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'Girl dads' are taking over the internet. Is that a good thing?
"Girl dads" are melting hearts right now.
Content of fathers positively and hilariously participating in the social and emotional lives of their daughters are going viral. These men are princesses (wearing wigs). Parents with dad bods who contour and paint their nails. They're unbothered by tiaras and tutus. They drink matcha.
The videos highlight how today's dads are more engaged and involved with their children than fathers in previous generations. Recent research backs this up. And while online chatter about "girl dads" is now growing, there's long been similar discussion of "boy moms." Cultural watchers say it's a good thing to see hands-on parents earning attention and, in some cases, admiration, but these viral trends also beg the question: Why are we still gendering everything so much? And are we celebrating "girl dads" more than moms?
Despite the funny or relatable picture these trends paint, they also signal that parents alone can't change decades of gendered stereotypes about how we raise kids, said Clare Stovell, a lecturer in sociology of gender at the University of College London.
"I have reservations about being so focused on gender with parenting and the connotations that implies, the assumption about what it is to be a girl, what it is to be a boy, and what it is to parent girls and parent boys," Stovell said.
Dads haven't always had hair braiding in the job description, so representations of men positively involved in their kids' lives should be celebrated, Stovell said. And moms being who they want to be to their kids should be similarly rewarded − but that's not always the case.
The memes about "boy moms" tend to lean more into the stereotype of the overbearing mama bear or the exhausted mom chasing after out-of-control toddlers.
Plus, a true shift in what parenting means is more likely to come when raising kids isn't categorized along the lines of "his" and "hers" at all, said Jessica Calarco, professor of sociology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Breaking old parenting thinking comes from subtracting labels, rather than adding them to our interactions, she said. The fun in the "boy mom" and "girl dad" can get lost if it eventually leads to kids getting different kinds of parenting because of their gender, rather than receiving the care that fits them as individuals.
"Gender is more fluid than we give it credit for," Calarco said. "Often these tropes become increasingly stereotypical the more they get used."
Only time will tell if the prevalence and praise of the "girl dad" trend signals a true shift toward more equal parenting responsibilities.
"(Girl dad) interactions are fantastic, it's brilliant," Stovell said. "It's nice seeing fathers more involved in childcare. But that shouldn't be at the expense of acknowledging the real hard work mothers do all the time as well."
Strides have been made in recent years and dads are more involved than ever − but moms still shoulder more of the childcare responsibilities. Women spend twice as much time as men, on average, on childcare and household work, according to an October 2024 study by the Gender Equity Policy Institute. And for many women, that looks like a double shift of paid and unpaid work, researchers found.
"Women overwhelmingly do the majority of childcare," Stovell said. "But are we as shocked or impressed to see a mother interacting with her son doing stereotypically masculine activities?"
Until the answer to that question is yes, we've probably still have a ways to go.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Girl dads' are taking over the internet. But is that good?
