By Shameem Guilliano

I hesitated for a moment before I typed the word “dadbod” into Google and hit Enter. I’d heard about this new word last week and after that, hadn’t heard anything else about it until around three days later, when my boyfriend tagged me on a Facebook post explaining the whole “dadbod” phenomenon and why it’s so stupid. That was it; the word had hit me, gone full circle and then come back to me in only three days. This was going to be one of those internet things, wasn’t it?

So I decided to read up on this new thing and find the origin. There were plenty of online newspapers explaining the word and what it means, linking back to the original source.  The 7^th search result was a link which would take you to every photo on Instagram tagged with “dadbod”. No thanks – I continued scrolling. A YouTube video titled “Why The Dad Bod Is Worse Than Ebola” was on the first page of results, too (admittedly, it was hilarious, watch it). I resisted reading all the comedic piss-take articles in front of me and skipped straight to the original article.

American student Mackenzie Pearson started the whole thing with her article on “Why Girls Love the Dad Bod”. For her, the dadbod says “I go to the gym occasionally, but I also drink heavily on the weekends and enjoy eating eight slices of pizza at a time.” Right. She then goes on to list why her and her girl friends like the dadbod so much. The FIRST thing she mentions is the fact that girls don’t want a guy who makes them feel insecure about their bodies and “we don’t need a perfectly sculpted guy standing next to us to make us feel worse.” I had no idea taking care of your physical health was a bad thing these days – how dare you improve yourself and make us feel uglier! 

 ‘Insecure’ seems to be the buzz word here. Her second point is titled “We like being the pretty one” which is enough said. The last point that stands out is the idea that apparently having a dadbod means he’ll have the same body type at 45 and therefore this means you know what you’re getting into when he’s 22. Great, so if you look better than him now you can bet you’ll still be the hot one at 45! Phew!

Self-confessed dadbodder (?!) Peter Holley took to the internet to explain why girls love his body type so much.  He says “women need men – just not the macho ones” due to men no longer needing to really be “men” anymore. We no longer need the brute strength our ancestors needed to get things done. I see his point but does this mean we suddenly don’t find brute strength attractive? No. He goes on to say that having a dadbod “says I have a job...responsibilities.” As opposed to men who actually care about their appearance? It all sounds like another one of these “fit-shaming” situations that creep up online every so often because people are insecure and can’t handle people around them making them realise they’re actually pretty lazy and fat.

So, if you want to be the hotter one in the relationship and enjoy having a man who is complacent enough to sit back and let you shine while knowing he won’t bother looking for a better woman, the dadbod is for you! I don’t know, I think many women genuinely find the body type attractive and that’s perfectly fine, but those that are drawn to this body type while also insulting men who take care of themselves because of their own insecurities need to delve deeper into their issues. No one’s forcing them to date a “perfectly sculpted guy” but when you prefer someone who sits back and does nothing just to boost your own deflated ego, there’s a problem.

Leonardo – THE original dadbod...Apparently

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