AIBU to find a baby shower wish list a bit grabby?

[Handrearedmagpie]

Friend having baby shower. I freely admit to liking baby showers, which previously have just been groups of female friends/family getting together for cakes, some wee games & a good catch up for the new mum before life gets busy.

However, friend has sent out invites for her baby shower (men included - fine, each to their own) but with an Amazon gift wish list included?!?!?! Like, aren't gifts meant to be given once baby is safely here?! Are we meant to provide good gifts (as opposed to a token baby shower gifts) twice?!

It's been a while since I've been to a baby shower as this friend is younger than me, so maybe I'm just out of date & "wish lists" are a thing? AIBU to think it's grabby??

Yes, but at least if there’s no gift list, you can choose something you like and within your budget.

Any baby shower I attended was an excuse to get a group of friends together socially and one of the group hosted it at home with others contributing to the food. We played silly games and ate pink and blue coloured cakes and bread for sandwiches (they didn't know whether the baby was a boy or a girl). Any gifts given were small items such as some wipes, nappies, a pack of bibs, etc. There was no gift list or expectation to fork out lots of money.

I think it’s both grabby and pragmatic. I think this about cash requests at weddings too. I know people will bring gifts so it makes sense to give people a steer, but I don’t know why can’t people just host a gathering for wholesome genuine reasons rather than expecting to get stuff?

There is a grabby mercenary element to it without doubt. How are people who hold them not embarrassed?

I think a baby shower is a horrible imported American custom - vulgar and crass. It goes very much against my value system to preemptively celebrate baby’s safe arrival this way. What if something goes wrong?
Expecting presents is the pits - and again, what do you do if baby is stillborn or lives only a few days? Awful.

I am sure it is a US import... like a bridal shower. Why does a bride to be need to be showered in gifts? People take gifts to the wedding.

I have only known people to give gifts to mums that have had their babies, and not some party before.

personally wouldn’t want to choose something I like but something the parents to be would find useful. And gift lists usually have a variety of different items on it from packs of nappies up to larger items.

but ultimately I doubt a close friend is going to defriend you if you bought their child an outfit that wasn’t on the list. I am sure they simply don’t want to end up with 6 outfits they know their baby will never wear or 3 nappy bins etc and it would be a waste of money for the person buying it

I think part of the joy of gifting is picking out something you think someone will like. Being given a list takes all the fun out of it.

I am 100% with you. I didn’t have one and I don’t agree with one but if someone is having one and people agree to attend, there is an expectation that you give a gift as it’s the point of the event.

thankfully I have only ever been to one in my life and that was virtual as during Covid!

I'm in the US too and don't care for baby showers and didn't have one. The games are annoying AF.

But a list is normal. Gift grab, depends what's on the list.

I remember when they were a big thing a few years ago. Probably the side hustle of choice for mums. Social media was full of "businesses" making them.
I have not seen any in a while.

OMG the games. The one I went to, the poor pregnant lady had to be hugged by everyone, and we then had to then use a piece of string to guess how big her bump was.
Another was a version of 'pin the tail on the donkey' except it was 'pin the dummy on the baby's mouth'. Every time someone had an attempt at it, the host went "wah wah wah"...

What gets missed out on these threads is that Americans don’t have baby showers for themselves. A non-relative has to offer to host one. It’s something your mom’s best friend offers to do.

And the parents get 5 baby baths, 6 bouncers and all the clothes in size newborn that won’t get worn.

Then what you’re describing isn’t really a baby shower, it’s a pregnancy get-together with cake.

I’m with Miss Manners on this. Lists, where there’s an expectation to gift an item listed, are grabby and tacky. I don’t buy the “it’s too hard to answer a question about what you’d like” nonsense. Pregnancy is not a lobotomy.

They have always been about gifts. You are showering someone with gifts, hence the name.

Also where I live in the US, the bride or the expectant mother (or her close family) should not host her shower. That would be considered grabby. Showers are usually hosted by friends of the honoree or perhaps friends of her parents.

What is the point of a bridal shower?

This is why I detest the American Baby Shower tradition, even more so that so many are doing it in the UK now. In my culture, you take a gift to mum and baby AFTER baby has been safely born.

Horrible idea that should have stayed in America, where having babies costs a bomb we in the UK don't face.

I secretly think anyone having them in the UK is a bit of a greedy git and refuse to attend one. But I think asking for money for weddings is shit as well.

In north american tradition, you don't invite people to your own baby/wedding shower - they are arranged for you (and sometimes more than once, in different contexts), by friends, family members, work colleagues. They might then ask you for a list or ideas, but it's not 'you' who is doing the inviting and expecting in quite the same way, but the hosts. Presents are often little, and useful. They might be themed (like a 'book' shower, or for a wedding, a 'kitchen' shower or a 'camping' shower or whatever). They are a nice chance for different groups of people to get together before the baby is born - traditionally, to offer advice and experience, so a wedding shower would often be all the female relatives, including ones that you might not see often. And the games or activities might reflect that.

You can't judge them as an import from somewhere else when you don't have the same history and context surrounding them, because the whole set of cultural norms would be different. It's the same with trick or treating, and other N American customs that have been imported (back) into the UK (I know the origins), things that are totally different there, and have been totally changed and sometimes worsened when imported here, and are then derided, despite the import here not really being very much like what it is there.

Ha, I agree about the weddings too.
The huge majority of people getting married already live together. What do they actually need?
I did go to one wedding where they said they just wanted money to go towards their honeymoon. That seemed reasonable to me.

What on earth is a bridal shower?

For me the worst part of all this is men at a baby shower.

Personally, I don't like wish lists at all. Even for weddings, really; its so cringey. Either ask me what I want/need or surprise me.

A pack of nappies, a toy or a little outfit is all I'd expect at, or bring to, a baby shower.

But there’s still showering the person with gifts - they just haven’t told you what to purchase? In the same way a wedding is still a wedding minus a registry, the celebration is the central part rather than the Amazon checklist one presumes?

Well then, one presumes wrong. A wedding is still a wedding without a registry because the point of a wedding is, rather obviously, two people getting married whereas a baby shower or bridal shower is literally called a shower because the guest of honor is being showered with gifts. The registry is I guess technically optional, but pretending it’s some tacky corruption of the event is absurd when gift-giving is the entire premise and comparing it to a wedding is a pretty flimsy analogy because gifts are incidental to a wedding and central to a shower. The Amazon checklist isn’t the defining feature. The 'showering with gifts' is.