Maybe I’ve got my priorities very screwed up, but I find this sort of nonsense much more offensive than, say, nudity.
Perhaps it is marginally less a boondoggle than purchasing the “rights” to name a star after someone, but I ran across this disturbing business in an ad hosted on ABC News’ website.
The LifeGem ® is a certified, high-quality diamond created from the carbon of your loved one as a memorial to their unique life.
Love. Life’s single greatest risk. Life’s single greatest reward. Love captures your heart in a second and holds it for eternity.
You have known the feeling of pure joy and elation, and it will be forever cherished. Love is more than a memory.
You have experienced a love without equal. You have had someone truly special in your life and mere words simply will not do.
Love knows no boundaries. Love knows no end.
Let’s put aside the idea that the carbon that one dies with in one’s body is pure happenstance, and that as far as we can tell there’s nothing particulary unique about the specific atoms that constitute that portion of a person’s body. This is a very strange commodification of a corpse, to convert it into a trinket, a thing.
I suppose that I could go on at length about why I feel that this is so, but I’m more interested in your own reactions, so I’ll leave it at that.
So the freeze-dried body of my dad propped up in the corner isn’t your style either?
Jeez. Why not process the carcass through an oyster and make a pearl?
I’d rather be catfood, Robin.
Yeah, but analyze, guys. Why’s this so . . . sick?
Love knows no boundaries…. This makes me think of this guy in Brisbane I heard about…
I am not offended by nudity, I just don’t think it belongs on Jeff’s site. However, if he thinks it’s okay, I won’t say anything again.
As far as making diamonds from whatever carbon happens to be present in the body of a loved one at the time of their death, eh, whatever. It’s weird, but once I’m done with my body I really won’t care too much what happens to it, I think. Then again, I won’t know until it’s too late.
Nonsense, cranky. We are here to quarrel and fuss and agree and disagree. Or at least I am. Anyway, it may improve (and what could not?) my traffic.
At least she wasn’t showing her face. ;-P
All funeral practice is directed at the living–and almost all of it costs a bundle. I don’t find this any weirder than, say, wasting space in a grave yard or keeping an urn full of ashes on the mantle. [Waits for the movie about haunted LifeGems.]
I would make scornful remarks behind the backs of people who had LifeGems.
What do you have against hugs, Dan? Nice, sweet post mortem hugs to compress your wonderful ex-self into a tiny insignificant chip of glittery stone.I’m with cranky. After they’re done with me at med school they can crush me to bits. If they want. Or not. What the fuck do I care?
“Here she comes,” I would say. “Hide the cat.”
“I was going to get matching earrings but it looks like the twins are responding to the chemo.”
<i>This is a very strange commodification of a corpse, to convert it into a trinket, a thing.</i>
Uh, Dan, haven’t you heard of <a href="http://www.hairwork.com/remember.htm">Victorian</a> <a href="http://www.deathonline.net/remembering/mourning/victorian.cfm#memento"> mourning jewelry?</a> Or <a href="http://www.deathonline.net/remembering/mourning/victorian.cfm#photos">post-mortem photos?</a>
Certainly a small diamond is a more tasteful solution when one can’t completely let go, rather than take <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062067/">Madam Rosepettle’s</a> approach.
;-)
well, that was fun… a whole comment down the bit-bucket … how many links can I have in a comment before I’m rejected as spam, boss?
Dan, this "trinket" business is nothing new… google "victorian hair jewelry" … where the hair of the deceased loved one was either put in a locket or woven into exotic designs. Also photographing the dead was popular at that time.
A diamond seems a reasonable, tasteful solution rather than the approach <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0062067/">Madame Rosepettle</a> used.
;-)
EEEEK!!! and the comment shows up!!
Maybe I should start drinking [what time is it?]
Peepul, peepul, peepul! Do I have to point everything out?
You die, your carbon gets smushed into a lump of cubic zirconia, and what have you got? A tangible, negotiable carbon footprint offset, suitable for any transaction. If Aunt Frieda was rather portly, you might have enough for a down payment on that Prius you’ve had your eye on.
What if I come out as a pink diamond? Other than that worry, as long as my wife waits until I’m dead to smush me into a diamond… I’m fine with it.
Mass manufacturing using Brazilian street urchins is a no go for me…
Darleen, one of the default setups in wordpress is to automatically moderate comments based on the number of embedded hyperlinks. I set mine to not allow any comments including hyperlinks to post without my consent and the spamming stopped. YMMV
Eh. There are worse ways to dispose of the dead. Exposure comes to mind.
And, really, rather a nice little gem than a lump of adipocere in a coffin.
Almost two dozen comments and no Ed Gein reference?
Why settle for a little trinket when you can have a lamp or fine upholstered chesterfield.
Grampa never was the sharpest tool in the shed, but now he’s brilliant!!!!
Missing: Diamond ring. Sentimental value. Reward.
Grandpa was never so multifaceted before. Nor so adamantine.
"Musta been her nipples. They always could cut glass."
Man, I agree, Dan. It is twisted. I also think keeping your ‘loved ones’ in an urn – or what remains of their body, anyway, is a bit twisted too. But this line:“I was going to get matching earrings but it looks like the twins are responding to the chemo.â€ÂI nearly fell off my chair! Let the dead rest, I say. They’ve freakin’ earned it.
My general, plodding scientific brain responds to this much as many others have been: "It’s just carbon. We could EAT the dead; it was the person in the body who mattered, not the meat." The rest of me makes "ew" faces and finds the practice creepy, perhaps because it’s just so…so…commercial.
I don’t really see anything wrong with it, it’s no weirder than lots of other practices. I would say anything less than stuffing and mounting your dead is weird, but not out of bounds.
Me? I want my friends to use my skull as a drinking cup at my post-funeral bash.
Pellegri has been watching Charlton Heston movies.
As long as the diamond I’m made from is used on an old turntable to play "Dark Side of the Moon" or say "Houses of the Holy" or perhaps "Adagio for Strings" I have no problem with the concept. At least as long as there’s a air of reverence to the occasion. I draw the line at being set into a locket and given to someone’s teenage daughter, only to end up being traded for beer at a Goth bar.
“I was going to get matching earrings but it looks like the twins are responding to the chemo.â€ÂYou guys are killing me! Uh, just an expression. Not planning on becoming jewelry for quite awhile. Still the possibilities intrigued me. "Baby, Remember how I said we could get engaged after mom died, and you wondered why?"
I want to be freeze-dried and ground up for fertilizer. I want to be spread around the base of a fast growing pine who’s wood is used to make Brawny paper towels. Then people might think I looked like that hunk of Canadian gay archetype.
Plus, I’ll still be able to clean up after my kids.
Hello from LifeGem. Yes I am the founder and inventor. We love you bloggers. Many of your visitors have averaged about 17 minutes on my site http://www.lifegem.com
A LifeGem is not for everyone but if you ask any of our clients they will tell you how important that gem is and how it eases the grieving process.
BTW, A LifeGem is a real diamond made in a lab.
Thanks for the mention and all the creative comments. We love you guys. :)
strange days are coming
If they weren’t so freakin expensive I’d probably get one for my husband when his cat dies. Pets I can see, not so sure about people.
And BTW, the reluctance on the price is more of a statement of my feelings about my husband’s cat than anything. If I liked his cat more, I might consider it. I’m not sure how much of the cost on this is actual manufacturing/R&D/advertising cost, etc. and how much of it is playing on the "good things aren’t cheap" adage and on people’s grief.
mijos wusocune gukma
lopu http://kf8m6kc.cn/sitemapn508236.html [url=http://kf8m6kc.cn/sitemapn119807.html ]rype[/url] cyso http://nsrwkvf.cn/sitemapn471824.html [url=http://kf8m6kc.cn/sitemapn296812.html ]pemu[/url] cody http://kf8m6kc.cn/sitemapn456941.html [url=http://kf8m6kc.cn/sitemapn574265.html ]muxa[/url] jepes