We watched the first half of Blood Diamond last night, planning to finish it tonight. It’s horrifying to watch a movie like that, because even though you tell yourself that the people getting shot and hacked to pieces are just actors, you know it’s based on real life. I was living in Africa in 1999, and would hear news of the Sierre Leone conflict on Radio Free Africa. But seeing it in technicolor makes it all the more real.Â
As we were watching the movie, I kept glancing down at my ring and feeling ever so glad that I am wearing a ring that was made in a lab in the US by highly skilled technicians working under OSHA standards. Even though the movie points out that only 15% of the world’s dimonds come from “conflict” areas, there are an awful lot more that come from “non-conflict” areas in Africa where the diamonds may not be traded for weapons to fight a civil war, but the working conditions aren’t so spiffy.Â
Related posts:
