Dad Lore

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About

Dad Lore sometimes called Father Lore is a slang term and expression coined by younger internet users to describe their father's lives before they met their mother. Dad Lore is typically depicted as mysterious, convoluted and sometimes troubling, with children piecing together pieces of their father's lives from his sporadically shared anecdotes. TikTokers sometimes compare "Dad Lore" with "Mom Lore" in which the latter is shown to be more superficial and straightforward. Memes about Dad Lore were popularized in 2023.

Origin

On January 2nd, 2022, YouTuber^[1] Niveko posted a video captioned "Father Lore," showing a clip of someone reaching for milk in VR chat and then entering the backrooms. The meme is a play on the Getting The Milk meme, in reference to the cultural cliché where fathers leave to get milk from the store and never return. The post gathered over 3 million views in two years (seen below).

On May 20th, 2022, Tumblr^[2] user propalitet made a post that read, "fathers casually dropping the craziest lore of their lives in the middle of a conversation," followed by Tumblr user revolutionarytea writing, "My brother and I trying to piece together our dad’s life based on random info he casually brings up once and then never mentions again." The post gathered over 180,000 notes in a year (seen below).

propalitet fathers casually dropping the craziest lore of their lives in the middle of a conversation revolutionarytea My brother and I trying to piece together our dad's life based on random info he casually brings up once and then never mentions again Git legendofthehiddenbbc 172 roomba-with-knives-taped-to-it When my great grandpa was on his deathbed my grandpa (his son) was with him and says his last words were "I told them they shouldn't have hanged that woman. Well by damn they're paying now" and no one in my family knows what the f--- that means F My grandmother was harassing me about the dangers of online dating, and my grandpa was like, "Oh fer crying out loud, leave her alone. My parents met online, she'll be fine." Apparenly my great grandparents were both telegraph operators who would chat over the line in between messages and fell in love and my great grandma moved halfway across the country to marry a dude she met over the telegraph. 186,020 notes Nov 10th, 2022 No one alive in the family had ever heard this story until like 70+ years later when I happened to start seeing a dude from OK Cupid.

Spread

On January 24th, 2023, TikToker^[3] @magnolialordblu recounted what she called her Dad's lore, gathering over 11 million plays and 2 million likes in a year (seen below, left). On April 15th, 2023, TikToker^[4] @podness posted a videogame montage with the caption, "Dad's lore before meeting mom," gathering over 1 million plays and 180,000 likes in eight months (seen below, right).

@magnolialordblu
It’s genuinely crazy that he is still alive today

♬ lovely – Yori

@podness Dads got the craziest stories 💀 #fyp #dadlore #dadsoftiktok #meme #gta4 #gta ♬

Memes comparing Dad Lore and Mom Lore took off in November 2023, with TikToker^[5] @business_monkey.0 posting a video comparing the two and gathering over 9 million plays and 2 million likes in two weeks (seen below, left). On November 27th, 2023, TikToker^[6] @adrielisshort posted a video comparing Dad Lore and Mom Lore, gathering over 1 million plays and 500,000 likes in a week (seen below, right).