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Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

Here are 12 ideas to celebrate that this Father’s Day isn’t your father’s Father’s Day.

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads
An employee gift wraps a present. (Photographer: Adam Berry/Bloomberg News)

(Bloomberg) -- Soon the third Sunday of June will be upon us, and with it, quarries of whiskey stones, herds of leather goods, and an inferno of grills—all presented as perfect gifts for Dad. As the editor-at-large of Fatherly, a site devoted to modern parenthood, I’ve watched this annual algae bloom of patriarchy year after year. Over the past 10 years alone, according to the National Retail Federation, Father’s Day spending in the U.S. has increased by $6.6 billion, and is estimated to reach $16 billion this year. That’s a lot of hip flasks and fishing trips. But as the roles of fathers and notions of masculinity evolve, so should your gift giving. For those woke dads out there—or those just opening their eyes—here are 12 ideas to celebrate that this Father’s Day isn’t your father’s Father’s Day. 

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

It used to be that Tom’s, Warby Parker, and Bombas had a corner on the feel-good fashion market. But their one-for-one model has recently come in for some well-founded criticism. (Maybe the desperately poor don’t need slip-ons?) That’s one reason why Brooklyn-based State bags works with local aid organizations to better understand what communities need and deliver aid accordingly. Sometimes, it’s a backpack. Sometimes, it’s facilitating conversations between police officers and inner city youth. Sometimes, it’s straight-up cash. In the case of State’s two-tone Crosby Fanny Pack ($75), a portion of the proceeds goes to Seeds of Peace, an organization that sends children from conflict zones to a summer camp in Maine. Plus, Dad will be right on trend with the street style.

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

What is more woke than smashing the patriarchy on Father’s Day? By now, every performatively woke Dad has that 1970s-homage “Future is Female” tee from Otherwild, the L.A. design studio founded by Rachel Berks. So do him one better and clothe him in Otherwild’s latest, lesser-known resurrected slogan from the early 2000s: a unisex long-sleeved T-shirt that reads “The Patriarchy is a Pyramid Scheme” ($40).

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

An afternoon spent gazing at trailblazing feminist artist Judy Chicago’s installation The Dinner Party at the Brooklyn Museum—39 place settings of the world’s most badass women around a three-sided table—may seem like the perfect Father’s Day outing. Alas, it’s in the Elizabeth A. Sackler Center for Feminist Art (yes, that Sackler) ... ah, intersectionality … Don’t fret. Get him Artware’s new set of Judy Chicago coasters ($24), in which four of Chicago’s colorful, psychedelic vagina plates are shrunken and rendered in cork board, to keep his credenza unscathed by scandal or liquid. 

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

For years, treating Dad to bourbon on Father’s Day amounted to feeding him a dram of racism, oppression, and silencing. The brown liquor is soaked in the slave trade, among other things. But Uncle Nearest is different. Founded in 2017 by author and historian Fawn Weaver, the Tennessee whiskey is named after Nathan “Uncle Nearest” Green, a slave who first taught Jack Daniels how to distill. The 1856 Premium Whiskey (from $65) has bold spice notes up front, with a mellow caramel finish and only hints of vanilla. A portion of the proceeds go to a scholarship fund for Green’s descendants. 

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

For a let-loose sort of summer, get Dad away from stonewashed dad jeans (and their environmental ravages) with these silk hemp trousers ($295) from a Portland, Ore.-founded, gender-neutral, eco-friendly clothing company that uses sustainable, plant-based dyes.

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

Like most commodity crops (coffee, chocolate), the spice trade has long relied on exploitative labor practices. Diaspora Co., a queer woman of color-owned spice business based in Berkeley, Calif., started with sustainable turmeric but just raised enough money via Kickstarter to purchase Indian farmer Abraham Chacko’s entire 400-pound crop of pesticide-free heirloom green cardamom ($36 for 100 grams). Rare for the spice trade, Diaspora Co. pays a living wage to its suppliers, year round. 

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

Cotopaxi, the outdoor clothing line, shares more than simply assonance with Patagonia Inc. Both are certified B-corps, and both are run by mission-inspired white guys and named after Latin American landforms (Cotopaxi is an Ecuadorian volcano). But only Cotopaxi has this handsome Teca Half-Zip Windbreaker ($80), which is bright, unisex, colorful as hell, and made 100% of remnant fabric.

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

Although it may take a while for Dad to make peace with the fact that his backyard barbecues are destroying the earth (not the grills—the beef), this tome might help. Future Food Today: A Cookbook ($35) by Ikea’s Danish innovation lab, Space10, looks hard at what we’ll have in our fridges in the future, with practical instructions on how to get there. For summer: There will be dogless hotdogs (carrots in a spirulina bun), bug burgers (made of 20% mealworms), and microgreen ice cream. 

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

The Super Bowl was so boring this year that there was nothing to do but contemplate the non-Super Bowl (but nevertheless Super-Bowlian) Gillette ad, the apotheosis of woke consumer packaged goods. After 30 years, the brand was reinventing its slogan, “The best that man can be,” to fit the #MeToo era. Gillette has also innovated in other—less controversial—ways, such as by introducing a heated razor ($200) that provides the pleasure of a hot towel with a touch of a button. 

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

Semi-woke is making breakfast smoothies for the kids, yet waking everybody up with the thunderous whir of a blender. Woke woke is Dad waking up only himself and using Breville’s new Super Q blender ($500) with noise-suppression technology and a powerful 1,800 watt motor to pulverize cardamom pods and bananas in near silence. 

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

Some might call it a nap, but Yoga Nidra, also called Yogic Sleep, is an ancient practice that awakens the body by putting it into a state of guided slumber. It’s also part of a new wellness program at the Ritz Carlton Amelia Island (half-day programs from $800) which includes making mandalas on the white-sand beaches and a CBD relief and recovery massage. Lunch included.

Father’s Day Gifts for Woke Dads

You didn’t think we’d let you get out of Father’s Day without whiskey cubes did you? If he already has them, try these amethyst whiskey cubes ($145) designed by Anna Rabinowicz, a product designer who got her start designing prosthetic knees but has since moved on to crystals and geodes.

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Justin Ocean at jocean1@bloomberg.net

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