What Does It Even Mean to Be a Halfway Decent Dad in 2024? (2024)

Scientific fact: No one has ever smiled while saying the word father. Bowed their head in respect or fear? For sure. Followed it with the word figure? You know it. Included it in the title of their “brave and unsparing” memoir? You betcha. Magazines (this one included!) love nothing more than to furrow their brow and devote pages upon pages to the state of American fatherhood. It’s no wonder, with a word—a figure—so looming that every man, on some level, fears turning into his father.

Becoming a father is serious business. Unless you work at the White House or are a surgeon of some kind, raising a kid is likely the most important thing you’ll ever do. The stakes are high enough to make a guy wonder whether he should be a father at all.

Our radical suggestion? Don’t do it. Don’t become a father. Become a dad instead.

You know the difference in your bones. A dad knows the name of the teacher, the best friend, and the kid who smells weird. A dad apologizes when he’s wrong and does finger guns when he’s right. He can tell you which sweatshirt is the itchy one. He does the voices when he reads from The Berenstain Bears and can name at least a couple members of BTS.

A dad makes his kids feel good, like someone in this tough world actually wants to be around them. But how to become a dad? We asked some dads we know for a few tips. You didn’t ask? Guess there’s one thing dads and fathers have in common after all: They love to give unsolicited advice. Here’s ours.

But First... a Quiz! Are You a Dad or a Father?

How often do you start a sentence with the words “Why, when I was your age. . .”?

A_ Almost never. (10)
B_ Occasionally. (7)
C_ At least once a week. (5)
D_ It’s the title of my podcast. (0)

Your child is playing on a youth sports team. You:

A_ Stress sportsmanship, healthy competition, and the value of bringing enough orange slices to share. (10)
B_ Track team standings in a suspiciously thick binder. (7)
C_ Conduct frank postgame assessments of your child’s play. You try not to be harsh, but there have been tears. (3)
D_ Remind your child, “It’s not a foul if the ref doesn’t see it.” (0)

How do you help your child with homework? A_ You work side by side, patiently guiding them to arrive at the right answers themselves. (10)
B_ You do a nighttime run to the drugstore for poster board—but no more than once a semester. (7)
C_ You take one look at the worksheet and panic. (4)
D_ Are they getting homework already? (0)

Your child is about to receive a “participation trophy.” You: A_ Congratulate them! Showing up is an achievement, too. (10)
B_ Encourage your child to accept the trophy graciously, then throw it away in a couple weeks. (5)
C_ Post a Facebook screed about kids today, participation trophies, and the goddamn mercy rule. (0)

You impart life lessons by: A_ Making every effort to set a strong example; the surest way to give instruction is to model good behavior. (10)
B_ Buying your kid a subscription to Esquire. (7)
C_ Buying your kid a subscription to Foreign Affairs.(0)

Your child is helping you fix a leaky kitchen faucet when, out of frustration, you slam down a heavy wrench, seriously marring the countertop. You: A_ Collect yourself, apologize for losing your temper, and explain that we all make mistakes but that it’s important to own up to them and try to do better. (10)
B_ Let a few choice curses fly but then sheepishly say you’re sorry. (5)
C_ Blame your wife for insisting on that polished granite countertop. That ugly green slab cost a fortune! (–5)

Well, father or dad? Tally your responses and see below.

50-60

Congratulations—you’re a bona fide dad. You’re shaping young people of good character and probably won’t be the subject of any tell-all memoirs.

30-49

You’re solidly in the dad zone. Keep up the good work and your children’s future therapy bills should stay manageable.

10-29

You have some work to do. Glad you found us.

0-9

You may, in fact, be a father. But it’s not too late. We’re here to help.

How to Tell a Dad Joke

Interview by Josh Rosenberg

Dad jokes only seem easy. We asked Jim Gaffigan, comedian, father of five, and founder of Fathertime Bourbon, to break down the art form for us.

What makes a perfect dad joke?

It has to be a bad joke. The most important thing is the fact that the joke is annoying to our children. A key element is we pretend to be unaware that it’s a groaner.

Do you have a favorite?

There are some classics. “I’m hungry.” “Hi, hungry, I’m Dad.” It has to be an observation on a very lazy connection of two seemingly unrelated ideas.

Why do you think dads gravitate toward puns?

Kids are dumb, so they’re not going to get it initially. But as they get older, it becomes a joke that is shared. It’s probably the most effective modern tool for communicating sarcasm that we have as human beings.

Is It Okay to Have a Favorite Kid?

It’s more than okay; it’s the only way. Take it from Deion Sanders.

By Brady Langmann

Deion Sanders might be better at tossing bons mots than at coaching football. The grizzled, never-not-controversial head coach of the University of Colorado Buffaloes is full of them. There’s “If your dream ain’t bigger than you, there’s a problem with your dream.” Or “I’m married to football; baseball is my girlfriend.” One more? “Confidence is my natural odor.” Fans eat up his sound bites like Ralphie the Buffalo devours a bushel of grass at halftime.

Then, on numerous occasions (including Father’s Day!) last year, Sanders ranked his five children: Deion Jr., Shelomi, Shilo, Shedeur, and Deiondra. Before you howl—he didn’t rank his babies the same way each time. When journalists, in disbelief, followed up, he doubled down, saying, “I’m the only one that’s honest about ranking my kids. You guys act like you all love them the same, and you don’t.” (Sanders, uh, declined to comment.)

Here’s the thing: Coach Prime is right. This sounds like a very big-F Father move, but it’s really a classic Dad move. Everyone has a favorite child. You have a favorite child. As in the Sanders household, your favorite probably changes with the various kids’ wins and losses. Today, the one who had to be told only once to put on his shoes is most likely ranking ahead of the one who made you late for work with a meltdown about why the banana wasn’t yellow yellow. Why not be like Prime Time and just admit it? When I’m a father of five (Brady Jr., Furiosa, Peggy, Elvis, and Steve), you know damn well I’ll keep my rankings on a whiteboard stuck to the fridge. Love you, Brady Jr.!

Level Up Your Dadding with a Few Choice Pieces of Gear

By Krista Jones

Diaper? Done. Snacks? Packed. Wisdom? Imparted. What further proof do you need that you’re a dad? Here are three items that Esquire commerce editor Krista Jones recommends.

Parenting Tip: Why Not Show Your Kids an R-Rated Movie?

By Kevin Sintumuang

I watched Zack Snyder’s Justice League with my kids when they were eight and five. And they liked it. I mentioned this, with a bit of guilt considering its R rating, to Snyder during a Q&A. “It’s a pretty soft R,” he told me, as if to say I wasn’t that terrible a parent. Sure, I had to ignore the kids’ questions about what the Joker meant by giving Batman a “reach around,” but for the most part, if your kids can handle curses and some violence, they can handle soft R’s. One of the best parts of being a dad is knowing which rules are okay to break. The fatherly refrain of “no R-rated movies” is one.

Since then, we’ve added more soft R’s to family movie night. Game Night, the Rachel McAdams/Jason Bateman kidnapping caper, was a hit, too. Air, the story behind the making of Air Jordans, is totally family friendly if you ignore the fact that they say nutsa*ck. We’ve hit The Holdovers (an instant high school classic), Terminator 2 (secretly about fatherhood), and Good Will Hunting (they’ll need to learn about Boston somehow).

Kids are more capable of understanding media than we give them credit for, and the more we activate that media critic in them—and show them that movies can be pretty damn cool—the better. I watched Heat with my older daughter when she was nine, and she got it: The area between good guys and bad guys can be pretty gray. My younger daughter, now eight, wanted to watch Oppenheimer after it won the Oscar for Best Picture. I told her there was nudity. “Why does a movie about the nuclear bomb have nudity?” she asked. Good question. I didn’t have a good answer. But we’ll watch it, skip over those bits, and talk about it.

What My Dad Was Right About

I was afraid of turning into my father . . . until I did.

By Michael Sebastian

Here’s a story about my dad that he won’t like me telling you: When I was, I don’t know, ten, I cleaned up spilled milk with our fabric toaster cover. My dad was not happy. “You know, Michael,” he said, “sometimes you can be a real jerk.” He wasn’t wrong, and now that I have two of them myself, I know that everyone sometimes has this thought about their kids. But he said it to me.

My dad was an asshole sometimes. He had a short fuse and a certain way of doing things. How he loaded and unloaded the dishwasher—don’t get me started.

He worked all the time. He wore a suit and tie six days a week. On his one day off, he’d wake up my older brother and me early to run errands, and he refused to let us change the station on the car radio. He was a classic father.

But he did give a sh*t. The old man showed up to every one of my baseball games, usually in that suit and tie. He persuaded his friend, a civil engineer, to build a toothpick bridge for a Boy Scout competition. (We came in second.) I wanted for nothing, including the college education for which he paid.

Then a funny thing happened when I became a dad. Despite trying not to, I also became my father. Not that it’s all bad. I show up to games, even if it’s usually in a jacket and tie. I help with Girl Scouts. But then there’s the dishwasher. . . . 

Why does no one know how to load a dishwasher properly? Coffee mugs go on the upper-right rack. It’s all about the geography of the kitchen, I explain to my wife and kids, who fail to grasp this. The cabinet where the mugs live is to the right of the dishwasher. When the mugs go where they belong, unloading is much easier—you save yourself a few steps and several minutes. Last month, I shared this strategy with my father. “Smart,” he said approvingly. I wish I could bottle and sell the pride I felt.

You’re a great dad already. Want to be better? We’ve got you covered.