The Dad Bod: An Impossible Body?

Introduction

Young people began talking about the “Dad Bod” in about 2015. According to Pearson, a college student widely credited with writing the first feature about the Dad Bod, it spoke of “a nice balance between a beer gut and working out . . .. It’s not an overweight guy, but it isn’t one with washboard abs, either.” Pearson outlined the appeal for young women: “While we all love a sculpted guy, there is just something about the Dad Bod that makes boys seem more human, natural, and attractive” (Pearson, 2015). Pearson’s piece sparked a flurry of conversation online, and the term “Dad Bod” spread from continent to continent. Four years later, GQ Magazine offered a similar definition:

The Dad Bod cares just enough to look outwardly healthy, certainly lifts a dumbbell or two in the garage but wouldn’t collapse into himself when presented with a pizza; [he is] super hot but still attainable. (Myers, 2019)

If the Dad Bod was instantly recognizable, it was more than simply a body type. The term has come to signify a range of tensions and contradictions that shape the male body in the twenty-first century. It speaks to discourses of health, motivation, leisure, restraint, sexiness and disgust, and defies easy classification within the norms of masculinity that circulate and are transformed within neoliberal cultures. The Dad Bod is inextricably bound to notions of family, (hetero)sexuality, masculinity, work, health, fitness, and beauty standards. In this article we place the Dad Bod in its historical context and explore some of its complexities: How do neoliberal values emerge through this body and contribute to its image? What kinds of biomedical discourses shape the Dad Bod? How does this body reinforce and undermine established norms of masculine embodiment? And how do men actively negotiate the idea of the Dad Bod in their own lives?

The Dad Bod is caught up in a recursive set of social relations that destabilize this body just when it seems to challenge various forms of social and biomedical authority. Scott’s (2011) concept of “performative regulation” is a useful theoretical starting point. Scott expands upon Michel Foucault’s work on the discipline of bodies. “Performative regulation” refers to the complex reflexivity that loosely binds surveillance, regulation and the repetition of norms on the one hand, and agency on the other. Scott also draws from Erving Goffman’s analysis of the ways social interactions between people and public commentary give rise to particular “definitions of the situation,” and she notes that these definitions shift between contexts and over time. She suggests that Goffman’s interactionist analysis intersects with the forms of surveillance and self-regulation that Foucault described: people working with and against social norms are “simultaneously controlled and controlling, docile and agentic, solipsistic, and other-oriented” (Scott, 2011, p. 49). Self-disciplining subjects do not interiorize expert knowledge wholesale, but they work with aspects of it. They may incorporate elements of professional knowledge about health, bodies, and sexual attraction, for instance, “into their self-narrative” (Scott, 2011, p. 49). This opens the way for a range of responses to the Dad Bod. Some men embrace it, some reject it, many ignore it, and others adopt an ambivalent stance.

In this article we conduct an analysis of some recent examples of the Dad Bod drawn from social media and online news sites across the English-speaking world. These help us to map out key themes and connections. The almost instant global reach of the discursively produced Dad Bod reflects the porosity of international media in the age of the internet: an article posted to a website in the USA, for instance, is instantly readable from Australia, New Zealand, or Canada. The impacts are felt globally, and sometimes personally. As Pink (2015) points out in her discussion of sensory ethnography, “everyday worlds are constituted in part through digital media” (p. 120). Media texts embed key linguistic patterns and symbols that speak to a range of ideological positions (Lemke, 1995). Lemke notes that discourses are far from static or unidirectional: they change over time and between contexts. An analysis of discourse involves exploring how social symbols, cultural ideas, and different “versions of the world” are variously constructed and portrayed in a range of texts (Ritchie, 2003, p. 35). Their social, historical, and political dimensions, and the linkages between them, become clear (Lemke, 1995).

Historicizing the Dad Bod

There is nothing new about men’s bodies being subject to criticism. Forth (2008) has tracked histories of complaint about weak, soft, and flabby male bodies that began during the eighteenth century. The muscular male body has been evoked at the sharp end of various ideological crusades. Foucault ([1976] 1990) pointed out that the body has been shaped, regulated, and surveilled in the service of capitalism, and others have noted the utility of the strong, lean body in the ideological systems underpinning colonization, fascism, and the pursuit of empire (Zweiniger-Bargielowska, 2006). Dutton (1995) suggests the well-known, muscular male body of ancient Greek society “depicted man, not as he actually was, but as he could or should be” (p. 24). Such a body spoke of an aspiration to a “perfected sense of being” (Dutton, 1995, p. 34). While the eighteenth century saw a rejection of soft, bloated male bodies in favor of muscularity, the nineteenth century engendered several movements against comfort, ease, and pleasure (Forth, 2008, p. 128). The growth of the middle class later in that century gave rise to the ideal of the strong but dignified middle-class body as a point of distinction from the “rough” working class (Forth, 2008).

A number of studies since the 1950s have illustrated the ongoing appeal of the muscular male body. Young men sought the mesomorphic body for themselves during the 1950s and 1960s, a time when boxing gyms became popular (Deno, 1953; Mishkind et al., 1986). Several authors suggest the “V shape,” with its broad shoulders, a tapering torso and slim waist, became increasingly popular in the 1980s and 1990s, as sedentary white-collar workers sought to live up to a muscular ideal, and a burgeoning consumer culture rapidly expanded market share by commodifying men’s as well as women’s bodies (Dutton, 1995, Grieve et al., 2005; Mishkind et al., 1986). Semi-naked male models appeared in advertising, and the “sexy body” also “became the young body” (McDowell, 1992; Parks & Read, 1997). A 1994 survey asked 6,000 men how they liked to see themselves (Bordo, 1999). Characteristics such as attractiveness to women, sexiness, and being good-looking topped the list, displacing older values of assertiveness, decisiveness, and wealth. A “hot” man was toned or even bulked up, and sagging flesh became a potent “signifier of decay and disorder” (Bordo, 1999, p. 225). The corollary was “bigorexia,” in which large muscles are never large enough (Bordo, 1999; Grieve et al., 2005).

The Dad Bod is often seen as a new and original kind of body, but the “bear,” “girth and mirth,” and “daddy” subcultures within the gay community offer something of an antecedent. The bear and girth and mirth communities began to take shape in the USA during the mid-to-late 1960s and were formalized in the mid-1980s by way of underground magazines like BEAR, Bulk Male, and specialized clubs and bars (Whitesel, 2014; Wright, [1997] 2013). The “butch shift” of the 1970s saw some gay men reject the association between male homosexuality and effeminacy, and they adopted a hypermasculine aesthetic instead. The bear and big gay man offered a contrast with the V shape, as well as the thinness associated with gay bodies during the AIDS crisis (Gough & Flanders, 2009). During this period, girth and mirthers associated substantial weight gain with health, and the bulky, hirsute bear body was associated with “naturalness” and gay male masculinity. Many men saw the bear body as raw, wild, powerful and rugged (Hennen, 2008).

The “daddy” figure within the gay community is both a form of kinship and a sexual/erotic identity, and refers to any attractive, older gay man in a financially secure position who embodies hegemonic ideals of masculinity (Kardolus, 2020). There is a long history of queer people creating “chosen families” with community members because they have been rejected and denounced by their biological families. Daddies and other more mature community members take the place of biological fathers and help guide newly “out” gay men (Kardolus, 2020). It is also a highly eroticized identity. Daddies in pornography and “cruising” culture are loaded with power and frequently sought out by young gay men (Mercer, 2012). ¹ Like the gay daddy, the Dad Bod is associated with celebrating fat or soft male bodies, being a father, and eroticizing middle-aged men (Dominguez, 2019), although, as we will demonstrate, the Dad Bod refers to a wider set of identities and body types.

Neoliberalism provides a social context for the Dad Bod. This system of social organization intersects with lived experiences of male bodies and concerns over muscularity, shape and size. It commodifies all aspects of human life, prioritizes individualism and personal liberty over the welfare of others, and celebrates self-governance and the successful entrepreneur (Harvey, 2007; Monaghan, 2005; Rimke, 2000). Neoliberal cultures position hyper-efficient bodies devoid of disability and illness as “normal,” desirable, and worthy of visibility (Shildrick, 2019). Neoliberalism, celebrity culture, and the Dad Bod intersect on social media (McIntyre et al., 2021). Since 2008, media outlets and celebrities have used “leaked” photos of nude male celebrities for financial and social gain (Hakim, 2020). As the Dad Bod gained in prominence, people turned to celebrities for relevant visual representations. Candid shots of such actors as Jason Segal, Jason Momoa, Zac Efron, Leonardo Decaprio, and Adam Sandler have proliferated on the internet under sensational headings like “Celebs Who Absolutely Rock Their Dad Bods” (Pennington, 2019), and “20 Celebrity Dad Bods We Can’t Help but Love” (Pomarico, 2019). The sexualized commodification and subjectification of the semi-nude, soft, male celebrity body helped to make the Dad Bod culturally legible (McIntyre et al., 2021).

Even within neoliberalism, however, there is room for reflexivity and resistance to hegemonic norms in the ways Scott describes. Contemporary Western society has given rise to a dynamic set of “tensions between soft and hard male bodies” (Tanner et al., 2013, p. 80), creating space for alternative masculinities that involve vulnerability, emotionality, and a reduced focus on being strong and muscular. Even bodybuilders who post about their quest on Instagram, for instance, temper their appeals to the hard, heteronormative male body with expressions of solidarity and care toward their friends and family members (Marshall et al., 2020).

Definitional Instability and Male Body Positivity

What now constitutes the Dad Bod, and who might be said to have one, is a complex question. Watson is a New Zealand father of Māori descent who offers anecdotes and advice about parenting under the handle “How to Dad” on YouTube and Instagram. Watson wonders whether he has a Dad Bod. At the age of thirty-one, he wrote: “I’ve got one of those cool Dad Bods right? Dad Bods are cool, right?” The answer to this question proved elusive:

OK, come to think of it, no one really knows exactly what a Dad Bod is. . .. So are Dad Bods meant to be slightly chubby, a bit of junk in the trunk and a belly full of Export Gold [beer], or are they meant to be ripped [and] muscular? . . . With media folk lumping “extremely ripped” dads and “slightly chubby” dads under the same “Dad-Bod” title it bloody confuses us all. We’re not sure whether to sneak off and have another pie or drop and do 10 push-ups. I’m confused. (Watson, 2019)

Watson hints that, in the absence of clear-cut guidelines, the discursive category of “Dad Bod” is so broad that those who may possess such a body are unable to know where the boundaries lie—and therefore the rules of engagement are highly unclear. Having thought about his own body and articulated his ambivalent attitude, Watson performatively sends up the notion of the Dad Bod by using irony and humor. He jokingly suggests straddling a middle line: “you’ll find me in the sauna eating spicy chicken wings” (Watson, 2019).

Myers (2019), who writes in British GQ Magazine, agrees about the vagueness of systems of body classification, but he regards the effects as more malign than Watson does. Myers suggests men end up feeling bad about themselves, and he rejects the normative aspects of the Dad Bod:

As a body-confidence sell, the Dad Bod was, for me, the “singer-songwriter” of body types, a punt at authenticity but ultimately, as a body confidence sell, a failure . . . How pumped do you actually need to be to call yourself “athletic”? Does anyone even know what “stocky” means? . . . Bodies are unreliable witnesses and the state of yours may have no bearing on your lifestyle at all (Myers, 2019).

Watson echoes Myers’ suspicion about the failure of any putative “body confidence sell.” He poses a question about gendered body expectations and the relationship between the Dad Bod and a positive body image; Watson draws from the body positivity movement that respects all bodies by focusing on their assets rather than their imperfections (Tylka & Wood-Barcalow, 2015). “As empowered fierce women fight for their rights, we see advertising campaigns start to embrace all different female shapes. But curvy dads on billboards? Name one,” Watson (2019) writes. He implies the Dad Bod has the potential to open a discussion about body positivity, but he is unsure whether this is likely to be realized. Bell and McNaughton (2007), who wrote about male body image in an academic journal several years before the emergence of the Dad Bod, also noted the broader issue. They argue that the hyper-visibility of women’s body image issues, along with concerted efforts to encourage greater female body positivity, have resulted in the perception that men are immune from fat-based prejudice. These two sets of authors, Watson and Bell and McNaughton, write in different kinds of media and in different decades, but they agree on the need to question the tight, toned male body of neoliberal culture and make space for a range of male body shapes.

There was, for a while, a degree of optimism about this prospect. A Dad Bod contest on Australian radio station TripleM celebrated the male body as it finds itself in everyday life: “This bloke we are searching for is exceptional in his ordinariness. This bloke is so ordinary he is extraordinary. This bloke . . . embraces the body he is in” (TripleM, 2019). These contests have been popular in the UK and the USA as well as Australia. Photographs from the competitions reveal men baring their bellies, triumphantly showing off their less-than-toned biceps, and grinning at the camera. This is the body of the “self-confident chunk” rather than the “ripped hunk” (Thomas-Sam, 2021). Those participating in Dad Bod contests engage in a performative opportunity: they help to (re)constitute masculinity while they perform it, celebrating the body they have. Journalist Russo suggested the Dad Bod might open the way for men’s engagement with body positivity:

For once, society joined hands to celebrate what a real, average working man looks like; peace swept over the land. It was a moment for body positivity among men that helped make the concept of the Dad Bod so popular; for a second, it told men they . . . need not reach for unrealistic ideals that might not even ever be attainable (Russo, 2019).

Clearly something happened in the years after the celebrity versions of the concept came to prominence: it split into two types. The soft, “everyday” body was one, but some muscular, toned bodies were also labeled as Dad Bods. Russo suggests the concept became hijacked and transformed into an even more bulked up masculinity than what had gone before: on-screen Dad Bods were now “ripped, muscular heartthrobs” with “19 packs, bulbous biceps [and] skull-crushing calves.” Such male bodies “may be charming to look at [but] they fail to represent what an American father actually looks like: beer belly, love handles, happy smile and all” (Russo, 2019). “Perhaps no one truly understands what the Dad Bod is anymore,” Russo added. “And that’s a problem” (Russo, 2019). Others agree that the original idea of the Dad Bod as an “average” body has now become muddled (Tan, 2019). If Zac Efron, who looks like a “Human Hercules,” can be said to have a Dad Bod, “then what hope is there for the rest of us?” (Elan, 2020). For these critics, the lack of a stable signifiers meant the Dad Bod’s liberating possibilities have been co-opted into an exaggerated version of earlier norms. Waters (2020) contends that, in media coverage of men’s bodies, “chiselled guys still dominate.” Some critics suggest the body shaming of larger men, and its effects on men’s mental health, has carried on apace (Tan, 2019; Waters, 2020). The ability of the bifurcated Dad Bod to inspire resistance to neoliberalism’s disciplinary regimes may be somewhat limited.

Morality, Health, and the Dad Bod

The prevalence of moral judgments about obesity and larger body types has been widely discussed in recent decades. During the 1980s, psychologist Mishkind and his co-authors pointed out that negative attitudes are most pronounced in cases where people are seen to be responsible for their own weight. An endomorphic male body shape has often been associated with sloppiness, dirtiness, and laziness (Mishkind et al., 1986). Although the Dad Bod is not often defined as obese, it may give rise to similar connotations and discourses. The “average” Dad Bod is sometimes seen as a sign of slothfulness and disgust or a failure to adequately balance work, exercise, and family. The man who neglects his body and health is one who fails to work hard enough and conform to the model of the neoliberal citizen; he refuses to “grow up” and continues to willingly embrace “unhealthy” ways of living and the “wrong” kinds of consumption. Millar (2018) from Men’s Health explains with some urgency that older men have a greater responsibility to be fit and avoid developing the “dangerous visceral fat” associated with the Dad Bod:

And whether it’s partying or a new addition to the family keeping you awake at night, it’s clear your priorities have shifted since those halcyon days when you could pack on muscle and keep off fat while eating whatever, whenever. In your head, you’ve still got it; in reality, you’ve got a rapidly burgeoning middle-aged spread and fading muscle memory. Now’s the time to shake off premature old age before it’s too late. (Millar, 2018)

McUtchen (2017) agrees with Millar, while writing his own experience into an article in the Australian edition of Men’s Health. In his account of new fatherhood, McUtchen describes how his daily life “has gone from one with a standard daily run or workout to a world of weighing up a nappy change versus a toddler standing precariously on a balcony railing to a wife who needs coffee now.” McUtchen set out to conquer his developing Dad Bod by “waging war” on it:

All of a sudden, no abs, no arms and absolutely no love for the bathroom mirror when you’re getting out of the shower . . .. But I’m just too young to give up. I’m not even 40. I mean, I had a six-pack just over six months ago. I don’t want a dadbod. And that’s because of what’s happening underneath the surface, too. The stiffening of joints from lack of use, the couching of vital organs in layers of oozy fat . . .. A dadbod should be like a beachbod—a physique fit for the task. It should have a strong core for lifting kids of any age, a rock solid lower back for picking up Lego like a boss, and enough of a gun show that you can rock your newborn to sleep without running out of firepower. (McUtchen, 2017)

McUtchen rejects the aspects of his own body that do not live up to either his own expectations or prevailing notions of masculinity and fatherhood. He regards the “beachbod” type of Dad Bod, in comparison to other types, as a matter of practicality (“a strong core for lifting kids”), but it is also profoundly performative. A “beachbod” is meant for public display and it plays a role in constituting acceptable male embodiment more broadly. When McUtcheon says “I’m too young to give up,” and “I mean, I had a six-pack just over 6 months ago,” he rejects the unruliness of his body and resolves to do better. It is his perception of his body’s internal processes, rather than external social pressures, that threaten his sense of agency and wellbeing. It is likely no accident that both his account and Millar’s appear in various editions of Men’s Health. As Crawshaw (2007) points out, this magazine and others like it have for some time promoted neoliberal ideals of health in which men are active and entrepreneurial citizens who have a “duty” to maintain a “healthy” and socially acceptable body (p. 1607).

Metaphors of science, health, militarism, and aggression provide dense frameworks for discussing the Dad Bod in Men’s Health and elsewhere. They operate as a set of resources with which men might think about their own bodies and act accordingly. One anonymous blogger employs a militarized language of health when he tells his readers that “belly fat is a hormonally active fat that invades your internal organs and substantially increases your risk of heart disease, diabetes, and cancer” (Eat This, Not That, 2015). Like McUtchen (2017), who writes on “gun shows” and “firepower,” this blogger adds that fat “sabotages your muscles” as well as “invades” organs (Eat This, Not That, 2015). Phillips (2015), erstwhile editor of Men’s Health magazine, sums up with the ultimate do-or-die metaphor: “kill [the dad bod] before it kills you!”

Not always are those who disseminate health discourses quite so demanding. Former track athlete and health commentator Hadrick (2018) asserts that the “beer belly,” which is often considered a key signifier of a Dad Bod, “is also a common sign of years of excessive alcohol consumption,” but he steps back from overtly condemning the man with the Dad Bod. Instead he offers a more reflexive, less strictly regulating account with room for agency and compromise. In an echo of body positivity, He sees the “Dad Bod look” as a realistic achievement for many men and an “encouraging development in the world of self-image.” He advises men to cut back on fatty food and alcohol, and “strive for regular improvement, not perfection. That’s what the Dad Bod is all about . . .. You don’t have to have the perfect body to be considered healthy and attractive” (Hadrick, 2018).

Hadrick’s ambivalent embrace of elements of health and body positivity discourses speak, in part, to the contradictions embedded within masculine practice and embodiment in neoliberal times. Food and drink consumption have a strong relationship with normative masculinity. Beer drinking and the eating of pizza, burgers and large steaks, recently described as “dude food,” have long been associated with “masculine performance” (Buerkle, 2009; Contois, 2020). Although some fans of “dude food” think of themselves as rebelling against healthy eating mandates, beer guzzling and burger eating are rarely compatible with toned musculature and the “optimization” of masculine strength and endurance in a competitive society (Crawshaw, 2007, p. 1616). Hadrick (2018) advises men to avoid this trap by moderating their consumption: “just appreciate how you look and strive to improve your unhealthy practices little by little.”

Neoliberal discourses and disciplines influence the way some men seek to radically transform their Dad Bods. In a feature in the Guardian in 2020, O’Reilly tells of his transformation from “Dad Bod to rad bod” over a 7-week period. O’Reilly’s own form of performative regulation involved downsizing his diet, going for a 45-minute run each morning, and following a punishing regimen at the gym. He noticed a reduction in body fat and an increase in strength, achieving what Sassatelli (2010) refers to as “agile masculinity” (p. 165). He also changed the way he thought about male body image. “I’d internalized the idea that dwelling on the physical was for other people or, worse, symptomatic of society’s wider problems with fat-shaming or obsessing over appearance” (O’Reilly, 2020). O’Reilly began to embrace a self-help ethos and replaced his previous critique of “fat-shaming” with a discourse of self-improvement:

[My muscles] jolted into life, shrivelled and screaming in the darkness of my arms, shoulders and back, roaring to let them return to 30 years of unbroken sleep. Alex [my trainer] had other ideas, however, and quickly set about reducing me to a sweaty nub of offal each Monday, Wednesday and Friday, until that constant, heady state of alarm dulled to a dim resentment and, even, something like satisfaction from their first honest days’ work in my lifetime. (O’Reilly, 2020)

The embrace of pain as a form of therapy has a clear affinity with the neoliberal striving signified by “a hard day’s work,” but it also echoes a theme from the nineteenth century when pain was believed to forge manliness by “affirming commonalities among men who submit to the rigors of combat, training, or exercise” (Forth, 2008, p. 138). O’Reilly took a certain pleasure in his new, increasingly disciplined body as “resentment” gave way to “satisfaction.” His morning runs became “not just more manageable” but “enjoyable” as, in his words, he “remapped the frontiers of my own endurance.” As a new disciple of the gym, O’Reilly was “now relishing my workouts” and appreciated the help of trainer “and the belief he had in my ability to push further and further each day.” O’Reilly’s trainer helped him into a new subjectivity as well as a new body. This account is one of the most striking in its genre: with the help of his trainer, discipline, striving and pleasure fused together as O’Reilly relearned how to experience pleasure and performatively reconstituted himself in line with a neoliberal logic. As a former foodie, he even made peace with his limited diet and, as a result, he could tell his readers: “I’d attained a leanness I hadn’t considered possible.” Contois (2020) suggests that the Dad Bod is the “dude food body,” and O’Reilly rejects both the Dad Bod and dude food simultaneously (p. 23).

It would be a mistake to see O’Reilly as any more of a cultural dupe than the other men who actively negotiated male body ideals in different ways. As Sassatelli (2010) points out, the effects of exercise discipline are active as well as passive, “providing the subject with new capacities and subjugating it to new forms of power” (p. 3). At the same time, O’Reilly’s subjective reconstitution involved leaving behind both the physical Dad Bod and his previously articulated critique of both “fat shaming” and the cultural “obsession” with bodily appearance. His new attitude stressed self-government and an individualized view of health rather than a critical social analysis.

Female Desire and the Dad Bod

Pearson’s original intervention framed the Dad Bod in terms of women’s desires. “No one wants to cuddle a rock,” she wrote, alluding to the homely comfort of a male body with a bit of padding (Pearson, 2015). She also suggested that Dad Bods are attractive because they give women the sense that their own bodies are slimmer and therefore more publicly appealing than their partners’. “We are insecure enough as it is. We don’t need a perfectly sculpted guy standing next to us to make us feel worse” (Pearson, 2015). Pearson goes on to suggest that a young man with a Dad Bod helps young women picture a future together: “We know what we are getting into when he’s got the same exact body type at the age of 22 that he’s going to have at 45” (Pearson, 2015).

Pearson is not the only female blogger who regards Dad Bods positively. Under the evocative heading “Dad Bods are Like a Candy Store of Sexiness,” Lune (2019) suggests that men with Dad Bods are more emotionally open and mature, can relate to a woman’s sense of insecurity about her body, have a history of long-term and stable intimate relationships, and are better at communicating. Echoing the views of both Pearson and Lune, Iselin (2019) concludes those with Dad Bods “proudly reject” traditional male beauty standards and opt for a more “real” and “unfiltered humanness” that some women see as “sensually intimate.” These men, Iselin suggests, enthusiastically exercise their own agency, and they are “sexy in their rebelliousness.”

Some feminist critics do not look upon the Dad Bod with such approval. Engle (2015), who wrote a piece for Elite Daily under the heading “Why Women Need to Stop Accepting the Dad Bod,” argues that men are permitted to become “flabby as all hell” in a way that women are not, and that women would be condemned for adopting a lifestyle full of “bad” food and little exercise. It is not, however, necessary to wholly reject the Dad Bod in order to make this point. Iselin (2019), who enjoys the sensual intimacy of the Dad Bod, readily concedes that a certain degree of flabbiness is considered more acceptable for men than for women. Prins offers a different line of attack in a post on the Everyday Feminism blog. She suggests that post-pregnancy “Mom Bods” have never been properly acknowledged, and that women who like the Dad Bod because it makes them feel better about themselves are buying into a norm of that says: “You’re only as good as the man sitting next to you” (Prins, 2015; on the “Mom Bod,” see also Dickson, 2018).

Engle and Prins not only criticize the Dad Bod, but they dismiss the young heterosexual woman who desire it. Prins condemns Pearson’s teenage friends as “insecure . . . young ladies” who “have completely internalized the external body policing and found yet another way to self-police” (Prins, 2015). As Prins sees it, enjoyment of the Dad Bod is a kind of false consciousness rather than a form of performative regulation in which young women actively negotiate, and sometimes take pleasure in, the male body norms in circulation at a given time and place. Prins denounces Pearson’s enjoyment of the comfort of the Dad Bod and her contention that the owner of such a body seems “more human, natural, and attractive” (Pearson, 2015). She implies that Pearson and other fans of the Dad Bod negate their own selfhood and bodily integrity.

Some evolutionary psychologists, along with commentators influenced by their ideas, also dismiss women who enjoy the Dad Bod. “It’s survival of the fittest, people, not the survival of fattest,” insists former Men’s Health editor Phillips (2015). He calls the Dad Bod “stupid” and “dangerous,” adding that the “most desirable sex partners show maximum fitness, because good DNA always wins” (Phillips, 2015). According to this logic, women ought to find a Dad Bod less attractive than a toned body because it is less visually appealing and signals a lower level of testosterone and a lower sex drive. Phillips replicates the long-held stance of men’s fitness magazines, combining the technical language of biology and medicine (“DNA” and “testosterone”) with a claim to male neoliberal authority. Blogger White (2015) also suggests women who say “they prefer a Dad Bod to a fit, healthy, lean, muscular male body” must be deficient: “They are lying or have insecurities or both.”

Anderson (2015), a columnist for Psychology Today, joined the pile on, framing Pearson as lacking in knowledge: her conclusions were “questionable” and her embrace of the Dad Bod “made no scientific sense.” Like Phillips’ column, Anderson’s reveals a subtle discursive shift from an appeal to the facts of “science” to the rather more contested semiotics of sex. “The biological imperative to pair with someone that is healthy cannot be ignored. A paunchy gut and saggy pecs just don’t scream out ‘health!’ . . . the truth is, healthy = sexy, and always will” (Anderson, 2015). This kind of argument echoes elements of the feminist stance we have already laid out: both sets of commentators regard young, female fans of the Dad Bod as profoundly misguided, and there is a suspicion they are wilfully ignoring political or biological absolutes. Both groups of Dad Bod opponents construe the fans as “insecure.” Generation, gender, and the politics of knowing intersect here: young women need to be reminded of the ontological truths about male and female bodies by their elders who possess an appropriate epistemic authority (Janack, 1997).

Discourses of evolutionary psychology often loop back to neoliberalism. Phillips’ comment about “the survival of the fittest” is one example. McUtcheon appeals to the trope of self-governance when he suggests fathers with Dad Bods have eschewed personal responsibility for their physical well-being, are unwilling to be a good role model for their family, and have adopted a “toxic” and lazy mindset in relation to diet and exercise (McUtchen, 2017). In Fatherly, a “digital media brand for dads,” Coleman (2018) hints at the trope of the unmotivated “deadbeat Dad,” a staple of anti-welfare state discourse, when he writes that borderline “obese” men pose a significant health risk to their children:

Men who are cultivating their dad bods, however, are unlikely to engage in as much physical play. At the same time, they are likely to normalize an unhealthy weight and model poor nutritional habits for their children. Essentially, the problem with the celebration of the dad bod is that it can increase the changes that a child becomes obese . . . So, while love handles may be a humorous symbol of middle-age fatherhood, the implications for children’s health are far from funny. (Coleman, 2018)

Perhaps all is not lost for the Dad Bod, though. Some evolutionary psychologists take a softer tone, believing the Dad Bod may possibly indicate a healthier lifestyle, better parenting ability, and a more caring and nurturing approach than the neoliberal man offers. In Men’s Journal, Michael Rodio (n.d.) argues that that “mildly chubby . . . not seriously overweight” men have slightly less testosterone than others, take less risk, and thus make better fathers. Similarly, psychologist Sacco et al. (2020) suggest that many of those with Dad Bods have “greater paternal investment” than toned and muscled men. Rather than being seen as a troublesome by-product of becoming a father, this approach views the “average” version of the Dad Bod as an indication that men are looking after their family well: “The male stays close to the cave and helps prepare for the new infant’s arrival, ensuring that his DNA will be passed to the next generation” (Fox, 2019). No field of knowledge about the Dad Bod is consistent, and evolutionary psychology is no exception.

Conclusion

There is fierce disagreement and debate over the Dad Bod’s meaning, value, social significance, and whether it should be praised, denounced, or both. A site of fraught contradiction, the Dad Bod simultaneously embodies and resists a range of neoliberal values. Its connotations include disgust and abjection, but it also conveys a sense of comfort, safety, fun, and a relaxed attitude that ties into powerful signifiers of masculinity, independence, and freedom.

For some, the Dad Bod represents a vital yet complicated expression of male body positivity because it has the potential to celebrate less normative masculine bodies. In this view, the Dad Bod provides a useful reference point and a resource for reflexive body projects, a performative reassertion of a resistant masculinity. Many bloggers and columnists, however, argue that the Dad Bod fails to deliver on its potential. It may be recuperated into dominant neoliberal discourses when it is resignified from the “average” body into a bigger, more toned version. It is not surprising that some writers, including Watson (2019), Tan (2019), and Myers (2019), have confessed they do not know what actually constitutes a Dad Bod. The phenomenon is also profoundly gendered. Not only does it highlight disparities in body-based expectations between men and women, but the “average” version of the Dad Bod demonstrates the many ways men are celebrated for having relaxed lifestyles and carrying varying amounts of fat when women would receive pointed criticism for the same thing. At the same time, some have suggested there is a need for a more comprehensive public discussion of the diversity of male body image.

The Dad Bod has been extensively medicalized by the health and well-being community, and commentators oscillate between a positive standpoint and outright condemnation. Within some discourses of evolutionary psychology, the Dad Bod cannot and must not be attractive to women even though, somewhat contradictorily, some writers imagine it to be the body of a father who is capable of financially and emotionally supporting his family. To use Goffman’s term, conflicting “definitions of the situation” are at play here. Fitness groups mostly align with the first set of presumptions: they decry this body and see it as emblematic of a lazy, slovenly man who eats poorly and embraces a sedentary lifestyle rather than “good” health and neoliberal striving. Individual men like O’Reilly (2020) who chronicle their personally rewarding transformation “from Dad Bod to rad bod” describe the pleasurable pain of disciplining their unruly body, and suggest they have become a fitter, more self-aware, and generally better person as a result. They performatively reinforce neoliberal discourses of hard work and body discipline. This is not to say that these men are unreflective about the bodily transformations and their impact on their identity. Even some of the Dad Bod’s most trenchant critics, including Phillips (2015), acknowledge they are prone to such slippages themselves. Phillips admits he feels the need to rush to the gym and erase the signs of the Dad Bod whenever they appear. The body must be controlled and managed lest it becomes abject; that urgent trip to the gym is a necessary last-minute defence against bodily debasement. If a man is expected to take personal responsibility for his health and wellbeing in order to maximize his efficacy in the marketplace, then the failure to avoid the “round softness” of the Dad Bod can be interpreted as a personal and moral failure with potentially pathological consequences.

At the same time, as Monaghan (2005) noted 10 years before the Dad Bod appeared as a named type, strivings for bodily self-improvement rub along with “irrationalities and meaningful resistances to these multi-directional processes in everyday life” (p. 70). The Dad Bod can be seen as a partial repudiation of the gym culture that boomed through the 1990s when neoliberal ideology spread throughout Western economies. But this repudiation is not always total. The suggestion that the Dad Bod used to be fit, but has slipped a bit, suggests a waning interest in the self-disciplines of neoliberalism in some quarters rather than a total abandonment of them. There is ample room here for performative regulation, in which men work both with and against the ideals that circulate in the cultures around them. Some draw upon media images and discourses to embrace the image of the toned, disciplined body, embracing neoliberal discipline. Others—including afficianados of “dude food”—reject the presumption that the body ought to be disciplined in ways that are not fulfilling. Many find a middle way, navigating competing social demands to varying extents. The boundaries of masculine performativity are baggy enough to accommodate more than one form of male embodiment—and more than one view of it.

In the end, the Dad Bod is a multiplex phenomenon. Those who write about the Dad Bod have a range of different bodies in mind. For Pearson (2015), the Dad Bod is an innocuous, young male body with a modest amount of fat and a relaxed, easy-going personality. Health and fitness writers have presented the Dad Bod as an abject figure with a large, fat-filled gut. In contrast, Russo (2019) suggests the Dad Bod has also been conceptualized as a very fit and muscular body that only celebrities can achieve. It would be close to futile for fathers looking after small children to pursue this elite version of the Dad Bod. Because Pearson’s description of the Dad Bod is vague—”a nice balance between a beer gut and working out. . .. It’s not an overweight guy, but it isn’t one with washboard abs, either”—this body has become an open signifier that has been interpreted, and engaged with, in strongly divergent and often conflicting ways. Is the man with a Dad Bod sexy? Does he represent the achievement and failure of personal responsibility? Is he a good father? There is no consensus here. The Dad Bod is a literal embodiment of the profound tensions that exist within neoliberal society, one which demands individuals adhere to contrary ideals and multiple discourses of masculinity. The Dad Bod is an impossible body, yet one that contains myriad expressions of being.