I think the issue is how much of a catfight can the WSJ stir up. I am so
sick of all these "I am a big breastfeeding supporter but these nipple Nazis
just go too far making moms feel guilty" pieces. I have adopted a new
personal policy of completely ignoring them. What Jennifer Lopez said was
ignorant but making a fuss about it isn't going to change the world. Frankly
I thought Salma Hayak's comments about breastfeeding helping you lose weight
being a lie was more potentially harmful because she didn't make it entirely
clear that she was still advocating breastfeeding and not saying "so
breastfeeding wasn't worth the effort." I think that's what she meant -
don't try to diet while you are breastfeeding - but I don't think it was
clear to all the listeners.
I think as an advocacy tactic it is unproductive to get drawn into the guilt
debate. It allows for the assumption that there really are lots of
hospitals full of nurses pushing hard for all moms to breastfeed and moms
coming home to family members telling them breastfeeding is best for their
babies. I wish! With each birth I brought more Sharpies with me to write
"Breastfed Baby! No formula!" all over everything and always had to fight
off nurses anxious to give a bottle so I could "get some sleep." I fought
off formula providers with a stick. After one birth, the staff punished me
for keeping the baby with me at night by refusing to empty my trash or
change my sheets - and I had had a c/section.
Also the adoption of the "choice" language is an obvious ploy to make
breastfeeding advocates seem anti-feminist - again playing women off of each
other.
If these articles and blog entries stopped getting such overwhelming
responses, they wouldn't get published. So I am just not going to play.
Jake Marcus
> Date: Sat, 12 Apr 2008 16:10:32 +0100
> From: Morgan Gallagher <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Re: mothers right to NOT breastfeed
>
> Every mother has a right not to breastfeed - it's her body.
>
> Surely the issue is if the child then has a right to human milk?
>
> Morgan Gallagher
>
> sheila stubbs wrote:
>> An article in the Wall Street Journal. Check out the dozens (hundreds?)
>> of comments following the article.
>> http://blogs.wsj.com/juggle/2008/04/11/a-mothers-right-to-not-breastfeed/?mod=WSJBlog
>>
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