BIG DISCLAIMER : When I mean "masculinity in women", I do NOT mean the Manosphere's definition of that; rudeness, aggression, bossiness, being overly independent and hyperfixated on career, being mean-spirited, and picking fights for no reason. So my definition of a masculine woman isn't a modern woman.

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I'm starting to think that I as a man have daddy issues, and it explains my type a little bit. Or maybe I seriously need to cut Red Pill content out of my life. Anyway, before I go further, the summary is, I'm asking if a man lacking male role models--particularly fathers--or lack of bonding with them leads him to compensate by looking for tomboys or women who are masculine in other ways. So yep, this question is very much Freudian.

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I DID have a strong, masculine father in my home. Picked me up from school, talked to me about it, and I helped him clean his landscaping clients' yards and shoveled snow. However, I was much, much closer to my mother and grandmother than him. I talked with them more often and bonded with them way more. My mom and grandma were very feminine, particularly my mom. Soft, kind, empathetic, pacifistic to different extents, scared of pests, sensitive, couldn't handle intense violence and gore, and so on. My role models in school weren't too different. Mostly female teachers, and some male teachers. All pretty decent.

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In terms of media, I was kind of exposed to action girls at an early age. At 5 or 6 or so, my parents bought me the video games Mortal Kombat: Deadly Alliance, Codename: Brute Force, and Turok: Evolution, all of which had tough women as characters. On top of that, I used to watch Kim Possible as a kid. And at that age, I was aware of the fact that guys and girls were different. I knew that girls were usually soft, more likely to be scared of pests, more demure and gentle, and so on and so forth.

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And to be honest...I kinda didn't like that. AT ALL. I thought girls who were tough and more boyish--which again, my mom and grandmother were very much NOT--were cooler and more interesting. And I personally, had little to no interest in being that strong, masculine man. Not because of misandry in my life, but due to me not caring about gender norms.

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And my teenage years might have set my type in stone. I got into horror movies (mom and grandma hated those too), got interested in firearms (my mom WAS in the Navy but now refuses to have a gun in the house, and my grandma doesn't want a gun in her home), and I started watching iCarly. I liked Carly Shay, Sam Puckett, and Freddie Benson equally, but Sam Puckett really resonated with me for not being that soft girly-girl. And I was still more distant with a good, masculine father who was very much present in the home and in my life. Finally, I think that was around the time I started seeing toughness or masculinity in the ladies attractive. I got Call of Duty: Black Ops 2, and I just felt..."things" whenever I played as Misty Briarton in Zombies Mode.

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The final nail in the coffin was meeting a girl on Facebook and befriending her. She and I bonded and even fell in love because we had a lot of the same interests. But most of all...she was kind of a tomboy. She knew a little about guns, played violent games and loved horror with a passion, killed a snake one time, wasn't that scared of pests, and got into fights at school often (she was defending herself). So my ex-GF was a breath of fresh air for me. It helped that she was a switch too sexually.

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So that brings us to present me. Nowadays, traditionally masculine traits in women attract me, while femininity for the most part, doesn't interest me. Masculine traits like dominance, physical strength, combat prowess, being willing to fight and kill (essentially violence), tallness, stoicism, being logically driven, courage, heroism, protectiveness, and generally having masculine interests attract me. But dominance , strength, and violence are at the top of the list.

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I'd go as far as to say my ideal partner is kind of manly (and YES, I'm a straight man). As for feminine traits, submission, pacifism, and being physically weak and delicate are the most unattractive of all. So what do you think? Do lack of male role models and male bonding in a boy's life cause him to be attracted to action girls, tomboys, or otherwise masculine women later on?