Is it wrong to feel superior?

I ask because I've been meeting a lot of girls lately who, like me, are engaged and I have noticed one particular trait that their engagement rings have in common: Poor quality diamonds. Now. People may recall that I didn't even want a diamond at first - I asked for a ruby, but it turns out that most rubies these days are man-made and have poor color (as in, fluorescent pink). I also asked, once I'd settled on a diamond, for a quarter carat. I didn't care so much about color and clarity - I'm not perfect, why should my diamond be?

Well, I wound up with a perfect (at least to the naked eye) diamond that is just under half a carat. It sparkles just right and the setting is the loveliest I've ever seen.

Right after we became engaged, a co-worker of Will's asked his girl to marry him. He gave her a three stone ring, and the center stone must be at least a carat-and-a-half. The side stones are nearly as large. I saw it in "mood" lighting at a party, so I have no idea what quality the diamonds were, but I remember thinking that it was awfully garish. Another of his co-workers just got married and her husband bought her a one carat diamond. It's sort of milky white and looks...dirty. A girl in a shop I went to last week wore a nicely sized three stone ring. Again, milky, dirty diamonds.

Why size over quality? My ring cost under a thousand dollars (in fact, around one week's salary - but how vulgar of me to disclose that) and is classy.

I guess I just don't understand the need for a big diamond. It isn't a status symbol, really - is it? And if so, isn't quality just as important as size, if not more so?

I don't get it.