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Rebecca Namuddu

English 103

Professor Ashley Jean Granillo

28 October 2019

Blue or Pink

In American culture cakes vary by the type of celebrations they are being presented for,

and they also vary in different styles for the same celebration. They are used to celebrate

anything from birthdays, weddings, retirements, as well as any other celebratory events including

the gender of a baby. The cake “Wheels or Heels” by Sweet Mary’s conveys the message of a

gender reveal through the rhetorical principles and semiotics conveyed on the cake. In the book,

The World is a Text, rhetoric is defined as, “the art of speaking or writing effectively – usually

with an emphasis on persuasion” (Silverman & Rader 19). The gender reveal cake would be

explored for its way of persuasion through pathos, ethos, logos, and the observations known as

semiotics. The cake titled “Wheels or Heels” by Sweet Mary’s, states that there are two genders

that are assigned a symbol; however, the cake should not be used to celebrate gender stereotypes.

The cake relies heavily on pathos from the colors to the symbols as wells as ethos by the cake

portraying exactly what it’s supposed to portray, but for logos it is influenced by an either/or

fallacy; therefore, the sex of a soon to be born child should not be celebrated with a gender

reveal cake that supports gender stereotypes because it limits people to specific gender roles in

society.

The cake ‘Wheels or Heels” by Sweet Mary’s varies in the colors it uses, the symbols it

presents, and the patterns it portrays to reveal it is a gender reveal cake. On top of the cake there

is white icing with four wheels in a pile surrounded by blue hearts on one side of the cake, and
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heels with pink bows on the other side of the cake. A childish font is used to write the word

‘Wheels” in a blue, “or” is written in a yellow, and “Heels” is written in a pink. The cake has

four white zig-zag lines surrounding it with a black background and buttons spaced out every

three zigzags. The speaker of the cake is the bakery called Sweet Mary’s and the audience is the

parents of the soon to be born child as well as family and friends of the parents.

Even though the cake is celebrating a happy moment that is about to occur, the sex of the

child should not be celebrated by using gender stereotypes to assign a child a specific role in

society. The issue is that the celebration of a child’s sex should not be defined by a symbol that is

stereotypical. Society imposes gender stereotypes at an early age of somebody’s life, even as

early as someone that still resides within the womb. This has a huge effect on how people should

be according to the sex they are biologically and throws gender in either the masculine or

feminine category. Today there are different groups of people that express themselves not by

their sex, but by what they define as who they truly are and who they are sexually attracted to.

For example, the LGBTQ community, they have a rainbow flag to identify who they are as a

whole with the vibrant colors. There are many ways colors can play a role into provoking

different meaning or emotions.

Pathos can be seen on the cake through the different colors it portrays. Pathos is defined

as, “related to our word “pathetic,” and pathos is the emotional appeal to an audience” (Hayes 7).

In the Cake “Wheels or Heels” the speaker is using the colors to appeal to our emotion of

happiness. The colors pink, blue, and yellow are appealing, vibrant and warm colors that

illiterate happiness. In American culture expecting a baby is seen as a joyful and a happy thing

that is uncovering. The waiting and anxiousness of seeing the child and welcoming it in the

world is happy feeling and that is what the colors are evoking from the cake. Not only do we see
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this portraying of happiness with the colors but also with the symbols that are presented on the

cake.

Pathos can also be seen on the cake from the symbols that are the center of the attention

of the cake. The speaker here is appealing to our emotions through the symbols to evoke our

emotion of happiness such as the most important symbols being the wheels and the heels

purposely centered as the main attention on the cake (Sweet Mary’s). The wheels represent a boy

while the heels represent a girl which signifies that there is no clue what the gender is going to be

so there is happiness in the place on finding out what sex the baby is going to be. There is

another symbol that associates the emotion happiness which is the font “Wheels or Heels”

(Sweet Mary’s). The font of these words is very important in portraying what the speaker is

trying to show, and in this cake the font is shown as a childish font. In the book, Reading the

World as a Text it states, “Fonts tells us how the designers of a text want their text to be seen,

what associations they want us to have with that text (and perhaps their product)” (Silverman &

Rader 27). The font is playful on how the words are written with the curls at the end of all the

words. This font substitutes the emotion of happiness since it is written in a child font that is

playful evoking that emotion. Even though speaker is portraying the emotion of happiness on

every inch of the cake, the speaker also addresses the value through the cake as well.

The value that the speaker depicts through ethos is that the cake is honest in portraying

what it’s supposed to portray. Dr. Hayes defines ethos as, “related to our word “ethics” and the

ethos is the ethical appeal to an audience” (6). This is seen by the cake only pertaining to two

categories of gender which is girl or boy (Sweet Mary’s). The cake is portraying that the cake is

applied to a gender reveal cake because it has “or” between the wheels and heels to show that

nobody knows which gender the baby is going to be. The cake is showing the speakers personal
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experience on what represents a girl which is pink and heels and what represents a boy which is

blue and wheels.

Similarly, logos is also portrayed through the two genders presented on the cake stating

that there are only two genders being a girl and boy. Logos is defined as, “related to our word

“logic” and logos is the appeal to fact, logic and reason” (Hayes 8). Logos is showing that the

cake is logical on that there are only two genders. This shown with the wheels representing a boy

and the heels representing a girl concluding that there are only two genders that the baby is either

going to be. The baby is going to be either a girl that presumably likes pink and heels or a boy

that presumably likes blue and wheels. The assumption of there only being two genders connects

to the idea of American society only accepting two genders, girl or boy, and discriminating

against others. The logos of this gender reveal cake is being influence by the either/or fallacy.

The either/or fallacy or false dilemma can be defined as, “[the choice of choosing]

between two opposites instead of allowing for other possibilities” (Hayes 10). The speaker only

gives the audience two opposite choices which are a boy or girl even if there are other choices.

The speaker is only assuming that there are two genders and that they are represented by the

symbols that are associated with the gender. This connects to how society views gender as only

be two, when there are more that are set off to the side because they do not fit the social norms.

In conclusion, even though the cake, “Wheels or Heels” by Sweet Mary’s is used to

celebrate a memorable, happy moment it depicts the wrong message of conforming the unborn

child to gender stereotypes. Through the rhetorical analysis of the cake, pathos evoked the

emotion of happiness by the semiotics of the cake. Ethos shows that the cake is honest to what it

is portraying being it is a gender reveal cake. On the other hand, with logos the cake is logically

showing that the baby is either going to be a boy or girl, but logos is influenced by the either/or
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fallacy which only states that there is either going to a boy or girl when there are other choices.

Society is placing stereotypes on unborn children and categorizing them in specific categories

that society has deemed appropriate for the gender. The idea that American culture enforces

gender stereotypes needs to be changed for the future kids of America to live in a society that

does not force them into roles that they may not want to be in.
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Work Cited

Hyer, Maren Clegg. The Mercury Reader: A Custom Publication. Pearson Custom Publishing,

2005.

Silverman, Jonathan and Dean Rader. The World Is a Text: Writing about Visual and Popular

Culture. Broadview Press, 2018.

Sweet Mary’s. “Wheels or Heels”. Pinterest.

www.pinterest.com/pin/601863937681963726/?lp=true.

Tyson, Lois. Critical Theory Today: A User-Friendly Guide. 3rd ed., Routledge, 2015.