In response to Kathy Dettwyler's letter regarding b/f and work:

>>Kathy writes, You bet it blames women and mothers --- because, as with
all other aspects
of culture, culture is not some big monolithic unmoveable force…. Often
it is the other women in the office who are against a mom bringing her baby
to work, or breastfeeding in public, or even breastfeeding in private.  It
is the woman boss with no kids, or who formula-fed her kids, or whose kids
are grown, or the woman who is very proud of her "sexy breasts" who is
unsympathetic.

I have never argued otherwise. I believe that it is sometimes women
themselves (often those women who have not breastfed or have not been able
to breastfeed their offspring for whatever reason/s, often because of their
own sense of disappointment and often-misplaced guilt) who are the least
sympathetic about the issue of breastfeeding and paid work. In fact, that
sentiment partly underlies my argument in "Suckling and silence in the USA"
(1997) published in Feminist Economics. 

>> So while people argue back and forth about whether women should stay home
with their kids, or whether women should go back to work and put the kids in
day care -- I'm saying THINK BIGGER.  Imagine a world in which these are not
the only options.  In order to get to a better world, you must be able to
think about it first. ..>> I am arguing that work that
women do in the home is extremely valuable -- not just the childrearing, but
the cooking and cleaning and laundry and everything else women do to make
like happen and to make it nice.  But many women in the US have *bought
into* the male perspective that this work is unimportant and insignificant
and doesn't count and is only drudgery and can never be satisfying or
fulfilling.  And they make fun of women who would "choose" to stay home --
they must be morons, is the prevailing attitude.

I think that it is contestable whether it is only a male perspective that
devalues domestic work. In terms of teaching your students the value of all
types of jobs and how they all constitute a whole, while this is, no doubt,
commendable teaching, it is unlikely that the students are so lacking in
worldliness to fail to recognise that society does not equally value these
jobs (as evidenced by very different pay scales and working conditions).
Presumably, too, that is why they are at college / university as opposed to
undertaking janitor or "lawn fellow" apprenticeships.   The true test of
whether they left your classes totally convinced of the equal value of such
things would be if at least half of them entered such occupations. While I
think it is a great thing for each individual to be paid according to their
needs and abilities, it is not an ideal that has much currency in most
countries, the United States in particular. No doubt you will tell me to
think bigger! Thinking bigger needs to be implemented in action at the
group, community and, ultimately, national level otherwise it is lacking in
substance. I also believe that while you were courageous to take your baby
to the workplace, other structural issues needed to be present to support
this move, that is, some degree of employment clout and a sympathetic boss
and co-workers. These fall into the realm of luck / privilege as much as
courage. These factors need to be recognised and acknowledged, along with
courage, otherwise we fall into the "I could do it therefore so should you"
syndrome, which is ultimately unhelpful.

>>I certainly realize that not all occupations are safe or appropriate to
having the child physically with you.  But there is no reason why any of the
above-listed occupations can't have on-site child care and appropriate
breaks to breastfeed.  And bosses don't take kindly to these issues because
they don't think they are important, haven't done it themselves, haven't
seen anyone do it -- are basically afraid of what it might mean.  

There are other reasons of a more material nature as to why bosses don't
take kindly to the notion of breastfeeding mothers in the workplace. They
often see it as antithetical to productivity. It is not always merely a
matter of pointing out that here is something they may not have thought
about or witnessed for themselves. Employers tend to be influenced (like
policy makers) by facts and figures, in particular, the way in which
supporting breastfeeding in the workplace might assist or detract from
profit margins.

Stories abound of women fired for breastfeeding in the workplace and
sometimes these women had individual grit and determination. For instance,
the "famous" 1981 case of Linda Eaton, a very gritty woman, a firefighter
by profession (so she had already transgressed one obvious gender
boundary!) and certainly determined (if her progress through the United
States court system was anything to go on) was an example of this. She
eventually won her case but, apparently, at immense personal loss and felt
she had to resign anyway because of workplace "vibes" following this
ordeal.  It is for these reasons that the Bill to protect  breastfeeding
mothers in the workplace has no doubt been developed in the United States.

>> I broke down the barriers in my own department because I had the courage
to just
bring Alex with me and act like it was no big deal (and this was BEFORE I
had tenure, so I was taking a HUGE risk if they had truly disapproved).
After everyone saw that it was possible, then a year later, one of the
secretaries brought her newborn child to work with her full-time (not just
the one day a week I did) for the first 1.5 years, and now we have a lab
post-doc who brings his daughter with him to work 1/2 time, and she just
turned one, and suddenly it is just assumed that of course people will bring
babies into the office after they are born.  The post-doc who brings his
baby with him is the one whose dissertation defense I nursed through.
Sometimes all it takes to start to change the prevailing cultural beliefs is
for ONE PERSON to say "No, I won't go along with this.  I think we can do it
differently."

I think that although it is important that such individual initiatives and
strategies be commended,  this ought not to be at the expense of
recognising the need for and lobbying for policy / legislation that would
establish women's rights to breastfeed / express breastmilk in the
workplace. For instance, in the New Zealand situation, where, like the
United States, we have no paid leave and no breastfeeding breaks in the
workplace, the examples of a couple of law firms which give legal partners
paid maternity leave are used to justify  the lack of national legislation
which would in fact give other women workers similar opportunities to
combine breastfeeding and paid work. Policy makers and politicians suggest
that if these women can do it, why can't others? So, we have to be careful
with such arguments. 

>> In Mali, babies are everywhere in offices -- on mothers' backs, or in the
arms of babysitters when mother has to do something that requires not
holding or strapping on the baby.  WHY is child care compatible with office
work in Mali, but not in the US or the South Pacific?  If the office work is
basically the same, then the difference must be in the ATTITUDES of the
bosses and co-workers, and the mothers themselves.  And attitudes are in
people's minds.

These ethnographic accounts from nations undergoing the process of
industrialisation are difficult comparisons for industrialised contexts
such as the United States, New Zealand, Australian or United Kingdom
workplaces. They generally tend, quite rightly, to have little impact on
sceptical policy makers. Anthropological accounts are notoriously riddled
with inconsistencies about the "truth" of supposed practices (as the
"famous" criticism by New Zealand anthropologist Derek Freeman of United
States anthropology professor Margaret Mead's research in Samoa
testifies). In reality, it seems that there are often very many, very
different "practices" which characterise certain contexts, including in
many countries children actually working in the factories of "developing"
countries.  

Moreover, various United States studies suggest that workplace child care
situations are never likely to be an option for women because of reasons of
cost and size of workplace (see Galtry, J. (1997). "Breastfeeding, labour
market changes and public policy in the United States". Health Care for
Women International, 18 (5), pp. 467-80).
. 

>> The reason there is extensive lobbying for nursing
breaks and better maternity leave is because someone HAD THE IDEA FIRST THAT
THESE WERE REASONABLE THINGS TO REQUEST OR DEMAND AND THEREFORE THEY ARE
WORKING HARD TO CHANGE OTHER PEOPLE'S MINDS SO THAT THESE WILL BE A
REALITY….Many of the great social change movements of this century, which
have resulted in better lives for many people, began as ideas in the minds
of a
few people, which were radically different from the ideas in the minds of
the majority -- and slowly but surely, enough minds were changed that the
culture changed.  Examples: the US Civil Rights Movement, the Americans with
Disabilities Act, the women's suffrage movement to give women the right to
vote, and so on.  Nelson Mandela had an idea.  Rosa Parks had an idea.
Martin Luther King Jr. had an idea.  Culture begins in people's minds -- and
the great edifices that are built upon people's ideas can be changed by
changing the ideas inside people's minds.

I agree that culture begins in people's minds. However, some would argue
that it is the enactment into policy / legislation which has the most
impact on attitudes of the general population.  Sure, you needed the
inspired individuals to get the ball rolling but until the various pieces
of legislation were passed, eg the Civil Rights Act "Black" people could
be, and sometimes were, lynched for going into white-only coffee bars. The
major change occurred when this sort of discrimination was made  illegal.
This, in turn, affected attitudes. 

Finally, I think your argument implies an overwhelming lack of recognition
and acknowledgment of the assymetrical relations of power, which impact on
many things in life, including the integration of breastfeeding and paid
employment. These exist both within and beyond the workplace. 

Arguments which imply the need for social and economic "transformation" on
a grand scale are often easy to articulate, always attractive and because
of this  tend to win lots of sympathy. However, they are difficult to
translate into real, material terms. By contrast, reformist measures such
as specific workplace policies appear somewhat narrow and cost containing
but at the end of the day it needs to be asked which approach would provide
more women with more options  over combining labour market involvement and
breastfeeding. 

Judith Galtry

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