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Notes -
This either/or thinking doesn't check out to me. Scan women's romance literature and you'll find countless instances of the ideal being a strong and physically protective male partner who's also tender and emotionally attentive, something like having a guard dog who's tough to other people but a sweetie to you.
I suspect some women don't have a lot of experience meeting this type IRL, so it's likely that the splitting into tender partner + strong partner is a workaround for someone who's been traumatically convinced that strong + tender (or, as Sabrina Carpenter says, "jacked and kind") combo doesn't exist in a single man. You see something similar in the many romance heroes who are constructed as dashing and brash while also having some kind of physical handicap or emotional wound, which is perceived as making them safer to be around.
Then, too, there are a lot of people who falsely believe they display unappreciated "tenderness" when actually they're just passive or defensively/anxiously polite, neither of which is especially attractive.
I think it's just rare and a natural adaptation for there not being enough for those types for everyone.
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