Note that I’m not just talking about the shitheads who cause forest fires or water contamination, with their bullshit. I’m talking about ANY of this dumb shit.
People used to have some goddamn dignity. If you wanted to keep the sex of the baby a secret, then you’d have both pink and blue cigars ready to hand out, after the birth. If you wanted the doctor to tell you, then that’s fine. You’d be talking to your friends and you’d go “yeah, the new kid’s gonna be a girl.”
The whole concept of an extra baby shower, just to hoot and holler about that shit is FUCKING INTOLERABLE.
As far as I’m concerned, it shows that these dipshits are only interested in their offspring as accessories to their own lives. They’re after the attention they can get, off the back of their children. They’re after the lifestyle of being a parent, so they can associate with other people who define themselves based on the social and material trappings of parenting. And they’re drooling after social media likes and views.
Anyone who participates in that shit is proving that they’re not interested in being the parent of a human being. They’re just making a doll to dress up and pose for pictures, starting before the child is even out of the womb.
To reiterate the title: if it was up to me, everyone who has ever had any kind of gender-reveal nonsense for their upcoming kid should have that child seized by the state, hopefully to be raised by real people, rather than soulless degenerates.
It’s the grandiose, self-congratulatory, hyper-ceremonial pomp and circumstance of the situation.
It demonstrates a total lack of humility. So your baby-oven functions properly. Whoopee. It can produce either of the two standard flavors of human. Big fucking deal.
You know why so many traditions are ancient? Like, rooted in versions of themselves that are at LEAST centuries old, if not millennia? BECAUSE STARTING NEW TRADITIONS IS AN INTRINSICALLY EGOTISTICAL THING TO DO.
Following old traditions isn’t just something you do because you’re “supposed to.” When you follow a venerable tradition (as oppposed to a trendy fad), you are communicating that you understand your place. You’re just one human in a long chain of humans, just like yourself in every important respect. You’re affirming that you understand you’re truly not anything special, and neither are your offspring. And that’s A GOOD THING. Most people aren’t special. People have intrinsic value, as EQUALS, and it’s good when we recognize that.
Jumping onto a newly-made, bandwagon tradition like this one (especially one that is openly self-aggrandizing) indicates that you think in the opposite fashion. You think you’re the hottest of all the hot shit. You think you’re the main character.
If you think that way, you’re simply a bad person.
Man you are an AH. The baby oven functioning properly is not a guarentee. Its something a lot of people struggle with. I find you much more cringe than people wanting to throw an extra party. The only gender reveal party ive ever been to was for people with fertility issues. They had several miscarriages and that pregnancy meant the world to them. Seeing the gender on ultrasound was a milestone theyd never reached despite years of heartbreak.
So you’re insensitive and edgy, big whoop. You don’t need to post about it and pretend you are hot shit.
I understand people WANTING to throw an extra party. I understand people WANTING to pretend that they’re special snowflakes.
The point is, in order to be functional members of society, you need to RESTRAIN your selfish urges to scream about how super-duper you are, from your fucking rooftop.
You say I’m pretending that I’M hot shit? No. I’m not bragging about myself. I’m not saying I’m special. What I’m doing is trying to take annoying, self-absorbed shitheads down a few pegs. That is a necessary and useful function of society. That’s not a new fad. Reminding annoying people that they suck is possibly the longest-standing tradition that exists. I’m certain that language was literally invented, just so people could be told to stop acting the fool.
What? No, traditions proliferate because of network effects and cultural momentum.
Yes, that’s the mechanism of their transmission. But their PURPOSE is to reaffirm cultural norms, chiefly ones related to humility and basic conformity to one’s society. Not the “I’m going to do literally everything exactly the same as everyone else” sort of conformity, mind you. Just the BASIC kind of conformity and humility. The kind that says “I’m no more valuable than everyone else in the community.”
Rushing to join a new tradition (especially one that hyper-celebrates one’s own reproduction) is an indication of the opposite impulse. You’re communicating that you’re better, more important, more valuable than your peers and your ancestors. That’s destructive and maladaptive. Not everyone can be the best. If everyone thinks they’re the most special, then nobody will want to do the equitable sharing and sacrificing that all societies have to do, in order to keep running.
Last question; do you have children yourself?