Why am I all of a sudden attracted to more masculine men

[Larsz]

I turned 30 a few months ago. And a few things happened, all of a sudden I felt almost a sense of urgency to have a baby. And secondly, my taste in men has completely changed. I’ve always liked the indie, sensitive guy who is well educated and into the arts. All of a sudden I’m really attracted to hyper masculine men. Even the body type I am attracted to has changed. I’m curious if it’s socio-cultural factors or biological ones driving this change.

I have been with my fiance since university and out of nowhere I have lost attraction to him. Theoretically he is exactly what I want - kind, evolved and sensitive. He reads more feminist literature than me! But I find myself being attracted to almost his polar opposite.

Anyone else experience this?

I’ve always preferred big tall hairy physically strong men with big shoulders, but they must be intelligent and kind. Bonus points if in uniform. We’ve been happily married now for thirty years 😀.

I have enough angst in myself to want it in my husband thanks!

They are, but only because men in general are often misogynists. Some just try to hide it and others don't.

Men reportedly in to "feminist literature" always remind me of a poem by Stephanie Smolensky in my "in the pink" poetry book I bought in 1983 as a student. The poem is called " I told you when we started this relationship what to expect" and is about a bloke laying down his ground rules to his poor girlfriend. This bloke may be nothing like the OP's feminist literature loving boyfriend but one verse that sticks in my memory (but not that much so I had to go home from work to type it out properly is):-
"Me? I run a fucking creche two day a week-
I practically founded the Men's Group round here,
I've been into women's problems for years.
-No, I don't find that funny, are you drunk?
Well stop laughing then. What was that?
I make up the rules?
You're fucking jealous that's your trouble,
and hysterical and insecure,
colonising, possessive-"

So many lefty dudebros are like this.

For me, the sweet spot is a man who is strong/big and who is sweet/intelligent. It's not a binary - I'm aiming for both.

Anyway, it's not something I can justify to anyone. It's what I like for no particular reason other than that's what takes my fancy. I'm as much an animal as anything else.

They really aren’t. It’s funny how some people on this thread appear to be fixated on demonising men who are egalitarian. Maybe it’s part of that weird tendency I note in a significant minority of Mners who like to make claims about ‘all men are like ax’ in order to convince themselves they haven’t chosen poorly.

Agree.

As someone with fairly extensive experience of left-wing men, as friends and lovers, I can confirm there are awful dudebros among them, as there are among any given group of men. However all the best men I know are basically left-wing, believe in egalitarianism, stand up for people who don't have their privilege, have the intellectual and social curiosity to put themselves in the shoes of people who aren't straight, white or male. Yes, that involves reading feminist literature. You can mock all you like but it's much preferable to a man who refuses to read about feminism because he thinks it isn't for him.

(Men who have read feminist books also come in all sizes and shapes. Some of them even play rugby! The people who are stuck on the "men who read books are scrawny weeds with no practical skills" stereotype really need to get out more.)

And how depressing that a thread about "masculine men" should have ended up by cooing over men who don't read feminist books as the epitome of masculinity.

I was just scrolling to see if anyone has asked that, as I wondered the same

Partly my own dating experience, and partly that these shitty men must have had something that attracted the women in the first place, and I think it’s more likely they were macho types.

My experience is the exact opposite to that.

You can mock all you like but it's much preferable to a man who refuses to read about feminism because he thinks it isn't for him

Is it a refusal or just not even occurred to them to read about it? I mean I'm a woman and don't read books on feminism for no other reason than it just wouldn't particularly occur to me to do so.

I'm pretty sure plenty of men are able to respect women without having to read about feminism.

No luck at the gig. Was poorly attended and all couples except him.
I did mention this thread to ds1. He said about op "has she come off the pill ?" I was so surprised he knew about that. Apparently his close friend and him were discussing this recently. They jokingly had said it's feminine men who have pushed the pill in order get women.
Anyway he's thinking of try dating apps as said he would like to meet someone. He said he met a seeminly perfect partner whilst travelling and they're still in touch but live too far apart. I did know about her but didn't realise how well they'd got on. Such a shame.

If reading about things doesn't occur to someone then they're not for me. Intellectual curiosity really is a must. (And like most character traits it's neither inherently masculine nor feminine.)

There's endless subjects to read about...I don't read books on feminism...not because I'm unfeminist, just not something I'm hugely interested in reading about. There are plenty of other topics I am interested in reading about. I imagine the vast vast majority of men don't read books on feminism... probably women too.

Men can care about equality and work towards it by listening to women and being our allies. Unfortunately some seem to adopt a performative approach of earnestly bearded chin strokery, invariably followed by sharing their wisdom. Even more unfortunately they often feel this suffices in lieu of any positive action on our behalf. Of course your partner may be lobbying for better female representation in his work place at the possible risk to his own promotion and donating to the local women's refuge. But often ime, the male 'feminist' is not.

A must for me too.

Ye exactly.
Of course the two things reading literature and taking action are not mutually exclusive.
But only one of them really matters. Taking action.

@gannett @KimberleyClark It also depends on what you mean by feminist literature?

I have read books like Invisible women, also read articles on feminist subjects. But I don't go out of my way to read feminist literature as a specialist subject. It's more of a thread woven into a lot of other things I'm interested in like software development, finance/economics, politics.

Feminist literature to me seems to be centered around the ideas of feminism, things like third wave feminism, definitions etc etc. very theoretical.

LOL well I don't require men to have gone through a feminist reading list nor to have in-depth knowledge of Audre Lorde and Judith Butler. It's certainly not a conscious red line. But thinking about it if a man didn't have the intellectual curiosity to be aware of that thread woven into the things he is interested in, I don't think I'd be attracted to him. A straight white man who has never contemplated and is not interested to contemplate the experiences of women, people of colour and LGBT people is just... not someone I could respect, ultimately. As a mixed-race woman, if he's not interested in feminism and racial discourse, it's a bit like he's not interested in me and the things that shaped me.

But the discussion was actually the other way round - the prevalent view on this thread that men who read feminist literature or indeed any sort of philosophy were somehow unattractive and not masculine. So I was pushing back on that. And having said all the above, back in the day I did in fact sleep with a man on the day I met him 99% because he had good Audre Lorde chat. (He was good but I wasn't looking for a relationship at the time.)

Also yes taking action is more important but the point of the reading is that it's meant to inspire the action. I don't think I've met many people taking real-world action who haven't done some form of reading about feminism or racism or whatever the subject is. Not necessarily critical theory but articles, other people's experiences, even just Wiki pages.

Haha I get this around ovulation, especially during my 30s! I want DP to be as masculine as possible, and I tend to overlook his faults more then too. I already have children.

Something really strange happened to me recently. I was standing at a bus stop after work, and a guy walked past, not actually really my type, shorter than I would go for, quite a bit older than me. He looked like a roofer or builder or something, paint stains. Normally I'd never notice. Something about the way he walked, the look on his face, I could literally smell or feel the testosterone / aura off him 😳😳 like some kind of magnetism, and I came over all funny. He never even noticed my existence, so it wasn't like a reciprocal thing. It's even more strange, because I am happily with partner of nearly 20 years, and I am not really that bothered about men normally, not prone to crushes etc. It was genuinely so weird. He was like 10 feet away at all times! Maybe it means we'd match genetically haha.

So just out of interest, would it be ok for lots of men out there to dump their feminist, literary loving and deep thinking women who possess the incorrect body shape and opinions, in favour of women with good wide child birthing hips, large mammary glands for feeding their offspring and a strong need to stay home, cook, be quiet and raise the children. Or is it only women who can’t take the piss and shit on these apparently weedy pathetic men who they don’t fancy in favour of their strong rugby player types?

Men come in many varieties, some are sensitive and not sporty and they would have been reminded of this from childhood by all the adults around them. They find partners who love them, they in turn find partners of all varieties that they love, why do some on this thread think it’s ok to be pretty awful about them

@cookiebee men have been dumping women for all sorts of daft reasons since Adam was a boy. Mainly a younger model but lots of reasons. Women's hormones are biological. Maybe that's what happens to the men?

Men do this all the time don't they?

But yes both men and women can leave a relationship if they want for whatever reason...even if it does seem shallow

Agreed. It does real lasting psychological damage to lots of boys growing up when they are made to feel like they're not real boys or real men because they don't fit a certain stereotype or have interests that aren't playing sport or fixing things.

But men have left women for more feminine women on the past, so two wrongs clearly make a right according to lots of posters on this thread. As a pp said I really hope those posters don't have sons

This. Aren’t women their own worst enemy?

It is a mix with me, but i don't need a man to look after me i am perfectly able to do that myself married or not