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Gender Reveal Parties And The Destination vs. Journey Problem

I think most people realize gender reveal parties are a punchline by now, but there’s a bigger issue we should mention.

Ted Bauer
4 min readApr 1, 2024

Thankfully, as a dude, I haven’t been invited to many gender reveal parties. I think my total attendance-wise is 2, maybe 3. I also benefited from a quirk of how my adulthood has unfolded: my ex-wife’s friends only started having babies as I was exiting that world, and when I got into a new relationship, I usually hadn’t been on the scene long enough to get a coveted gender reveal party invite.

I did, however, talk to a bartender on Rainey Street in Austin one night about his gender reveal party. His grandmother, who was late-70s at the time, was bringing the cake into the party. She fell down the stairs, hurting herself in the process, as people at the party screamed “Oh man, the cake is blue!” Apparently it was a real scene. Some of the other punchlines around the gender reveal include massive forest fires, etc.

A few weeks back, I discovered “Funky Frog Bait” on YouTube, and this is a good take on the gender reveal:

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Ted Bauer
Ted Bauer

Written by Ted Bauer

I write about a lot of different topics, from work to masculinity to relationships and social dynamics, I.e. modern friendship. Pleasure to be here.

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