Copyright  1996  Phoenix Newspapers, Inc.,THE ARIZONA REPUBLIC  January
21,  1996

COMMERCIALISM MILKS BREAST-OBSESSED U.S.  By Susan M. Barbieri,
Knight-Ridder Newspapers

[Selections of text only.]

   They are milk-producing glands surrounded by fatty tissue, and they are
designed for feeding infants.

   Breasts. Big deal...[but] scholars, feminists and psychologists say our
culture seems to be
more breast-fixated than ever.

   "It is worse," says Laura Kuhn of the Media Action Alliance, a Circle Pines,
Minn.-based group that monitors media and advertising for images that objectify
women. "On the covers of magazines, there's much more exposed chest - from the
National Enquirer to Ladies' Home Journal. They're everywhere, even on product
packaging. Video covers, even greeting cards...

   Those who profit from the breast obsession see nothing wrong with using
women's bodies to boost the corporate bottom line. The marketing people behind
the Wonderbra say their print ad campaign, which features models with trussed-up
cleavage, is about "taking control and empowerment."...


   "During sweeps period on TV, you see more breasts on TV than anywhere else,"
according to a spokeswoman for the breast-intensive Entertainment Tonight...

   Karin Weiss, a Minneapolis sex therapist and founder of the Human Sexuality
Program at the University of Minnesota, boils down the American breast obsession
to its most primal essence.

   "Breasts represent that kind of safety or ultimate nourishment. But that's
pretty deep," Weiss says, laughing. "Our current adult generation, most of them
were bottle-fed because there was a whole period of time when women were advised
not to  breast-feed.  Maybe some of it is that these people have never had the
breast, and there still is that hunger for the breast that never was satisfied
as an infant." ...



Arly Helm                                       [log in to unmask]
(MS, Nutrition & Food Sciences, CLE, IBCLC; LC for IHC)