One of the best things about Christmas being over is that we get a short reprieve from the onslaught of diamond commercials, at least until Valentine's Day. Every ad for diamonds seems to be based on a couple of awful assumptions.
1) Your wife or girlfriend can't possibly be expected to love you if you don't buy her diamonds.
2) If your husband or boyfriend isn't buying you diamonds, he probably doesn't really love you.
3) Women love sparkly things more than anything in the world.
4) What women like about getting engaged/married is not the whole "love" thing, it's the big sparkly diamond.
One of the worst offenders is KAY Jeweler's with their "every kiss begins with KAY" campaign. Only diamond jewelery will make a woman want to kiss you. If you buy her a non-diamond gift, get ready for a lot of smooch-free evenings!
You know, kids, it was nice of you to put all this time and effort into trying to make a special day for me, but diamonds! Now that's a real gift!
Then there's this ad, in which the woman is frightened by lightning and need shiny diamonds to calm her down. She's basically a parakeet in a tight sweater. Seriously, what grown woman is frightened by lightning? And needs a big strong dude to feel safe? If she was frightened by a burglar, that might make some sense, but how is the dude going to protect you from lightning? Which you don't need to be protected from because you're indoors. It's just ridiculous.
And then there's Jared. You may be lucky enough not to have Jared where you live, I never heard of them until I moved to Atlanta. But there campaign revolves around the phrase "He went to Jared!"
Oh, you've found the love of your life and you're getting married? Ho hum, zzzzzzzzzzzzz. Oh a bright shiny sparkly thing! Congratulations, you lucky girl!
On the other hand, if your fella didn't go to Jared, well, let's just say it's gonna be awfully lonely for him on that couch.
Because what's the point of having a husband if he isn't supplying you with pretty, shiny baubles?
And I haven't seen one of these DeBeers ads for a while, but as I recall the basic plot is the lady marries the guy, has kids with him, puts up with them for 25 long horrible years, then finally she earns the shiny diamonds. With very suggestive music in the background. And I know, it's Handel or whoever, but I've always thought that that part of "Water Music" or whatever it is sounds a lot like sex building to a climax. Sorry if I ruined it for you. If I made it better, you're welcome!
Every year they trot out these ads and every year they make me crazy.
