# What’s up with gender reveal parties and fires? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [September 7, 2020, 12:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025 "2020-09-07T12:31:43Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2021, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/121 "2021-02-23T14:06:51Z")
I saw that story, it’s sad because it’s all so stupid. Now a kid won’t have a dad. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2021, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/122 "2021-02-23T14:48:13Z")
I saw an article in the New York Times about the explosion in Liberty, New York that killed the father-to-be and injured the uncle-to-be, and yes, it’s incredibly sad and stupid. The Times [article](https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/22/nyregion/gender-reveal-explosion-ny.html) included this detail about how the older brother of the father-to-be found out. > Mr. Pekny said he got a call from family members on Sunday — the day of the party — while he was in Florida, N.Y., about 45 miles away. He thought at first that the call was a ruse to get him to the party early, but when he learned the news, he raced to Liberty on Route 17, at times faster than 100 miles per hour. > > He said he blew by a state trooper, who pulled him over and started yelling at him. Mr. Pekny said he explained why he was speeding, and after the trooper went to his patrol car and checked on the radio to verify his story, he returned to Mr. Pekny’s pickup truck. > > He said the trooper told him, “You gotta go,” and did not ticket him. “The color completely ran out of his face,” Mr. Pekny said of the trooper. “He looked like he saw two ghosts.” ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2021, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/123 "2021-02-23T15:49:54Z")
But the trooper should have told him to slow down, or his family might have to attend two funerals. ---
**Author:** ![DCnDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dcndc/32/2842_2.png) [@DCnDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DCnDC)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2021, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/124 "2021-02-23T16:02:35Z")
I don’t care how “mechanically inclined” someone is. It’s shockingly easy to accidentally build a pipe bomb when you don’t know what the fuck you’re doing, which all of these morons have conveniently demonstrated. Either figure out how to make it work with a spring, or just get the fucking balloons and be happy with that. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [February 23, 2021, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/125 "2021-02-23T19:57:32Z")
I find speeding makes the dead come back to life. YMMV. ---
**Author:** ![Rilchiam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/2bfe46/32.png) [@Rilchiam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rilchiam)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2021, 3:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/126 "2021-02-24T03:11:39Z")
What should the mom, or anyone, tell the kid about **how** dad died? I can’t really imagine that conversation. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2021, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/127 "2021-02-24T04:06:03Z")
This could be a category of Darwin awards but unfortunately by definition these people have already successfully passed on their genes before their stupidity killed them. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2021, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/128 "2021-02-24T16:22:48Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > I believe that companies and manufacturers and marketers have discovered that strict gendering drives higher revenues. The same thing has happened with entertainment. In an era in which boys and girls both like superheroes and comic books, Disney aggressively designs and markets Marvel products for boys and Princess products for girls. Somehow, extreme gendering makes people spend more money. There was a fairly popular cartoon, one of the Teen Titan cartoons, on Cartoon Network that was cancelled. The alleged reason being that the cartoon was popular amongst girls and they couldn’t figure out how to translate that into toy sales. On the flip side, a surprising number of girls were fans of the Masters of the Universe (He-Man) cartoon and Mattel developed a She-Ra series in order to sell toys to those fans. I don’t know if extreme gendering makes people spend money so much as it makes it easier to figure out who to market your product to. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2021, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/129 "2021-02-24T16:29:17Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > This could be a category of Darwin awards but unfortunately by definition these people have already successfully passed on their genes before their stupidity killed them. - [The Darwin Award can be “won” even if you have replicated](https://darwinawards.com/rules/rules.children.html). ---
**Author:** ![PatrickLondon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/patricklondon/32/4422_2.png) [@PatrickLondon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatrickLondon)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2021, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/130 "2021-02-24T17:41:16Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > I don’t know if extreme gendering makes people spend money so much as it makes it easier to figure out who to market your product to. I may be unduly jaundiced, but I have long been under the impression that products aimed at female customers are priced higher, and that a fair proportion of customers of both genders tend to think that higher-priced products are _ipso facto_ better quality/value (and it’s a rare person who wants to look like a cheapskate when there’s an addition to the family) ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2021, 5:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/131 "2021-02-24T17:52:25Z")
I don’t want to mock the dead but this is just an example of 'Merica’s social media/"Keeping up with the Kardashian/“Hey, look at me” culture run amok. I get that people are excited about being a daddy and mommy - great. But do you really have to blow shit up? ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2021, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/132 "2021-02-24T18:20:44Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > Yep. The companies have seized on the incontrovertible fact that the children in the average family are about half boys and half girls, and have figured out that if you rigidly segregate their merchandise by gender, then families will have to buy more separate stuff instead of encouraging sharing and hand-me-downs. Also, a lot of girls’ stuff is priced way higher, for no real reason. … what PatrickLondon said. ---
**Author:** ![pullin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c57346/32.png) [@pullin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pullin)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2021, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/133 "2021-03-09T21:23:30Z")
In case anyone’s interested, here is a video [history](https://youtu.be/W_ByhV4eJ4s) of gender reveal disasters. I didn’t realize how many there were, and how much damage had been done. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2021, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/134 "2021-04-01T19:15:39Z")
Yet another gender reveal disaster: A plane released a pink cloud for the reveal and then promptly crashed. > **[A plane dropped a pink cloud in gender-reveal stunt. Then it fell to the sea,...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/04/01/cancun-plane-genderreveal-crash-deaths/?utm_campaign=wp_post_most&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_most&carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F3189893%2F6065ef4f9d2fda1e56dd0fbe%2F5fa00bbc9bbc0f3316b10a82%2F41%2F70%2F6065ef4f9d2fda1e56dd0fbe)** > > The pilot and the co-pilot of a small aircraft hired for a gender-reveal party in Cancún died Tuesday after the plane nose-dived into a lagoon, authorities said. ---
**Author:** ![mandala](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mandala/32/95_2.png) [@mandala](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mandala)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2021, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/135 "2021-04-07T18:52:23Z")
So if the woman is carrying twins, do they use two bombs, or one bomb and one candle-lit balloon, or something else? Lots of interesting possibilities here. ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2021, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/136 "2021-04-07T19:21:21Z")
You know the type of people who’d have a gender reveal party? ALL of my extended family (except me and my wife). And I finally, after seeing this thread so many times, figured out why the whole concept makes me uneasy. It’s because it’s another display of _"The World Revolves Around MEEEE…_ (and my darling family, and even my unborn baby)!" You’ve probably met my sisters and their ilk. They overshare everything on every social media platform, they start every conversation with “You’ve just GOT to hear what I’m planning…”, and any relationship is not only perfect, but needs to be held up in public to adoring fans as WONNNNNDERFUL! And if a daughter-in-law has been blessed with the continuation of the perfect family, well, then every detail of that is also fair game for oversharing, even things like gender. Why NOT have a party? And a shower? And can we have another party when the baby first kicks? Ooh, maybe soccer-themed… … (Damn, this place is cheap therapy. Thanks, all…) ---
**Author:** ![Roderick\_Femm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/roderick_femm/32/14875_2.png) [@Roderick\_Femm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roderick_Femm)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2021, 6:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/137 "2021-07-21T06:23:26Z")
I thought this might be of interest in this thread: > **[A Couple Is Charged In A Deadly Fire Sparked By Their Gender Reveal](https://www.npr.org/2021/07/20/1018622165/a-couple-is-charged-in-a-deadly-fire-sparked-by-their-gender-reveal)** > > The man and woman were charged with involuntary manslaughter because the El Dorado Fire killed a firefighter, San Bernardino, Calif., authorities said. So the couple whose gender reveal party was the cause of a Southern California wildfire is being charged with involuntary manslaughter because a firefighter was killed in the fire. There are other charges connected with them starting the fire, but this is apparently the most serious. I can hear them now: “But we didn’t know this would happen! It’s not our fault! It’s the fault of the lack of rain and our friends said it would be fun and we were just going along with the idea and you can’t hold us responsible because some firefighter was so careless as to get killed shouldn’t he have known better and anyway, it’s not our fault!” They pleaded not guilty. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2021, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/138 "2021-07-21T15:38:19Z")
Good! Those assholes are the ones that put me under evacuation warnings for a few days and made any number of my friends have to leave their homes, as well as killing a firefighter. I hope they rot. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2021, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/139 "2021-07-21T15:40:34Z")
> [@Roderick\_Femm](#): > > So the couple whose gender reveal party was the cause of a Southern California wildfire is being charged with involuntary manslaughter because a firefighter was killed in the fire. - Wait 'til the kid is old enough to understand this. ---
**Author:** ![peccavi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peccavi/32/388_2.png) [@peccavi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/peccavi)\ **Post date:** [July 21, 2021, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025/140 "2021-07-21T17:48:53Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > Wait 'til the kid is old enough to understand this Little Blaze? How old is he now? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-s-up-with-gender-reveal-parties-and-fires/920025.md?page=6)