In a sense, it's an admirable thing to do: they've gone through a terrible experience, perhaps many terrible experiences, and they try to help people who have gone through the same thing.

Unfortunately, this kind of experience also skews their perception on life. It's left them with a rather negative opinion of men, and this bleeds over into their personal and professional lives as well. They frequently work under circumstances that only reinforces their view.

It's been my experience that women who have been abused by their partners or parents are the LEAST sympathetic to male victims. I used to think the opposite, that they would care about everyone's pain. (Yes, I'm fully aware of how naïve that was) When I mentioned to them that men suffer abuse by their partners at about the same rate of women, the response was often: "Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck you, you piece of shit! Stop playing the victim! Male abuse victims are minuscule compared to the vast numbers of women!" And then, likely as not, they'd begin going on a tirade.

Even if they think they've moved past it, worked through their issue, it's clear they haven't. These wounded healers are often thinking about their pain, their scars, their anger, and it leaves them completely incapable of seeing the other side of the equation. It seems to be part of human nature to just think about our own pain and discount the experiences of others, but it becomes a massive problem when these individuals have such influence on national policy.