I'm not sure whether I'm repeating what Keren Epstein-Gilboa has already
said in her Ginger bread house analogy. But here in the Netherlands you
can't move for all the 'nice' brochures about bottle feeding. Without
exeption (and I stand corrected if wrong!) they always begin by saying bf is
best. (Now I think of Diane W. essay about language and bfding.) My theory
is that they are not only wanting to pull professionals in but also parents.
The brochures I'm talking about are the ones freely available in baby/todler
consultating waiting rooms. Many parents also get these brochures during
their pregnancies. Sometimes they tell me that they have one of 'those'
brochures' and when the topic of bottle v bf comes up they'll often say
something like "but formula companies aren't all that bad, afterall they do
say breast is the best".  Thus the ploy of the ABM manufacturers first
sucking up and being ever so kind about bf works - it makes them seem less
monsterous to parents and to be parents.
Needless to say when the topic comes up I ask them what they think is (from
a biological point and not a cultural/social one) the NORMAL food foor a
baby (a la Diane W.). Then I ask them why formula companies always say bf is
the best - usually the penny (sorry quarter or cent!) drops.

Also a question for Heather:

"images of breastfeeding itself - ads in the UK in healthcareprofessional
journals (where it is legal to advertise formula)
sometimes show mothers and babies feeding, with a strapline saying something
like 'can you get this close?' or similar. Often, these are not 'realistic'
images - the mother and baby might be totally naked, for instance, which at
the same time as romanticising bf, also undermines it by making it seem
something 'impossible' to do
* images of energy and/or  contentment, with sweet and roly-poly babies
being active, or else  smiling beatifically or sleeping
peacefully"

Is this also legal in the UK for parenting magazines? Last summer I spent an
afternoon going through the baby/parenting magazines that my sister had in
house (in the UK). I saw just the same types of advertisments for ABM - real
stomach renching stuff.


Sara Bernard
(The Netherlands - origins in the UK)

Keren - your analogy is certainly one to remember.

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