Coronavirus pandemic has made ‘gender reveals’ hotter than ever

Pyrotechnics from a gender reveal party in Yucaipa sparked a wildfire and ignited an international firestorm of criticism and fierce cultural debate over a custom many say is toxic and dangerous — not least because the fire continues to rage.

"I actually had a lot of people calling me asking if it was my gender reveal," said Samantha Nguyen of Santa Ana,who learned she was having a boy at her own gender reveal celebration the next day. "Everybody messaged me like, 'Oh my God, what have you done?'"

The events have grown so extreme that even the Pasadena mom who originated them now regrets it. But that doesn't mean they're going away. Instead, gender reveals are hotter than ever, thanks in part to rapid advances in prenatal technology and a global health crisis that has compressed major rites of passage into Zoom meetings and TikToks.

"It's a highly visual way to have a kind of kinship moment around the announcement of a child," said professor Jules Gill-Peterson of the University of Pittsburgh, author of "Histories of the Transgender Child"and a critic of the celebrations. "But it's also probably about how isolating it feels to be pregnant during this time and not to be able to rely on family."

Read the full story on LATimes.com.

Source: ktla.com