Gender Revele

[BrandineDelRoy]

Or sex revelation? I'm not a fan of nouns becoming verbs. But this is beyond words stupid.

When they told me my baby's sex, it came with a caveat that they might be wrong. Imagine having a pink party, getting loads of pink presents and then having to say oops.

We really are being shit women if we don’t get excited at the thought of a gender reveal party. The lovely cake, cupcakes and pastel icing, the ribbons, the confetti etc. What’s wrong with us??!

We really screw up our ‘cis’ credentials. How are our lovely gender non-confirming daughters and sons going to know they’re non-binary or transgender if we don’t subscribe to all these ‘cis’ rituals? What are they going to be rebelling against or veering away from to express their difference if there’s non of this shit to laugh at?

I jest of course. As a woman who was genuinely mystified at this increasing expectation to find out the sex of your baby before it was born - who absolutely didn’t care, who just wanted a healthy baby, I’ve been agog at how the gender reveal thing has grown into such a ridiculous thing. I’m sure they’re fun and ‘any excuse for a party’ but it’s like they’re compulsory now (yes, I know they’re not really) And because of that perception 14 year olds can have a laugh at this example of ‘cis’ normativity and point and stare at us for our ‘oppressiveness’ and ‘hatred’ of people who don’t buy into all that and are unique and distinctive individuals.

It’s exactly this sort of shite that identity politics actually reinforces and shores up. That makes a little boy who loves glitter ‘a girl’ and a little girl that loves running about outdoors, ‘a boy’.

I wish gender would just fuck off

Imagine having a pink party, getting loads of pink presents and then having to say oops.

Why would you get pink presents?

I think the real issue the TRAs have with "gender" reveal events is that it gives the lie to the whole AMAB/AFAB mantra, as if sex were randomly assigned by whoever attends a birth rather than it simply being observed.

If parents can know their baby's sex at around halfway through pregnancy, observations at birth merely confirm what is already known, and that doesn't suit the movement and its agenda.

My issue is the gender stereotyping involved with all the pink and blue coding. It's little less than indoctrination from birth. We had a lot of fun helping to plan and decorate a gender neutral nursery before anyone knew the sex of our grandchild, and nothing was changed when we did! I knitted in mustard and teal and rust and cream and it was much more trendy and fun than insipid pastels.

Even a slight tendency to pink a girl will lead to that girl knowing she is considered to have a personality that will be different to the blue group.

Discrimination by a thousand cuts

Hey, don’t be mean about pastels, I love them...

Wise parents protect their child from the excesses of gendered dress and toys. We need to follow children's own fascinations. I acquired a step-grandchild and on the last two birthdays have given a child-friendly world globe on a ring stand (so it can be picked up like a ball) and this year a proper microscope (for looking at insects and plants from the garden, etc). I'm now looking for ideas for next year when she'll be 9. Anything to offer an alternative to the fashionable tide of pink plastic tat and electronic entertainment!

Clothes, bedding etc. If you’re in group of people who like that sort of thing, wouldn’t it be expected?

@Tanders

Really? You don't see how picking a blue cake for a boy or a pink cake for a girl is reinforcing stereotypes

Nope. I find how the child is treated once they are born has far more of an effect on them than a cake when they are in utero and have no idea what's going on. You could assume that those who have a party are more likely to buy into stereotypes and inflict them on their child, but the actual reveal itself has zero effect.

And you think a parent who starts enforcing sex stereotypes when the child is still in utero won't continue doing so?

And you think a parent who starts enforcing sex stereotypes when the child is still in utero won't continue doing so?

Not neccessarily, no. You obviously do based on assumptions.

@PaleBlueMoonlight

Hey, don’t be mean about pastels, I love them...

Fruit pastels? I prefer chocolate

Yeah, that Twitter thread linked to is nuts.

I hate these parties but it's an excuse for more gifts/attention seeking/self-promotion.

My son was born in 1990. Almost nobody knew then what sex their baby was until he or she was born.

Really? My son was born in 1985 and I found out from the scan that he was a boy. My daughter was born in 1990, and I also knew in advance.

As for pink/blue -- I don't see the colours as necessarily reinforcing gender stereotypes: to me they are simply symbols,superficial indicators of the baby's sex, seeing as you can't tell the difference without actually seeing the genitals. Not that we NEED to know, but it's nice to be able to refer to a boy as a boy and a girl as a girl, using the correct pronouns. When my little granddaughter (2y) wears neutral colours (as she often used to) people tend to think she's a boy and refer to her as "he", because she doesn't have a very girly face, was bald for ages, etc.

None of my friends who had children around the same time as me knew the sex of their children

@DidoLamenting

None of my friends who had children around the same time as me knew the sex of their children

And just about everyone in my area did! Maybe it's a location thing -- my kids were born in Switzerland and Germany, and it was common there. Of course, the important thing was to have a healthy baby; but it was offered, and I was curious, so... nothing about buying the right colour clothes/room painting, though!

Not that we NEED to know, but it's nice to be able to refer to a boy as a boy and a girl as a girl, using the correct pronouns

Presumably friends, relatives and co- workers tell you the sex of their baby rather than signalling it by pink or blue clothes? If not, how very peculiar.

I don't comment on random, unknown children so am unsure of the situation where I would need to know the sex of an unknown child.

A couple of times I've bumped into people I only know through work with their new babies- "what a beautiful baby? Girl or boy?" worked fine.

@Tanders

And you think a parent who starts enforcing sex stereotypes when the child is still in utero won't continue doing so?

Not neccessarily, no. You obviously do based on assumptions.

Yes I do. I think it's more likely than not. If someone is so, I don't know, narrow-minded/ conformist/ hide bound by stereotypes that they think the colour of the icing on a cake , before their child is even born, has to be pink or blue I don't hold out much hope that they will make a stand against other stereotypes.

I went to one just before lockdown in Feb, they had a confetti balloon and a cake, and shock horror used pink as they have a girl (she's been born since). Her nursery is neutral, haven't seen any pink clothes, and my friend, so her mum has played women's rugby for as long as I've known her, never wears dresses, is the only female in her thermal engineering work team, has climbed Kilimanjaro and the horror even has short hair; I'm not convinced that she is set on passing on girls = pink and must stick to gender 'norms' as dictated by society, she just wanted a fun party. He is a primary school teacher, woah. I don't think a few people in her back garden is contributing to harmful gender expectations more than other things. Of course some people who have them will probably kit their child out in blue or pink, but I think people have an odd image of the type of people who throw them, that they're all the same.

I had a gender reveal with DS nearly 6 years ago before they were a bigger thing in the uk.

I'd had previous pregnancy losses, family and friend bereavements, family and friends who weren't well and friends who were moving away and wouldn't be around when the baby was born. It was just a nice excuse to get together and celebrate some good news for once. People still talk about how lovely the afternoon was and how nice the cake was!

I didn't force people to come and those who came were genuinely excited to find out what we were having. I know some people say nobody else cares what sex the baby is apart from the parents but our friends and family wanted to find out.

The cake had blue sponge when we cut in to it but I've never forced gender stereotypes on DS at all.

Some of them are tacky and cringy but some are just a nice way to celebrate with loved ones. All the negativity around them (excluding the recent well deserved negativity!) is a bit nasty at times. Just let people celebrate what they want to celebrate!

@DidoLamenting

Not that we NEED to know, but it's nice to be able to refer to a boy as a boy and a girl as a girl, using the correct pronouns

Presumably friends, relatives and co- workers tell you the sex of their baby rather than signalling it by pink or blue clothes? If not, how very peculiar.

I don't comment on random, unknown children so am unsure of the situation where I would need to know the sex of an unknown child.

A couple of times I've bumped into people I only know through work with their new babies- "what a beautiful baby? Girl or boy?" worked fine.

I don't comment on random, unknown children so am unsure of the situation where I would need to know the sex of an unknown child.

Neither do I, but, say, in a playground situation, I might tell my dgd, 'look, that little girl want's to play with your ball" or 'throw the ball to that little boy" something like that. It'a not a big deal, and not particularly peculiar.

I did witness an exchange once between a man and a new mother. The baby was dressed in a pink floral babygro and a pink headband with a flower on it.

The man said to the mother: "is it a boy or a girl?"

I had to stop myself from bursting into laughter. In theory, the man could have been making a point about gender stereotyping and not assuming the child's sex based on clothing. In reality I think he was just a bit gormless...

@CharDee

I had a gender reveal with DS nearly 6 years ago before they were a bigger thing in the uk.

I'd had previous pregnancy losses, family and friend bereavements, family and friends who weren't well and friends who were moving away and wouldn't be around when the baby was born. It was just a nice excuse to get together and celebrate some good news for once. People still talk about how lovely the afternoon was and how nice the cake was!

I didn't force people to come and those who came were genuinely excited to find out what we were having. I know some people say nobody else cares what sex the baby is apart from the parents but our friends and family wanted to find out.

The cake had blue sponge when we cut in to it but I've never forced gender stereotypes on DS at all.

Some of them are tacky and cringy but some are just a nice way to celebrate with loved ones. All the negativity around them (excluding the recent well deserved negativity!) is a bit nasty at times. Just let people celebrate what they want to celebrate!

And this here is why I regret saying up thread that I would find a even a non-gender stereotyping gender/sex reveal party over the top and unnecessary, because I don’t necessarily think I would. It isn’t a celebration that has featured even tangentially in my life and it seems to me an odd basis for a celebration, but I can totally understand that someone else might want to and I would almost certainly thoroughly enjoy it if someone I cared about threw such a party. I am always grateful to someone for putting in the effort of throwing a party or gathering.

Gender reveals were discussed on The Daily Show this week, with Trevor Noah very sincerely pondering whether they’re necessary anymore as “we know so much more about gender now” and maybe we could leave them until a person knows what gender or otherwise they want to be. Ended the bit with a dismissive ‘Karen’ gag as well. Trevor Noah is not an idiot. Really depressing.

A sex revelation party sounds more interesting than this boring thing.