Blood diamonds? Conflict-free diamonds? Which conflict? Whose blood?
The push against "blood diamonds," so-called, sounds like a wonderful move toward more ethical, humanitarian international standards -- and in many ways, it is -- but it also ignores (and implicity, then, condones) the crimes committed in any country where the warring forces have decided to cease hostilities and JOINTLY savage the population for wealth.
Blood and diamonds have always been inextricably intertwined:
"Diamond mining began in Africa in 1867 with the discovery of a "pretty pebble" along the banks of the Orange River in South Africa... Discovery of the diamond field resulted in the 1880 Boer War, a conflict between English settlers and the descendents of Dutch settlers (called Boers), all of whom had laid claim to the diamond fields."
The history of the monopolistic England-based DeBeers Group is awash with blood and always has been -- including the fact that the people actually named De Beers were Afrikaaners.
Given the history of De Beers -- enslavement, summary execution (for any miner trying to take one diamond away) humiliation (miners always had to strip naked at the end of each shift for cavity search), the outcry and international prohibitions against "Blood Diamonds" amounts to little more than De Beers protecting their market dominance against people using more or less the same tactics THEY used to get where they are.
Blood and diamonds have always been inextricably intertwined:
"Diamond mining began in Africa in 1867 with the discovery of a "pretty pebble" along the banks of the Orange River in South Africa... Discovery of the diamond field resulted in the 1880 Boer War, a conflict between English settlers and the descendents of Dutch settlers (called Boers), all of whom had laid claim to the diamond fields."
The history of the monopolistic England-based DeBeers Group is awash with blood and always has been -- including the fact that the people actually named De Beers were Afrikaaners.
Given the history of De Beers -- enslavement, summary execution (for any miner trying to take one diamond away) humiliation (miners always had to strip naked at the end of each shift for cavity search), the outcry and international prohibitions against "Blood Diamonds" amounts to little more than De Beers protecting their market dominance against people using more or less the same tactics THEY used to get where they are.
posted by Saintperle at
9:38 AM
