[egypturnash]

While status signaling is certainly a part of the purpose of jewelry, it also serves aesthetic purposes that earphones generally completely fail at. Those Airpods don't match your necklace, or harmonize with the green accents in the pattern of your skirt, or with the blue of your eyes.

Earrings can also signal higher status than Airpods; any middle-class schlub can spend $250 on earbuds. That pales next to the numbers that earrings made from precious metals and gems can quietly whisper to anyone who notices them.

[lotsofpulp]

Can people tell the difference between expensive "real" jewelry and less expensive fake jewelry (not the $10 fakes, but the more expensive fake stuff)?

[smabie]

probably most people can't. But historically and still today among Arabs, a women's jewelry is one of the few things she absolutely owns. In that way, gold jewelry serves as insurance against divorce and other stuff like that.

[Aurum197]

egypturnash, "quietly whisper"! We almost named our earrings whisperings.

[egypturnash]

That portmanteau is so so close to working and yet so far, no matter what gyrations you go through! Must’ve been frustrating.