"well, we've evolved since cave-man times and we have more variety of foods
and we can prepare them better, so we don't need to nurse until age 5 just
because we can't chew the tough old bison we happened to kill...".

Well Fio, she *does* have a point, of sorts.  I do think that the discovery
of fire and cooking, and then the later domestication of plants and animals
helped reduce the consequences of NOT nursing for 5-6-7 years, and enabled
people to wean earlier (say 2-3-4 years) without too much excess child
morbidity and mortality.

Just as antibiotics, immunizations, clean water, and good sewer systems
allow modern/industrialized societies to do away with nursing altogether,
without too much excess child morbidity or mortality.  But not without SOME
excess child morbidity or mortality.

Breastfeeding is way more than just food, for one thing.  But you know that.
  And if your child is the one who gets sick at age 3 or 4 or 5, but doesn't
die because they are still breastfeeding, then you'll think it was mighty
important.

She is clearly still struggling with the idea that "breasts as sex objects"
is a cultural phenomenon, not a 'natural' one.  My example of how powerful
culture can be is to ask people to think about what they eat, and who
defined for them what was edible and what not.  Surely it can be
idiosyncratic -- I don't eat 'organs' (liver, kidneys, brain) but my father
did.  Still, pretty much no one in the US eats termites or witchetty grubs,
and most of us would get physically ill if asked to eat them, even though
people in other cultures consider them delicacies.  Of course, I wouldn't
eat snails (escargot) or horse either, but many French people do.  Culture
is very powerful.

Kathy D.

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