Why Beyoncé Is Receiving Backlash For Wearing The Tiffany Diamond?

Beyoncé became the first black woman to wear the Tiffany Diamond, which is one of the world’s largest ​yellow diamonds. The diamond necklace is worth $30 million dollars. Queen Bey joins Audrey Hepburn, American socialite Mrs. E. Sheldon Whitehouse, and Lady Gaga as the only human beings to wear this diamond.

This latest Tiffany & Co. campaign by Beyoncé and Jay-Z has sparked the controversy about how the company acquired this diamond in the 1800s.

The yellow diamond was mined in Kimberley, South Africa in 1877 and is one of the largest of its kind to have ever been discovered. Tiffany & Co. founder Charles Lewis Tiffany – an American – purchased the diamond the following year, and it has remained with the company ever since.

Beyoncé flexing her blood diamond extracted from the Kimberley Mine in South Africa in 1877 using enslaved African labor. https://t.co/QrZdV6zwz1 pic.twitter.com/YAiPO5Kttm

— SLANK (@DabSquad_Slank) August 23, 2021

Many are accusing Beyoncé of selling out because she just put out the “Black Is King” visual album on Disney+ last year and is now starring in a campaign for a company that has been accused multiple times of exploiting black culture.

its the fact that beyonce did a whole album and went mama africa then went to wear a blood diamond. abeg. i love beyonce but its very contradictory https://t.co/uHTEw5TW43

— Mide (@Ewmide) August 24, 2021

https://twitter.com/pyarkarda/status/1430159011941322753?s=21

this is not just “a necklace” it’s a blood diamond that was mined off the blood of south africans, if they didn’t meet their quota their hands and feet were mutilated or were just killed. beyoncé doesn’t have the timeline “up in arms”, nobody should wear the diamond https://t.co/YgsxDtvnTv

— nuerteki (@newerteki) August 24, 2021

https://twitter.com/lovely__b/status/1429865647945703431?s=21

Now let's see if the Beyhive can sell out Beyoncé and Jay Z's #Tiffany line @TiffanyAndCo pic.twitter.com/8ChHKH4KR2

— IG: hezzahez (@hezzahez) August 23, 2021

Not y'all celebrating the fact Beyonce is the first Black woman to wear a Tiffany blood diamond following in the footsteps of Audrey Hepburn and Lady Gaga 💀😬 That rock needs to left alone in a museum explaining its history while paying ongoing reparations, not paraded around https://t.co/cZkiNUt5Oq

— Zelly Lisanework (@ZellyLisanework) August 25, 2021

Ms Tina wrong! I was so excited to see the pictures because of the Michel Basquiat unseen work and tht @beyonce channelled Audrey Hepburn.

However she wearing a blood diamond and it ain’t right. Have your partnership but know the history too!

Enslaved Africans died https://t.co/jAaGQTQiP8

— Cindey 🇳🇦🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🇭🇷 (@CynthiaLudmilla) August 25, 2021

“Beyoncé wearing a blood diamond harvested by enslaved Africans is totally fine bc it’s building generational wealth for her billionaire family. Isn’t that what we want?”

Do y’all HEAR yourselves?

— Pro-Pigeon Propaganda Account (@pRHOvocative) August 25, 2021

this is so classist, a lot of people don’t know where their diamonds are sourced from the difference is everyone knows where the diamond that was on beyoncé’s neck is from. it’s a blood diamond, so WHY is anyone wearing it https://t.co/SpN2yoU0fh

— nuerteki (@newerteki) August 25, 2021

https://twitter.com/purposehustle/status/1430536717728051201?s=21

Others are pointing out why people didn’t keep this same energy with Lady Gaga who wore the diamond back in 2019 at the Oscars. People also are wondering why the same people who are calling out Beyoncé aren’t calling out the jewelry industry and museums for taking, selling, and displaying other African diamonds and art.

https://twitter.com/des_ti_m/status/1429908614857306113?s=21

https://twitter.com/franklyngautier/status/1429896852627988481?s=21

Tiffany & Co regularly discriminates against black people. They sell diamonds soaked in the blood Africans. That Basquiat painting belongs with a black collector but Tiffany & Co bought it because “the blue color”. And y’all are out here getting teary eyed because Beyoncé! Jay-z! pic.twitter.com/Tov6dzTqCR

— The Red Housewife (@TheRedHouseWife) August 24, 2021

the AUDACITY for Tiffany’s to have beyoncé wear a (blood?) diamond and think they can claim ownership and association to Basquiats art? CAMP

— ✨ur favorite libra (@ayy_pilar) August 25, 2021

When Beyoncé claps back about the "blood diamond" on B7 >>>>>

— baby 𝓴𝓲𝓷𝓰 🕊 (@kudityisking) August 25, 2021

Another person who should be receiving backlash for wearing a blood diamond is none other than Queen Elizabeth. The Queen has “Star of Africa” inside of her crown. The diamond alone is worth up to $2 billion dollars. England has took a lot of diamonds from South Africa in the last couple of centuries.

This is a good discussion to have because it is important. For people, who are calling out Beyoncé need to call out the entire industry and stay on them because Beyoncé wasn’t the first or won’t be the last person who will sport that Tiffany diamond. People need to call out the mining industry. There is no way people from another country should be allowed to dig up something in another country and take it back with them to sell it. Could you imagine somebody from Africa traveling to America and trying to dig up George Washington’s body and then return to Africa to put it in a museum or to sell it to make a fortune? It’s audacious. Both sides make valid points but the conversation shouldn’t start and end with Beyoncé because this was happening before she was born and it will keep happening after she is gone.

People have the right to hold Beyoncé accountable for wearing the diamond but who knows maybe she is finding out now where the diamond originated from, can’t assume everyone has the same information as you.