Birthday Cake for Smashing? WTF?

Yesterday our family celebrated the newest addition's 1st birthday. My niece - the honoree's mother - ordered a really pretty 6" layer lemon cake with lemon fondant. It was really a beautiful little cake. When I saw it, I thought that there was no way that would be enough for everybody to have a piece, but then I saw there were also several dozen cupcakes at the ready.

When it came time for cake, my niece sat her daughter down on a table, then put the cake next to her and encouraged her to dig in. She did. With both hands. She made a royal mess of the cake - not to mention herself - and my niece and her friends laughed and laughed and had a great time of it.

I was shocked. I looked at my sister-in-law (niece's mother and grandmother of the cake-bespattered honoree), and asked her, "What the fuck was THAT??" She just shrugged and said, "I guess everybody's doing it now."

Now, I'll be the first to admit that I can be somewhat of an old fart, but this struck me as phenomenally stupid. (For context, I have always thought that brides and grooms smashing cake into each others' faces was childish and moronic.) How 'bout it, 'hounds...have any of you seen this recently?