<story><title>Diamonds Suck (2006)</title><url>http://diamondssuck.com/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>sametmax</author><text>Seems like an american things really. In France, nobody would expect anyone to buy a certain kind of ring. As long as it&amp;#x27;s pretty, you can go for anything. Or no engagement  ring. Some friends of mine don&amp;#x27;t even get wedding rings. And I just met a not married couple wearing rings just because they liked it.&lt;p&gt;Our wedding ceremonies are also usually way cheaper and less show off that the ones your pop culture is selling to you, so I hope you are not actually doing it IRL cause that seems a terrible way to start a long term relationship, money wise.&lt;p&gt;But I guess we don&amp;#x27;t have such a marriage culture here anymore. People do marry, but we also now have something called the PACS, which is a very simple legal union with no bells and whistles that is pretty popular. And of course plenty of people living for ever without a label on their relationship.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>beevai142</author><text>Given that the diamond ring fad apparently originated from a marketing campaign, it would be interesting to see how well the belief that wedding rings should have a diamond correlates with where the ads were run.&lt;p&gt;At least in the nordics, I don&amp;#x27;t think there&amp;#x27;s a specific type of wedding (EDIT: or engagement) ring that you&amp;#x27;re expected to have, and I think many people have no stone of any kind embedded in theirs.</text></comment>
<story><title>Diamonds Suck (2006)</title><url>http://diamondssuck.com/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>sametmax</author><text>Seems like an american things really. In France, nobody would expect anyone to buy a certain kind of ring. As long as it&amp;#x27;s pretty, you can go for anything. Or no engagement  ring. Some friends of mine don&amp;#x27;t even get wedding rings. And I just met a not married couple wearing rings just because they liked it.&lt;p&gt;Our wedding ceremonies are also usually way cheaper and less show off that the ones your pop culture is selling to you, so I hope you are not actually doing it IRL cause that seems a terrible way to start a long term relationship, money wise.&lt;p&gt;But I guess we don&amp;#x27;t have such a marriage culture here anymore. People do marry, but we also now have something called the PACS, which is a very simple legal union with no bells and whistles that is pretty popular. And of course plenty of people living for ever without a label on their relationship.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>pessimizer</author><text>&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.theatlantic.com&amp;#x2F;magazine&amp;#x2F;archive&amp;#x2F;1982&amp;#x2F;02&amp;#x2F;have-you-ever-tried-to-sell-a-diamond&amp;#x2F;304575&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.theatlantic.com&amp;#x2F;magazine&amp;#x2F;archive&amp;#x2F;1982&amp;#x2F;02&amp;#x2F;have-yo...&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;&amp;quot;In Europe, where diamond prices had collapsed during the Depression, there seemed little possibility of restoring public confidence in diamonds. In Germany, Austria, Italy, and Spain, the notion of giving a diamond ring to commemorate an engagement had never taken hold. In England and France, diamonds were still presumed to be jewels for aristocrats rather than the masses. Furthermore, Europe was on the verge of war, and there seemed little possibility of expanding diamond sales. This left the United States as the only real market for De Beers&amp;#x27;s diamonds. In fact, in 1938 some three quarters of all the cartel&amp;#x27;s diamonds were sold for engagement rings in the United States. Most of these stones, however, were smaller and of poorer quality than those bought in Europe, and had an average price of $80 apiece. Oppenheimer and the bankers believed that an advertising campaign could persuade Americans to buy more expensive diamonds.&amp;quot;</text></comment>