There’s this long-held derisive saying. You might have heard it, particularly if you’re a man who likes to use it. It goes simply, “Oh, she’s got Daddy issues.” As though that’s supposed to explain away why the woman in question might be “promiscuous”—an automatic synonym for “damaged goods” somehow—or otherwise “cuckoo.” Constantly seeking affection and validation where she never got it from the prototype for all subsequent men in her life. The “old adage” is one of many designed to place all responsibility for “wrongdoing” squarely on a girl’s shoulders when, in fact, it should be her patriarch held responsible for that so-called “craziness.” A word tossed around very easily when it comes to the female gender, and one that her own father would likely have no problem using against his daughter (see: the Orange One).
Another vexing aspect of the term is that it presumes a woman can only have “Daddy issues” if her father is absent or otherwise emotionally unavailable. But even those who do have objectively “good” relationships with their father can become a victim of the “issues” that stem from patriarchal influence (and negligence). Namely, the idea that everything about his character—as the first “major” male in a girl’s life—will later affect her in some way when she attempts romantic relationships. Marilyn Monroe, even now, remains one of the text book archetypes of this, rumored to have called some of the romantic leads in her life “Daddy” (according to The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe, that epithet was reserved, at the very least, for Joe DiMaggio, in addition to “Slugger”). The abandonment she suffered not only at the hands of her mentally ill mother, but a father who was never there in the first place forever scarred Norma Jeane. In contrast, a father’s over-involvement (see: Jamie Spears) can have just as adverse of an effect on a girl, perhaps proving that many men don’t have the delicacy required to toe the fragile line in their parenting style.
The “impulses” and “associations” a woman finds herself having will often be attributed by the “love interest” to being the result of her less-than-stellar rapport with Daddy dearest. Though, in some cases, maybe that rapport is a little too close. Too intimate. Which can also lead to the dreaded “Daddy issues” label as well. But even in that case, it is still the fault of the father for establishing this kind of dynamic, taking advantage of a malleable mind before she can see how “not cute” the interactions are (see: Dylan Farrow). And, naturally, many misogynists would try to posit that it’s all actually the fault of the mother for “choosing” a “partner” who ended up being toxic in the first place (see: Mia Farrow). As though a woman is supposed have the foresight to know just how “unmasked” a man can get. Turns out, for most, the answer is very.
But like her mother, a girl is always initially hopeful that the man she “chooses” (though, more often than not, chooses her) will be slightly more evolved than the ilk from previous generations. The ones that were meant to leave all traces of “retroness” in the past. Alas, retro is forever present being that parents pass down their ideologies ad infinitum through the lineages. Particularly the male ideology of being “strong”—usually a euphemism for being “superior”…to women. Superior even to his own eventual daughter (don’t see, but just know this is a prime recent elucidation: Coming to America 2). “Papa” can’t help it, they’ll say. He’s merely a product of an evermore fucked up society that seeks to confuse entirely the “male identity” in order to make way for what blokes view as “far more oppressive” women. But of course they’re going to feel “oppressed” when they’re no longer the ones in total control. This, in part, is what fuels a new breed of potential toxicity to the father-daughter relationship. For, on the one hand, the “modern” dad wants to adhere to the “woke tenets” of the present, yet on the other, it’s in his nature to subjugate and berate a female, particularly one of his own creation, in order to assert continued “dominance.”
Let us take, for example, the tween or teen girl who decides to go the “all-American” route and become a cheerleader. Try as she might to avoid it (though she’s probably not), the skirt gon’ get hiked and the makeup painted on. Daddy, of course, can only take two approaches—both of which will end up being wrong. He can vehemently oppose the gradual “whore-ification” (a.k.a. inevitable sexualization) of his daughter, or he can be a little too into it happening, embracing it with the sort of gusto that makes him come across as a Humbert Humbert type. So no, there is no actual path he can take that will not lead to his “baby girl” somehow getting a distorted perspective of “what men want.” Which remains, for the most part, “an itty bitty waist and a round thing in [their] face.”
Conversely, on the other spectrum of “daughter classifications” is the yielding of more of a Daria as opposed to a Quinn “varietal.” This finds the father perhaps even more flummoxed about how to “react.” What is a man to do with a “sexless” daughter? In some ways, that’s far worse. For no father wants to think he’s produced an undesirable female. Perhaps somewhere ingrained in every father is the increasingly ancient need to ensure that his daughter has the looks to “land a man” (especially if her dowry a.k.a. station in life ain’t that great) so that he can feel at ease knowing he’s no longer “responsible for her.” Here it bears noting that some will tout that a woman is the one solely responsible for all her actions, and should not try to wield “the sins of the father” as a means to excuse her own loca behavior. A lovely thought (for deadbeat dads), to be sure. But the truth is, a girl’s father is perhaps even more influential than a boy’s mother in shaping how she turns out and, equally as important, who she ends up giving her heart to (even if that heart is stomped upon in return by the object of her affection).
Freud, a go-to for “wisdom” when it comes to sexual attraction between parent and child, once stated of Oedipus Rex (a play that also ended up coining, in turn, the Electra complex), “[Oedipus’] destiny moves us only because it might have been ours—because the oracle laid the same curse upon us before our birth as upon him. It is the fate of all of us, perhaps, to direct our first sexual impulse towards our mother and our first hatred and our first murderous wish against our father. Our dreams convince us that this is so.” In the daughter’s case, the first murderous wish goes hand in hand with the first sexual impulse toward Daddy—whether conscious or not.
Depending on how “equipped” Daddy is for the job of raising a daughter so that she’ll have a somewhat successful attachment style to a man she can actually bang, she might just have a shot at not being one of those “anxious-preoccupied,” “dismissive-avoidant” or “dismissive-fearful” types. Alas, Daddy so frequently can’t seem to provide, consistently ending up engaging in behaviors that are ultimately damaging to his female progeny. As for the sons, well, they’ll be fine. They’re just there to perpetuate the chauvinistic cycle. Of course, it would be nice if just one generation could finally break it. That would be all it would take… you know, men actually embracing some form of accountability for their low-grade fathering skills, which mentally developing daughters suffer the consequences of. Only then might we be able to stop perpetuating this notion of women having “daddy issues.” Because it’s the daddies that have all the issues first.
