How is it not a character flaw ?

Because all of us want stupid shit?

Unless you’re willing to bundle everything beyond pure Buddha-tier equanimity as “character flaws.”

it’s unfair to draw the line between “useless thing you were socialized to spend money on” and “useless thing someone else was socialized to spend money on.”

Eh… stupidly expensive, unethically sourced, low store of value, easily substituted by superior cheaper alternatives feels like the height of “bad” materialism if there is such a thing.

Considering how many marriages end due to finances and how often couples fight over money, "wastes money" is probably one of the least desirable traits in a future spouse.

"Failure to see reason" is probably the next biggest red-flag/dealbreaker for me.

I'm going to die alone.

Fortunately it's the future. Just (gently) advertise on your Tinder (well, more likely Hinge) profile that you've watched that movie about blood diamonds and will be buying your and your future wife a lavish foreign honeymoon instead of a blood diamond to pre-screen potential dates if it's a deal breaker to you.

Yeah well that’s society for ya. If you go with lab grown make sure you only go for a size that’s actually achievable in natural-diamond prices for your income level. The signaling game (silly as it is) is good at outing “that’s an excessively large diamond for his/her income, must be lab-grown” versus “that’s a large diamond for his/her income, that’s an indicator of priority.”

The flaw isn't 'wanting the diamond', the flaw is 'being aware of the horrific nature of the industry and still wanting the diamond'.

A significant volume of the world's clothes are produced through sweatshop and child labor.

Then there's consumer electronics manufacturing... ...or being a tourist to the Saudi Arabia/Turkey/Russia/UAE where modern-day slavery is taking place at scale.

Out of sight, out of mind.

I’m sure the coffee you drink and the tshirts you wear and the phone you use are all ethically sourced eh?

We’re all deluding ourselves for the sake of sanity + having nice stuff.

Are you telling me I can get lab-grown coffee and t-shirts that avoid the nastiest parts of the traditional processes? As for phones, I'm on a used iphone 6. That doesn't make its original sourcing any better, but harm reduction is still reduction

The utility of a diamond ring is not to have shiny rock. It’s meant to be an expensive useless thing to demonstrate that you/your partner can spend money on expensive useless things.

So a shiny thing that’s less expensive actually doesn’t satisfy the same role.

A shiny thing that’s just as expensive but less valuable (ie lower $/karat, ie lab grown) is so large as to out itself as not-the-truly-ridiculous waste of money that a real diamond is supposed to be for its signaling value.

Yes! Fairtrade coffee and pre-owned clothing is the least we can do in the face of capitalism's worst excesses. It won't end horrors of humanity that have existed since before capitalism but it's something. Hoping a usable Fairphone comes to the US, but getting a refurb iphone is still better than getting a new one.

You can't fix the whole world with personal choices, like an eyedropper against the ocean, but you can still opt out of the worst excesses without having to compromise every modern convenience.