Gender-Reveal Parties
Hello! I recently had a friend ask for my thoughts on why gender-reveal parties are harmful. And because I spent almost an hour typing this up, I thought I might as well share it here too. :)
A few short key thoughts:
1) It starts putting people into boxes even before they’re even born.
2) It reinforces gender as something biological. It implies that genitals = gender, which is not true. That assumption is of course super harmful for non-binary and trans people, but it’s also harmful for cisgender people in terms of stereotypes and expectations that will be placed on them.
3) Any update about the growth of your baby is allowed to be exciting, but why the hyper-focus on genitals? I think planning an event that focuses on your baby’s genitals is weird and if people want to throw parties they can come up with other themes.
4) A lot of times gender reveal parties can be the thing to spark shopping sprees for the baby’s clothes, room decorations, etc. The implication there is that a person’s genitals can tell you about who they are going to be, what color they want their bedroom to be painted, what clothes they’re going to want to wear, etc. but their genitals tell you literally nothing about them except for what their genitals are.
I’m super interested in both parenting and gender theory, so here’s a bonus rant on number 4:
In terms of the bigger picture idea of furnishing a baby’s room - it may seem like it doesn’t matter in the slightest, because a baby probably won’t notice or care about the color of their wall. But theming a bedroom based solely on gender stereotypes is unoriginal and annoying, at best. Again, most of the time it won’t be a big deal.
But let’s say you find out your baby has a vagina so you paint her room pink and buy her dresses and pink clothes. Cool! Best case scenario, that kid grows up and is a girl and loves the color pink. Or maybe she grows up and is a little annoyed, or she doesn’t care in the slightest. OR, maybe that kid grows up and at some point, realizes he’s a boy. The more emphasis his parents have put on gender and gender roles, the harder his transition is going to be. And it’s going to be tough to see photos of a gender reveal party. And he won’t be able to show anyone his baby photos without outing himself as trans. Etc.
People are really so ready to assume their kid won’t be trans or non-binary, and it pisses me off because it’s not too much effort to leave space for that possibility. And the steps you can take to prepare in case they are (such as not enforcing too many stereotypes), will also still be good things to do even if you’re right and your kids are cisgender.
Unless you’re super committed to genderless parenting*, at some point you do have to make an assumption about your kid’s pronouns and gender, until they tell you otherwise. But it’s just generally not a good start to be forcing really strong gender stereotypes onto your kids, even if you guess right about their gender identity. So keeping it somewhat balanced or neutral until they can have a say in it is just the kindest thing to do for them.
*I’m personally not super into the “raise girls and boys the same” movement, because even though it’s a lovely thought, gender is such a huge part of society and kids will have different experiences, pressures, dangers, etc. based on their gender identity, so ignoring it altogether is probably not a good idea and will be impossible to maintain once they get school-age and have outside influences. From being friends with a handful of trans/non-binary people, from working with young kids, and from what I’ve learned of sociology/psychology/queer theory/feminism/etc.: What’s most important is to listen to your kid, honor their wishes and pronouns and identities, and support them figuring out who they are without trying to force them into a box from before they’re even born.
