Morgan posted a link to a standup comedy piece about breastfeeding, and I
enjoyed it a lot.  Having seen the pump company displays at the VELB
conference, I appreciated the comedian's send-up of a pump as something to
wear at the gym, because that's how the Freestyle pump seems to be being
marketed.  'Freedom is born', says the Medela ad, while not specifying what
one is freed from. The ad that appeared in the last issue of BIRTH included
five photographs, not one of which showed a baby at the breast, or even
facing its mother. To an illiterate viewer it would appear that babies are
for holding up in front of cameras, and breasts are for putting into flanges
and sucking out milk. The pictures made no connection between the baby and
the breast.

The mannequin (womannequin?) at the Medela stand was wearing something that
looked suitable for aerobics workouts, with the double collection kit
fastened on hands-free and the pump motor strapped fetchingly around her
slender hips like an iPod, or a Walkman, for all of you who can remember
more than 15 years into the past.  On the last day of the conference, a
pediatrician did a talk about unnecessary commercial products for babies,
and she showed a photo that rather chillingly showed what could be the
counterpart to the mannequin, expressing milk with a fake baby: it was a
baby, cradled by those disembodied, stuffed FAKE arms that were discussed
here a good while back.  Here is the baby, being hoodwinked into thinking
someone cares enough to hold it, and here is the mother, being hoodwinked
into thinking that this breastfeeding stuff is all just a matter of milk
removal.
The speaker at VELB didn't connect the two, but I certainly did, and I think
it's time we really let companies know what we think of the messages they
send in their marketing materials.  While Medela admittedly finances good
research, their marketing of products for sale has become increasingly
unpalatable, to me, anyway.  With the Symphony pump it was the slogan 'The
only thing more natural is a baby' and with the Freestyle it is 'Freedom is
born', both adverts containing NOTHING about the situations in which having
a pump may be appropriate.  It goes against everything I stand for in
working with mothers and babies, to portray 'lactating' as somehow at odds
with 'freedom', unless you have an electric  thingamajig that replaces the
role of the baby in getting the milk out of your breasts.
Imagine if we defined 'freedom' as having the option of staying close enough
to your child for at least the first six months so you didn't need an
expensive, high maintenance piece of electrically powered machinery and a
lot of things that need scrupulous washing up after every use, to give them
your milk.  Or, it could mean possessing the knowledge and skill to be able
to express milk by hand into the nearest suitable container at hand when the
baby isn't available.  

Liz Brooks pointed out in her talk at VELB that breast pumps are not covered
by the WHO Code.  That is no reason for us not to hold pump companies to the
same standards as what the Code sets: that marketing materials consist
exclusively of facts, and that the products not be marketed aggressively at
consumers, as though every mother needs to purchase her own Freestyle or
Symphony pump in order to breastfeed.

Rachel Myr
Kristiansand, Norway

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