I’ve been on this sub for about a fortnight or so and the recurring theme has been of women going for “assholes and/or misogynists”

Initially, I thought it was bull crap by incels and a lot of it frankly is, but after giving it much thought and reading a lot of answers here, I feel that a lot of guys confuse confidence and attractiveness with being an asshole. It’s one of those things where they overlap because a lot of assholes are indeed v assertive but that doesn’t imply every assertive/confident man would necessarily be an asshole.

Just for an example, I’m going to use the underlying assumption that we are talking about women who DO look for men who are naturally assertive and confident (and there are plenty of them, I can admit this. If not for personal anecdotes, women’s literature is enough proof that they tend to go for dom/men who ooze confidence and self reliance) but there’s a catch here- most women, especially those who do like an assertive man want his assertiveness for the rest of the world, with her they want him to be gentle and kind. Because they like feeling special.

This is why I can’t relate with men on here when they say things like “women always go for the assholes” because I don’t see it play out irl. I don’t think I recall a single woman ever expressing a desire for a straight up abusive psychopath. It just happens that a lot of guys who do exude assertiveness tend to fall in that bracket but they don’t make for good relationships. They just make up for bad incidents because chances are that they won’t make a distinction. They’ll be dicks to the women too.

TLDR: You don’t have to be a raging misogynist to get women. Just because there’s an overlap between two doesn’t mean that those woman actively look for assholes. Don’t confuse confidence, self reliance and charm with being an asshole.