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Mom credited with inventing gender reveal parties begs people to stop

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LOS ANGELES – Jenna Karvunidis, a Los Angeles blogger who is credited with creating the gender reveal party, now wants the trend to end, according to a post she put on Facebook.

She was expecting her first child in 2008 and decided to have a party. The party was covered by Bump Magazine, Karvunidis was interviewed and then she says the idea spread from there.

“I’ve felt a lot of mixed feelings about my random contribution to the culture,” Karvunidis said. “It just exploded into crazy after that. Literally – guns firing, forest fires, more emphasis on gender than has ever been necessary for a baby.”

In the decade since Karvunidis popularized the trend, it has traveled all over the world, including to Australia where a gender reveal party took a dramatic turn as a car used to spew blue smoke suddenly ignited.

"Who cares what gender the baby is?" Karvunidis said. "I did at the time because we didn't live in 2019 and didn't know what we know now - that assigning focus on gender at birth leaves out so much of their potential and talents that have nothing to do with what's between their legs."