Blimey, HOW MUCH??? something that’s less useful than Sheldona’s extra top-tube…

A rare blue diamond which could set a world record price per carat when it is sold in May has gone on show in London.

I mean, i know it’s rare, and shiny and stuff, but what can it actually do? I’m all for shiny pretty things, but millions of pounds, on a piece of rock?

I fully appreciate that it is something that will be highly desirable, but surely, buying something like this is just making up for inadequacy in the buyer, no? Bit like a lot of consumerism, I spose.

Question is, even if you could afford it, would you want to buy it? Will the buyer be getting it because they really really really love it, or just because it’s worth so much?

Crazy…

I would buy it for MrsWCA because she is worth so much more to me the rock wouldn’t seem excessive.

buying something like this is just making up for inadequacy in the buyer

Why do you think this? It is a bizarre piece of inverse snobbery. Anyone who can afford such a thing is fabulously wealthy. Wealth on that scale is invariably the result of a combination of rare genius and great courage, either on the part of the individual or his or her forebears. Wealth of such magnitude brings with it opportunities for the development of character through education and experience which those of us who are forced to spend all our time grubbing around trying to make a living can only dream of, as well as the ability to have sexual intercourse on demand with almost anyone instead of just watching it on the internet.

The chance of someone with the money to buy such a diamond being in any normal sense “inadequate” is very small. Rather, you are attempting to project your own inadequacy onto them, and will no doubt soon start babbling on about how your experience of growing up in the east end surrounded by a fascinating cast of genuine and authentic poverty-stricken asshats has turned you into a real character who feels entitled to talk dismissively about the super-rich despite never having met any of them. You may also start rabbiting about the values of love and friendship in an attempt to justify your inability to earn sufficient money to buy such a magnificent stone.

🙂

BigDummy by name . . .

At the end of the day, it is utterly useless. It has no real value other than it’s rarity, and what some muppet will pay for it.
Very nice mind, but I’d rather have a nice custom Curtis.
🙂

I’d rather have a nice custom Curtis, it has no real value other than it’s rarity, and what some muppet will pay for it

😉

I dont like the colour. if it was orange it would be worth more to me.

Probably a better investment than stock, bonds or gold at the moment.

I think PeterPoddy and the Cap’n have summed the whole thing up between them.

Moving on.

[chuckles at soma_rich] Do they come in orange? 🙂

Nice one, BD! Great response, as always. Well thought out, well written, intelligent, thoughtful…

..But rong.

Although I suspect you are fishing for a response. 😉

Don’t get me wrong. I think it’s nice, to have nice things. But personally, I just don’t see the need for such an ultimately useless baubel. And I do actually know some super-rich people; I doubt they’d buy it, even though they can afford it. People have differing priorities.

As for ‘inadequacy’, we all have out little weaknesses. We’re Human. We compensate, by making social statements about ourselves, in order to gain acceptance and acknowledgment from our peers. We buy nice clothes, we do our hair nice, we buy nice cars, jewelery, carpets, Phillipe Starck Rocket juicers.

Status symbols. In our society, it seems that wealth = power. So, people desire things that show off their status and power to others.

Because, if we truly felt completely comfortable about ourselves, we probbly woon’t need them. I’m sure there are many, ridiculously wealthy people, who woon’t dream of splurging such an amount, on such a thing.

Anyway, enough of that.

My point was, than een if you could, would you?

I woon’t. Just seems pointless.

I have nowt against someone who would, though. Their choice, and up to them.

I think Poddy says it all, really.

Wealth does[/b] equal power.

There is a world of difference between you or me raiding TK Makk for some bargainous threads and OD-ing on hair-spray to make ourselves appear less as though we lead lives of quiet desperation and someone with a net worth greater than half the countries in Africa buying the best diamond to be discovered in modern history simply because they can.

It’s also a matter of limitless resources, and diversity of investment. If you already own more houses than you can live in, a yacht and a helicopter to travel between them, and your income each year massively exceeds your outgoings then you have to find stuff to buy. This will be a marvellous investment, because, although entirely arbitrary the market value if diamonds of perfect clarity is consistently high, and one of this rarity will appreciate. As will as being a fabulous staus symbol and a trophy piece this will be a shrewd investment, and will also provide bragging rights for someone who’s main problem in life is working out what to spend their money on. 🙂

I know a lass that lives in Trump Tower, New York. something like the most spensive apartment building in the World.

It’s a modest, one-bed flat. Tiniest of kitchens, no wash-mashin (maid service), and you can’t open any of the windows. The view is ok, but not spectacular (all you can really see are other very large buildings).

I asked her why she chose to live there, rather than something a lot nicer, and less claustrophobic. Her answer was that living there gave her a status, which enabled her to have more ‘power’, when negotiating a pay-deal, or getting credit at Prada, and a better seat at a restaurant. All part of the image.

I admit, I have little understanding, of such a rarified world. Just seems bewildering, to me. People more concerned with status, than just getting on and enjoying their lives.

Ah well. Spose that’s one worry I’ll never have. I’ll survive.

Oh, and she coon’t have parites or owt, in her place.

Give me a flat on a shithole housing estate in the East End, any day.

you have to find stuff to buy

Because..?

I would buy it for MrsWCA because she is worth so much more to me the rock wouldn’t seem excessive.

I’d missed that, in all the nonsense.

See, that is beautiful.

it weighs 7.03 carat…

if i owned the original rough cut diamond at circa 26 carats i’d be asking lot of q’s about the other 19 carats…. 😀

See, that is beautiful.

Nah, it’s sentimental bollocks and very easy to say if you don’t have the wonga. If I could afford the fabled Blue Diamond I’d also be trading in MrsDummy for a younger model, or indeed several of them. 😉

Duntmatter – poor people buy stuff ovbsessively, they just buy stuff that is (a) useless, (b) ugly and (c) common and mass-produced. The urge to buy things appears to be a societal trait, not a characterisitioc of rich people. 🙂

No, it’s beautiful. You just have no soul.

Wealth on that scale is invariably the result of a combination of rare genius and great courage

I presume you define genius such that that is a circular argument? Meanwhile I prefer to apply the word “courage” to all the top blokes out in Afghanistan than SAS.

[hijack]
Rudeboi did you see the pics of you in the Purbecks this weekend?
[/hijack]

I have no idea even of where on Earth the Purbecks are. I have never been there.

What pics? Where?

I presume you define genius such that that is a circular argument?

Of course. But vanishingly few people get utterly loaded by fluke, while a lot of people rate their talents more highly than any market in talent does. 🙂

I have no idea even of where on Earth the Purbecks are. I have never been there.

What pics? Where?

Ve haf ze effidence, Englander!

a lot of people rate their talents more highly than any market in talent does.

Are we allowed to mention the BB contestant who proved the market in talent doesn’t necessarily recognize genius?

We are working on different ideas of what constitutes wealth here. I quite agree that the odd few million may be picked up here and there despite a proven pointlessness. 😉

BigDummy, what makes you think that all of us mortals are “forced to spend all our time grubbing around trying to make a living can only dream of, as well as the ability to have sexual intercourse on demand with almost anyone instead of just watching it on the internet.“

That is the biggest piece of rubbish I have heard in a long time. How about you speak for yourself? If this is what your aspirations are plainly dictated by the society you live in – good for you.

Less time watching MTV cribs and worlds richest, more time enjoying the qualities in life which are free (and trust me, there are many). There is more to life than being incredibly rich or shagging some brainless blondes, but hey I’m just speaking for myself…

[Person on internet expresses ludicrously controversial opinion without caveating it enough for some people’s taste shock. Hold the front page] 😉

Sorry the title seems to have been cut short:

“something that’s less useful than Sheldona’s extra top-tube and it’s not RudeBoy”

Rudeboy yesterday…

SSP

How true SSP

Clearly my extra tube is useful as it gives you (Rudeboy) something to think about in your plain simple life, now move along little man and find something else to think about.

NicheFeathers all ruffled? 😉

What handbags for a niche fight? 😉

Sheldon,

RB has plenty to think about with all the conspiracy theories he keeps reading about…I know this because they* are watching his every move 🙂

SSP

*you know, “them” the ones with the black helicopters employed by the lizard men!

Heh!

Nice chicken. What breed is it? Us city types aren’t too up on country ways.

And who TF is that charlatan, masquerading as my good self? 😯

The matter is now in the hands of my legal team. I shall comment no further.

BD – As an explanation of why people buy things, you seem to be saying ‘Other people also buy things’. Thanks for the lesson on ‘poor people’ though 😛

Indeed. The point is that asking “why?” of the need to purchase things is a question applicable to both rich and poor people. Unless they’re so poor they have nothing to buy or nothing to buy anything with. As this diamond (and indeed most of Dubai) demonstrates, the point at which rich people become too rich to buy things does not appear to have been reached yet. 😀

Wealth of such magnitude

Odd thread. BD salivating over the fact that the rich are different from you and I… and then getting all sniffy about what he sees as mere platitudes from RB. What if – as the blighted credit agencies are discoverin’ – real value lies somewhere else altogether…? Put it this way: five million quid could buy you some overpriced bling, or a yacht full of models licking MDMA-infused whipped cream off each other, or god-knows-how-much simple oral rehydration solution (diarrhea being a leading cause of mortality worldwide in children under five). I suspect that not even BD would sneer at the moral/ethical dimension of such a choice.

As for buying things: I’d whore myself for a set of vintage XT Thumbies, but materialism generally equates to “stuff”, and stuff means clutter. And I hate clutter.

All IMO, of course. 😀

I must confess that I was rather hoping that Rudeboy would bite rather harder than he did. 😉

(The diamond) has personality and character

No, its a diamond.

I must confess that I was rather hoping that Rudeboy would bite rather harder than he did

“It is not a fish until it is on the bank”, as the Irish say. 😀

Well, that’s ‘cos you underestimated me as usual, BD. You took my comments as ‘aren’t rich people all selfish bastards’, which was not what I meant.

five million quid could buy you some overpriced bling, or a yacht full of models licking MDMA-infused whipped cream off each other, or god-knows-how-much simple oral rehydration solution (diarrhea being a leading cause of mortality worldwide in children under five)

Who woon’t want the former? Blimey Charlie..

But as Noteeth points out, how can you ignore something like the latter?

As a 10-year old child, I traveled to Bangladesh, with my family. The poverty and suffering I saw there, made me realise that I am not poor. Never will be, whilst I live in Britain, have a roof over my head, have benefited from a truly excellent Higher Education system, and can rely on a World-class health care system. In many respects, I am positively wealthy, compared to most other people on this planet.

I do like shiny pretty things. But I woon’t want really spensive things, knowing that millions of others don’t even enjoy basic Human Rights, such as access to clean water, adequate food, the right to live a life free from persecution and injustice.

Personally, I’m not bothered about being ‘rich’. I’m just not motivated by greed, and the need to posess as much as possible. Just seems pointless, to me. We already have so much, to enjoy, yet we always seem to want more. Now, I dunno about you, but that dissatisfaction with what we’ve got, and a constant hunger for more, strikes me as a terrible insecurity, which pervades every aspect of our lives, when we could just get on and enjoy what we’ve got.

But I may be discounting Human Nature, here. The will to survive. The need to dominate, to ensure control of resources, etc.

I just think we’ve kind of lost the plot, a bit. We’ve forgotten our Humanity.

Ho hum.

noteeth – how much would you whore yourself for some xt thumbies, exactly?