Time To Ban Gender Reveal Parties

A colorful but destructive gender reveal party in Arizona
about five years ago. It's a boy! It's also a destructive
wildfire that caused $8 million in damage!

 In the past month two people have died participating or planning gender reveal parties. It's the latest disaster caused by people trying to outdo each other. Stop! 

In recent years these parties started at least two major western wildfires and inspired zillions of gender reveal party pratfall videos. 

The problem seems to be the idea has taken off, and people insist that each gender party has to play out much more elaborately than any previous one.  

In the most recent incident, a father to be died while working on a device for his child's gender reveal. According to the New York Post:

"Christopher Pekny, 28, was working on the device for his child's gender reveal part in the Catskills town of Liberty when it blew up just before noon on Sunday. 

The blast killed Pekny and injured his brother, 27-year-old Michael Pekny, who was treated for his injuries at the Garnet Medical Center in Middletown, according to police."

Earlier this month, Evan Silva, 26 died when he was hit by shrapnel from a malfunctioning cannon at a Michigan baby shower. The cannon was supposed to just emit a loud bang and apparently smoke for the gender reveal, but something went wrong with the device. 

There have been yet more deaths in recent years during gender reveal parties

A soon to be grandmother was killed in October, 2019 by shrapnel from a pipe bomb that was meant to explode and spew pink smoke.   

Two huge wildfires began at gender reveal parties in recent years.

A large wildfire started last September by a gender reveal party about 70 miles east of Los Angeles killed a firefighter. 

A 2017 Arizona gender reveal party sparked a wildfire that caused more than $8 million in damage.

Then there have been less deadly mishaps associated with gender reveal parties: 

According to the Mercury News:

In April, 2018 a car in Australia rigged to emit blue smoke caught fire as it did - irony alert - burnouts in front an an expecting couple.

In September, 2019, a crop duster that dropped 350 gallons of pink water stalled and crashed in Texas. Luckily, there was only one minor injury but the plane was destroyed. 

Sometimes the people at these parties are of, um, low quality. 

A gender reveal party in Boardman, Ohio got violent when the manager of the restaurant asked the 20 or so people to take their confetti bombs outside. They did, but then refused to clean up the mess in the parking lot.

They hurled insults and menus at staff, and left without paying their bill. 

In another case, a man kicked a football that on impact, would explode with pink powder. That's what happened, but the man also fell during the kick, badly breaking his ankle.  

Honestly, folks, if you're going to have a baby congratulations!  And please, if you must tell us the kids' gender, just text us, put it on Facebook, give us a phone call, that's it.   That's all we - and you - need.