February14
I guess I’m sort of skipping around. Last post was on Darfur, now I’m back to Sierra Leone and the diamond mine problem.
I watched the History Channel documentary entitled Blood Diamonds which won an Emmy for “Outstanding Non-fiction Special”.
Did you ever stop to think about what makes diamonds so valuable? They actually exist in the world in abundance. Diamonds aren’t rare. So what makes them so precious to us? Why is it that “a diamond is forever”?
The value is thanks to good marketing. Diamond’s are considered extremely valuable in the U.S. thanks to this “diamond is forever” marketing. Since the 1950’s, a diamond engagement ring has been “the thing to do”. But it is very likely that the diamond you are wearing helps aid in the cycle of violence and bloodshed.
Watch a good portion of Blood Diamonds here. It’s extremely informative.
My husband and I haven’t been to church much recently. The last time we went, the minister gave a sermon on Paul Simon’s song, “Diamonds on the Souls of her Shoes”. I took notes on the bulletin. His sermon was entitled: “Few are Guilty, All Are Responsible”.
The song is about diamond mining in South Africa…
(a-wa) O kodwa u zo-nge li-sa namhlange
(a-wa a-wa) Si-bona kwenze ka kanjani
(a-wa a-wa) Amanto mbazane ayeza
She’s a rich girl
She don’t try to hide it
Diamonds on the soles of her shoes
He’s a poor boy
Empty as a pocket
Empty as a pocket with nothing to lose
Sing Ta na na
Ta na na na
She got diamonds on the soles of her shoes
She got diamonds on the soles of her shoes
Diamonds on the soles of her shoes
Diamonds on the soles of her shoes
People say she’s crazy
She got diamonds on the soles of her shoes
Well that’s one way to lose these
Walking blues
Diamonds on the soles of her shoes
She was physically forgotten
Then she slipped into my pocket
With my car keys
She said you’ve taken me for granted
Because I please you
Wearing these diamonds
And I could say Oo oo oo
As if everybody knows
What I’m talking about
As if everybody would know
Exactly what I was talking about
Talking about diamonds on the soles of her shoes
She makes the sign of a teaspoon
He makes the sign of a wave
The poor boy changes clothes
And puts on after-shave
To compensate for his ordinary shoes
And she said honey take me dancing
But they ended up by sleeping
In a doorway
By the bodegas and the lights on
Upper Broadway
Wearing diamonds on the soles of their shoes
And I could say Oo oo oo
As if everybody here would know
What I was talking about
I mean everybody here would know exactly
What I was talking about
Talking about diamonds
People say I’m crazy
I got diamonds on the soles of my shoes
Well that’s one way to lose
These walking blues
Diamonds on the soles of your shoes
The minister, Sid Hall, said that when he was an SMU seminarian, he and several seminarians were upset with some of the investments that SMU was making that benefited corruption. They decided that they were going to change the face of SMU. But a seminarian who was a native of South Africa said that while he felt it was important to recognize the importance of divestment, he had trouble with American liberal self-righteousness that seemed to think there were easy answers. Had the Native Americans been able to resist European diseases in the same way the Africans had been able to resist the diseases, Americans would be dealing with the same thing the South Africans are dealing with today. It’s complicated. There is no easy solution. [Listen to Sid's sermon: here.]
Everything that happens in one place is connected to everything that happens everywhere else. We are all connected and that connection is not based solely upon the positive occurrences new agers emphasize but likewise upon the negative occurrences no one wants to look at. What I am doing and what I am buying has a ripple effect elsewhere. Even “not buying” has a ripple effect.
In the song, both the man and the woman are empty inside: the rich woman and the poor man. The men and women who work in the mines literally walk with diamonds on the souls of their shoes, but this does not make them rich in the materialistic sense because their labor and the dust that results from the labor is forced. Those who are wealthy and are blind to the forces that drive their need for wealth likewise have diamonds on the souls of their shoes. But they are spiritually impoverished.
Sid says the song is about the play between the west and the more impoverished nations. It’s a reminder that we are all connected to each other. Notice in the lyrics how everyone ends up with diamonds on the souls of their shoes…
- Diamonds on the souls of her shoes…
- Diamonds on the souls of their shoes…
- Diamonds on the souls of my shoes…
- Diamonds on the souls or your shoes…
It’s all interconnected. It’s not about an idealization of poverty because the idealization of poverty is reliant upon an idealization of the wealthy. And it’s not about an idealization of wealth because wealth is reliant upon the slave labor of the impoverished.
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OafqYNCzq5U&hl=en&fs=1]
