Surprise! It's a Gender!

 I placed a call to my tech support the other day, something I'm becoming increasingly reluctant to do.  For starters since they have my flat bugged its largely unnecessary but also because I'm not entirely sure they have my best interests at heart.  Nevertheless I recently had my first encounter with what is apparently a "cultural phenomenon" and I wanted to see if it had crept into the more tyrannically ruled parts of the world.

My tech support were pleased to see me or at least they seemed less displeased to see me than most of the people I run into.

"Happy New Year, did you get the mutated, poisonous snakes we sent you for Christmas?"

"I did but you shouldn't have put them all in the same box.  By the time I got around to opening it there was a scene of reptilian carnage not seen since the extinction of the dinosaurs."

I could see one of them making a note; "killer reptiles to be sent in separate boxes from now on."

"So what can we do for you?" they asked,  "I hope you're not going to ask for Aryna Sabalenka's phone number again."

"We might get on."

"She's the one who ordered the snakes."

"That's a little harsh, she doesn't even know me."

"We might have dropped a few hints."

"Remind me to take my profile off your dating website."

"For the last time that's not a dating website its a human trafficking board."

With the preliminaries safely out of the way I got down to the real reason for my call.

"I've been invited to a gender reveal party."

"Well if you don't know by now..."

"Not my gender, relatives of friends are having a gender reveal party for their child.  Does that sort of thing happen in Belarus?"

"Oh yes, all the time.  Mind you we just call it child birth.  We bring potatoes for the fortunate mother, a bottle of vodka for the doctor and midwife and play guessing games to see if we can identify the father. Its a happy time."

"This is actually happening before the birth."

"Before the birth?  Well that's Westerners for you.  You're so impatient."

So it would appear that the delights of the gender reveal party have not yet filtered through the protective layer of secret policemen and pollution that shields Belarus from the outside world.  My tech support would be of no use to me.  With nothing more to ask them I signed off, well there was one more thing.

"Guys, about Aryna Sabalenka."

"We'll see what we can do."

"Really?"

"No."

It would not be true to say that I have never heard of a gender reveal party.  I just thought it was a peculiarly American peculiarity.  Now it would appear that they are making their way to Australia as well.  I've got to admit I'm not a fan.  For starters why all the excitement?, basically you've only got a choice of two.  I had a fifty percent chance of getting it right without any extra information at all.  Secondly, again why all the excitement?  Once the pregnancy has been established there's a pretty good chance you're having something.

I know (or at least I have been informed) that when a joyful event happens a certain type of person feels an overwhelming urge to share that information with their friends.  Either so those friends can share the joy or possibly to make them feel worse about their own wretched, joyless existence.  But this isn't a joyful event.  That doesn't take place for a few months (either that or it took place a few months ago) all this is really about is cataloging.  You're basically having a party to announce what is going to be on your child's drivers licence in sixteen years time.  Possibly another party will be required when you discover whether they're right or left hand dominant (for the record I'm left hand submissive).

There is also the danger that your children upon looking back on videos of the various festivities which announced their insertion into one of society's currently accepted gender slots will pick up on which gender the parents were actually hoping for which could lead to a certain amount of tension in the teenage years.  It is a little unfair to expect children to start disappointing their parents before they are born.

Finally of course you don't know how your child is going to identify in years to come.  It is possible that footage of your gender reveal festivities will be the principal evidence when your offspring accuse you of a pre-natal hate crime.