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British Talk Show Host Consults 'Psychic Banana' to Predict Royal Baby's Gender

This isn’t the psychic banana’s first rodeo.
Photo via Twitter user Scott Bryan

I’m sorry to add to the trash heap of royal baby coverage, but it must be done. On Monday morning, Holly Willoughby, host of British channel ITV's talk show This Morning, sliced into a "psychic banana" in anticipation of the royal tot’s birth.

She wanted to know: Would Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, and Prince William's third child be a boy? So Willoughby consulted her trusted psychic banana. She cut off the tip of the fruit and detected a faint, vague Y shape, from which she surmised the answer was “yes, this child will be a boy.” If she were to find a dot, the answer would’ve been no.

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I know what you're thinking: Haha, um… what the fuck? Let me explain.

This isn’t the psychic banana’s first rodeo; Willoughby consults this clairvoyant fruit pretty often! She’s been using it for years, and seems aware of its utter silliness. I guess you could call the concept of the psychic banana the distant cousin of the gender reveal, something that should be banned wholesale, full stop, no questions asked.

I've gotta say, though, that after watching three videos of Willoughby slice through the little black nubs of bananas in the hopes of forecasting the future, I find the concept somewhat endearing. I’m part of the problem!

I have so many questions. What makes a banana psychic? How often is it correct? How does Willoughby keep faith in it when it’s wrong, as has happened before? What compelled Willoughby to begin using the psychic banana in the first place, and when did she begin using it, anyway?

"I'm afraid we have absolutely no idea what you're talking about," Willoughby's publicist wrote MUNCHIES on Monday when reached for comment about the psychic banana. "Where on earth have you heard this nonsense?!"

Two minutes later, he replied that he had done "a quick Google" and seen where MUNCHIES got this information from, directing MUNCHIES to This Morning's press office. A spokesperson for This Morning claimed over email to MUNCHIES that the psychic banana was "an item on our morning magazine show" and not Willoughby's concept. Hmm…

Anyway, turns out the psychic banana was correct this go-around. The child is a boy! Congrats to the couple. As for you, currently nameless child, welcome to a world that will hawkishly surveil your every move and potentially rob you of your childhood.