Message n1

I've seen vids of crocodiles in a gender reveal party and I'm like…evolution will do its job.


It is September 2020 and a violent wild-fire in California which resulted in extensive damage, evacuation, and land loss, was started by what the news described as a 'smoke-generating pyrotechnic device' used in a gender reveal party.

The result of this news is that I get lost in a YouTube black hole for hours.

Balloons blow up ejecting blue or pink confetti into the air, and awful looking cakes are cut open to show the party guests whether the expectant couple will give birth to a little boy or a girl.

During my descent into the gender reveal nightmare, I realise how many of these celebrations went from slightly to terribly wrong, and I stumble into yet another video and yet another fire.

The video dates back a couple of years. It is 2018 in Arizona, the camera is recording a black shooting target surrounded by tall, dry grass. The words ‘Boy or Girl’ are handwritten on it, and soon the target, which I learn is packed with explosives, is shot by the father-to-be with a high-powered rifle.

A big blue cloud violently leaks out into the air and shortly afterwards the grass starts burning, all the while the voice of a man nervously suggests packing everything up and leaving, before the video cuts out.

The fire ended up destroying 47,000 acres and resulted in $8 million in damages, not to mention all the people who had to be evacuated.

Never before had I watched unfolding in a slow-motion video, the damage that heteronormativity can wreak.


We may, ultimately, want more undisciplined knowledge, more questions and fewer answers
(Halberstam)