Climbing onto soapbox:
Lactnet's strength is in uniting many people with very diverse backgrounds
around the one issue we all agree on: that human milk is for human babies.
I hope you can bear with me as I draw that agreement further, to include our
appreciation of the strength of Lactnet.

Many of us will find kindred spirits about other issues on Lactnet, and it
is easy to forget that we only 'know' a fraction of the subscribers, and to
assume that a viewpoint we find central to all our values will be held by
everyone else who also believes in human milk for human babies.  If we lose
that focus so that only certain political or religious views are acceptable
on Lactnet, we all lose an unparallelled opportunity to expand our
understanding of two things: breastfeeding and the people we share this
planet with.

Please, please let's NOT GO THERE on Lactnet.  I am in awe of the diversity
on this list, and of how we manage to use it to our mutual benefit.
Politicians come and go, in all countries, (didn't anyone else see the
addendum on an Aussie post, that they are like nappies, needing to be
changed often and for the same reason?) but human milk and human babies
remain, and they need us to protect our common ground for their benefit.

It is sometimes relevant to illustrate how different governmental systems
solve- or create!- logistical problems relating to health policy or to
breastfeeding, and such posts have a place on Lactnet.  But election
post-mortems, or partisan political declarations, will only divide us if
carried out on the list.  For me as a person with strong convictions about
nearly everything, Lactnet has been a necessary exercise in focus, and in
diplomacy.

It is very easy, not to mention FUN, to carry out correspondence off the
list.  If you have participated in other lists and seen what a loss it is
when they degenerate into personal posts between two or three subscribers,
and especially when the tone of that correspondence demonstrates the worst
potential for use of e-mail, you will know why I am responding now, before
we get anywhere near that point.

Climbing down from the soapbox now
Rachel Myr
Kristiansand, Norway

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