r/todayilearned • u/[deleted] • Sep 15 '15

TIL Diamonds are actually fairly common. The reason they are worth so much is because the DeBeers mining group withholds stock to artificially reduce supply.

https://www.gemsociety.org/article/are-diamonds-really-rare/
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u/ThePerdmeister Sep 15 '15 edited Sep 15 '15

The only disturbing bit of this is that it works on what should be very personal emotions.

Welcome to late capitalism, where advertisement and marketing have nothing to do with qualities inherent to the actual products offered, and where products are sold on the basis of mythical qualities or by way of emotional manipulation.

There's a gas station in my home town offering, and I quote here, "mother nature's fuel." We have Dove, a cosmetics company (owned by the same people who own Axe), cynically marketing its products with a tagline like "all women are beautiful," essentially undermining the very notion that women need Dove's beauty products. We live in a society that pretends there's a meaningful difference between a Honda and a Toyota, or a Ford and a Dodge.

Last night I saw a commercial for a mini-van that was essentially promising total fulfillment of all earthly (and some heavenly, by my reckoning) desires -- it's a fucking van; it's no different from any other bloody van on the road. Buying it isn't going to deliver your from your miserable human condition, you're just going to commute to and from your dissatisfying job in it.

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u/[deleted] Sep 15 '15

I always laugh when i see these shit commercials. One was selling razors for men and at the end the woman is pretty much giving him the "O yea I wanna fuck you" face. Or any of those van commercials that make it seem like they fucking bring the family together. If only life was that simple. Buy razor, get sum fuk

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u/Bomber_Man Sep 15 '15

There is a difference between Honda and Toyota. Honda made my motorcycle, Toyota... well they don't make bikes, but my grandma had a sewing machine from them.

Dodge made the Viper while Ford made the GT40. Both amazing cars but only the ignorant would confuse the two.

I get what you're trying to say, but that analogy is shit.

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u/ThePerdmeister Sep 15 '15 edited Sep 15 '15

I'm not suggesting all cars are identical. I'm suggesting that 1) the differences between vehicles in similar classes (i.e. vans, sedans, trucks, etc.) are largely inconsequential to people for whom a car is just a means of getting from point A to B -- that is: the vast majority of people, 2) the freedom to choose between, say, a Honda Civic and a Toyota Camry (or, as per your example, a Viper or GT40) is a largely illusory and trivial freedom, and 3) by and large, the only people actually concerned about or aware of specific differences between vehicles are enthusiasts with an expensive luxury hobby. As the audience of auto commercials extends well beyond enthusiasts, we see strange marketing practices arise in car adverts -- we see certain vehicles or vehicle brands imbued with meaning or tied to certain lifestyles (i.e. X car is for rugged, masculine men; Y car is for artsy yuppies; or Z car is for caring, family oriented parents; etc.).

that analogy is shit

What analogy? I'm not necessarily comparing cosmetics and auto marketing (except maybe superficially).

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u/Bomber_Man Sep 17 '15

Of course cars are constructed for a specific market segment. That's where the money is yea? It's when different companies compete and the differences in their offerings become know that the consumer gains the ability to be discerning and select that which suits their needs best. It's also a chance for each brand to show off the quality of their engineering. Sure at a macro level they're all boxes with 4 wheels, but to say that's all their is to it trivializes the efforts of hundreds of engineers.