This year’s John Lewis Christmas advert, which shows a young boy and his family celebrating the festive season in the company of a singing plant, has attracted criticism on social media for peddling a ‘fatherless’ stereotype.

"Banned the dad, have we? Sexist b**tards. You’ve lost me as a customer forever. Happy Christmas, hope you’re bankrupt next year." 

"I enjoyed the advert, but it would have been nice to see the dad or even Grandad. Fathers play just as an important role in their children’s lives."

"You could have at least slipped a token Grandad into the mix. Apparently, men don't exist at Christmas for whoever runs your marketing team. Lots of single Dads out there as well but much more important to look inclusive by excluding 50% of the population. Embarrassing."

John Lewis has defended the advert, explaining: “This ad shows a mum and a grandma. We always attempt to show a broad representation of British life, single parent families make up nearly a quarter of families with dependent children in the UK and they aren’t often shown on TV.”

Sounds reasonable enough, especially given the tagline ‘Let your traditions grow’, which hints at the idea of new versions of family emerging, adapting and finding new ways of doing things? 

Not really, because there is an inaccurate and divisive assumption that underpins this advert: that in families where parents divorce or separate – of which, as John Lewis states, there are plenty – fathers simply disappear from their children’s lives.

In reality, the vast majority of fathers are ‘around’ for their children, from birth through to early adulthood and beyond. Last year in England, 95.4% of mothers and fathers registered their baby’s birth together (percentages are similar in the rest of the UK); and our new research shows that of the 95% of UK fathers present in their baby’s life in the year 2000, almost nine in ten were still part of their lives when they were teenagers. 

At the age of five specifically – roughly that of the boy in the advert – 77% of the children studied were living with both their birth parents, leaving 23% who were not. And we know from other, official data that in around 90% of lone parent households, the child lives mostly with the mother. 

So, it would be fair for John Lewis to assume that a fifth of children could, at age five, be classed as ‘living with mum’: a big enough minority to reflect and resonate with the public, perhaps. But – and it is a big but – at that same age, we also know that 94% of the children were either living with or in contact with their birth father. 

Some of the children not fully co-resident with both parents will have been living full or part-time with their dad, with the remainder having some other kind of contact – including regular overnight stays, regular or occasional visits and/or virtual contact.

Given that Christmas, other religious festivals, school holidays and birthdays are times where even children least likely to see their father regularly might well be in touch, the ad seems almost to advocate father absence. 

And the lack of a grandfather, uncle or any other man just compounds the issue. How many children do you know who have literally no male family member present during the Christmas season? This advert shows the family at various time points, so this is not just about dad not being there on Christmas morning.

It would have been so easy for John Lewis to be inclusive of fathers or father-figures without damaging its progressive ‘families come in all shapes and sizes’ concept; indeed, this could have enhanced the message. 

The advert could have showed dad turning up at mum’s house bearing gifts, illustrating that today’s separated parents cooperate to ‘put the kids first’. It might have had one of the children Facetiming dad: a key method modern families use to stay in touch. As the social media critics quoted above suggest, a granddad could have softened the ‘female-onlycaregiving’ vibe.

So top marks to John Lewis for bringing a ‘non-traditional’ model of family life to our screens this Christmas. But the John Lewis advert is such a pinnacle and much-watched advert for the season – that the repercussions of this fatherless advert will be lasting. 

We need to stop underplaying men’s presence and availability in their children’s lives: societal norms shut dads out enough – we don’t need to play up to this in advertising too. John Lewis has missed a ‘feel good’ opportunity to offer an alternative but representative modern family view; alienating Britain’s dads and undermining decades of progress in co-parenting in the process.