Susan Bradley is a Canadian psychiatrist best known for creating the disease “gender identity disorder in children” and working with Kenneth Zucker to develop a form of reparative therapy to prevent gender diverse youth from becoming transgender adults. Gender Shock author Phyllis Burke characterized Bradley and Zucker’s practices as “child abuse.”
Background
Susan Jane Bradley was born in 1940. Bradley was born in Niagara Falls, Ontario. She earned a bachelor’s degree from University of Toronto in 1962, then worked for a year in India before earning a medical degree from University of Toronto in 1966. She earned her specialty licenses in psychiatry and child psychiatry in 1972.
Bradley served the American Psychiatric Association DSM-IV Subcommittee on Gender Identity Disorders.
Psychologist Daryl Hill was lead author on a paper outlining Bradley’s dangerous beliefs: “Zucker and Bradley believe that reparative treatments (encouraging the child to accept their natal sex and associated gender) can be therapeutic for several reasons. They believe that treatment can reduce social ostracism by helping gender non-conforming children mix more readily with same sex peers and prevent long-term psychopathological development (1.e., it is easier to change a child than a society intolerant of gender diversity). Reparative therapy is believed to reduce the chances of adult GID (i.e., transsexualism) which Zucker and Bradley characterize as undesirable.”
A 2007 celebration honoring Bradley’s career was disrupted by transgender protesters. Bradley’s former clinic was shut down in 2015, and her abusive practices were outlawed in Canada.
Anti-transgender activism
Since retiring, Bradley has become a favored source for presenting conservative criticism about gender diverse youth and their healthcare.
Though she is Canadian, Bradley signed a 2018 letter from hate group American College of Pediatricians to the Trump Administration. Bradley demanded “upholding the scientific definition of sex in law and policy,” adding “an individual who identifies as transgender remains either a biological male or female.”
References
Burke, Phyllis (1996). Gender Shock. Anchor. ISBN 978-0-385-47718-5
Hill DB, Rozanski C, Carfagnini J, Willoughby B (2006). Gender Identity Disorders in Childhood and Adolescence: A Critical Inquiry. pp. 7-34. In Karasic D, Drescher J (Eds.) Sexual and Gender Diagnoses of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM): A Reevaluation. Haworth Press ISBN 0-7890-3214-7
Duggan, Laurel (March 11, 2023). ‘We Were Wrong’: Pioneer In Child Gender Dysphoria Treatment Says Trans Medical Industry Is Harming Kids. Daily Caller https://dailycaller.com/2023/03/11/pioneer-in-child-gender-dysphoria-treatment-says-trans-medical-industry-is-harming-kids/
Gagnon, Audrey (April 12, 2007). Boys will be girls: Gender identity clinic event disrupted by trans activists. ‘’Xtra!’’ http://www.xtra.ca/public/viewstory.aspx?AFF_TYPE=3&STORY_ID=2873&PUB_TEMPLATE_ID=1