or our marriage, I
readily acquiesced.  We are much more successful now and could easily
afford a nice ring, but there has never been any hint of a desire for
one.  (Full disclosure: I did buy her diamond earrings for our 10th
anniversary, but they were nowhere near what people seem to pay for
wedding rings.  While she wasn't as angry as I thought she's be from our
previous jewelry discussions, she was hardly thrilled.)

As far as friends and family go, I have never heard anything from anyone
about it.  And seriously, if the guys you hang out with are paying
attention to what's on your wife's finger, you are either hanging out
with jewelers or metrosexuals.  I couldn't tell you what even one of my
friends' wives have on her finger, and I have no interest in finding
out.  It is none of my business.

P.S. Those "every kiss begins with 'k'" commercials annoy me, too.

And, yes, this is what I'm saying, from another reader: 

Jonah:

          You mean to tell me that whole swaths of the West can make “marriage” mean a man and a man “hooking-up”; people will write their own vows, get married underwater, divorce can be as common as dirt and yet the diamond engagement ring-practically invented by DeBeers can not be got rid of?  How depressing.

        I’m sure there is some Goldberg like Masai- right now saying-“No matter that we have cell phones and can only kill one lion a year, the custom of 10 cows given to the bride’s father will never go out of style.”

06/11 05:17 PMShare