A gender reveal party is a celebration where either the guests, the expecting parents, or both find out the gender of the baby.
Video Gender reveal
Description
The gender reveal party can be seen as an analogue of the baby shower, which also employs the trope of pink (denoting a female) or blue (denoting a male) to designate gender. However, it is typically held earlier, near the moment, formerly private, when parents learn the baby's predicted sex. Gender reveal parties also typically are open to men and women, unlike the traditionally all-female baby shower. The rise of the gender reveal party seems "inextricably tied to social media." YouTube searches report that there are "more than 500,000 videos of expectant couples slicing cakes, setting off smoke bombs and bashing piñatas to expose one of two colors: pink or blue". Other methods include the release of balloons from a box.
Maps Gender reveal
Criticism
Some argue that the term "gender reveal" is a misnomer, as all available tests measure the child's sex, which is to say, chromosomal or physical characteristics, rather than gender, which some believe to be an acquired social identity.
Gender reveal parties have become much more popular due to cell-free fetal DNA testing being available as early as ten weeks; some are marketed as detecting fetal sex as early as five weeks. The DNA test is non-intrusive as it only requires blood from the mother. Previously, the sex of the unborn baby was determined via obstetric ultrasonography between 16-20 weeks. The tests are not perfectly accurate, and in cases of sex chromosome disorders or other abnormalities of development their results may not match those of fetal ultrasound. Despite the potential inaccuracies of these tests, the infant's sex is determined upon childbirth by the delivering doctor through a "cursory assessment of [the] offspring's genitals"; thus, even after birth, sex assignment may not be accurate.
A significant issue is that as many as 4% of infants are intersex (formerly known as androgynous or hermaphrodite), though it is incredibly difficult to determine the frequency of these cases. Gender reveal parties may be problematic for expectant parents whose children's biological sex cannot accurately be assigned before birth, and can set the stage for future issues when the babies will not fit squarely into a pink or blue box. Modern practices in intersex management have moved away from the presumption that infants should be subjected to sex assignment surgery by guesswork shortly after birth, and it is perceived to be more important for children to have the autonomy to match a surgical intervention to their chosen gender. Psychologists believe that a child is able to declare their own gender identity "around age two or three".
Critics of the gender reveal parties fear they may set children up for a lifetime of gendered "expectations and stereotypes, and any behavioral deviation from that will be severely punished." There is no guarantee that the gender assigned to the child during this ritual will be the "gender identity [the] child ultimately adopts."
The parties have been criticized by some for perpetuating gender stereotypes through themes such as "Rifles or Ruffles?" and "Wheels or Heels?".
The concept of a "gender binary (i.e. woman/man)" is widely accepted by American society, and this structure enables gender reveal parties to flourish. According to some, gender identity should be seen as an "open-ended category" and should not depend entirely upon one's biological sex.
References
Further reading
- Gieseler, Carly (2017). "Gender-reveal parties: performing community identity in pink and blue". Journal of Gender Studies. doi:10.1080/09589236.2017.1287066.
- Nahata, Leena (2017). "The Gender Reveal: Implications of a Cultural Tradition for Pediatric Health". Pediatrics. 140 (6): e20171834. doi:10.1542/peds.2017-1834.
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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