<story><title>We Buy Broken Gold</title><url>http://laphamsquarterly.org/swindle-fraud/we-buy-broken-gold</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>sukilot</author><text>Note these are the same people who sell you your diamond engagement ring. Every woman who insists on a ring like this is starting your marriage on a lie. I got dragged into a store like this and paid thousands of dollars to a racist asshole who told me how much smarter we were than those Christianss who come in to buy jewelry for Christmas. I&amp;#x27;ll probably never really forgive my wife for doing that (but she is wonderful in so many way, just a victim of that propaganda like so many others), and God help me if my daughter doesn&amp;#x27;t know better by the time she grows up.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Kliment</author><text>A friend of mine does jewelry courses in the Amsterdam area and has special courses for couples to make rings for each other. It&amp;#x27;s an order of magnitude cheaper than supporting the diamond industry, and much more personal and fun. His website is at &lt;a href=&quot;http://sawugo.nl/&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;sawugo.nl&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt; if anyone is interested.</text></comment>
<story><title>We Buy Broken Gold</title><url>http://laphamsquarterly.org/swindle-fraud/we-buy-broken-gold</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>sukilot</author><text>Note these are the same people who sell you your diamond engagement ring. Every woman who insists on a ring like this is starting your marriage on a lie. I got dragged into a store like this and paid thousands of dollars to a racist asshole who told me how much smarter we were than those Christianss who come in to buy jewelry for Christmas. I&amp;#x27;ll probably never really forgive my wife for doing that (but she is wonderful in so many way, just a victim of that propaganda like so many others), and God help me if my daughter doesn&amp;#x27;t know better by the time she grows up.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>SomeCallMeTim</author><text>My wife recently asked me &amp;quot;Why did we decide to get a diamond at all, when we both knew it was a scam?&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;And I didn&amp;#x27;t really have a good answer. It just seemed like the thing to do at the time. We were both involved in picking out the rings, too; it&amp;#x27;s not like I went out and bought them for her without her input.&lt;p&gt;Thankfully I didn&amp;#x27;t spend a completely insane amount of money on the rings (not compared to what I was earning -- less than a couple weeks&amp;#x27; wages -- which is still too much, really but not the crazy amount some people spend). But neither of us were really ready to step &lt;i&gt;that&lt;/i&gt; far away from what was &amp;quot;expected&amp;quot; of us, I guess.</text></comment>