Oct 09 2006
The Problem With Breastfeeders Again
Much like that rabble rouser Leche League loser I wrote about a few weeks ago and her co-lactater in arms, Jessica Pierre, a reporter from the New York Daily News decided to, in typical sensational form, try and see how inconsiderate she could be and what kind of reaction she could get. My favorite part of the story is this gem. One of the stores she picked was the Apple Store on Fifth Avenue.
The Apple Store - Inside the gleaming white Mac mecca on Fifth Ave. and 59th St., where workers in identical T-shirts rush to straighten iPods knocked askew, I’m certain my baby and I will be a spectacle.
On a low circular concrete bench facing a busy bank of computers, I pick a spot between two guys - a businessman and a hipster glued to their laptops - and in full view of a dozen sales associates.
Out comes the nursing pillow, down goes the baby, up comes the shirt and I toss a coverup over my shoulder. Twenty minutes, we’re done - and no one has said a peep. My benchmates never look up.
All in all, I would have created more of a stir if I’d announced my home computer is a Dell.
“I don’t know if we have a policy that you can or can’t do it, but breast-feeding is natural,” one employee tells me. “Now, we do have people who come in and log onto certain sites on the Internet and take out certain body parts - that we don’t allow.”
To their credit, the Apple Store employees didn’t even notice and didn’t care. However, this reporter in proving her point demonstrated exactly what the non-breastfeeding public hates about breastfeeders. Go back and read the bolded part again. She sat next to a busy bank of computers in full view of a dozen sales associates.
What a self-centered loser.
I think she did a whole lot more to backup the claims of people who think that breastfeeding women are generally complete inconsiderate wretches than anything else. Well done. I’m sure you needed to whip it out in the middle of a busy retail store. God forbid you lactating messes pump it into a bottle and then go about your business.
Thanks for proving the point.
Technorati Tags: breastfeeding, hypocrite
October 9th, 2006 at 11:55 am
Ok, I’m confused. You seem annoyed at the outcome of the reporter’s experiment. Why?
Apparently the only one bothered by her little experiment was you! The customers didn’t notice or care, and neither did the employees.
Why, then, your annoyance? Care to expand or clarify?
October 9th, 2006 at 4:29 pm
You sound so bitter.
Why would anyone breastfeeding bother you?
What does it change in your life?
Move to North Korea.
They like to forbid things that are natural there too.
October 9th, 2006 at 6:20 pm
And yet if I go outside the Apple Store and urinate in the flower pots no one would defend that natural act. Or what if my wife and I have sex in the car while waiting to pick up the kids at the Apple Store - natural act, right?
Just because it’s a natural act and nothing to be ashamed of does not mean it has to be done in full view of the public without any consideration.
October 10th, 2006 at 1:41 am
The point I took from this post is that the mother didn’t happen to meet her baby’s need to eat there and then, but rather that she was towing her child about in search of a shopping outlet in which to be a spectacle (her words). She’s trying to elicit negative reactions from people who were just minding their own business. There’s nothing characteristically North Korean about thinking that’s nuts.
October 10th, 2006 at 10:12 am
I’m with Belf on this one. “Lactating Messes”? Err…Vinny, were there weaning issues in your past?
October 10th, 2006 at 10:42 am
Torque absolutely nailed it. See Comment 4.
October 10th, 2006 at 3:03 pm
Torque accurately echoed your peculiar outrage, yes. What I don’t understand at all is your apparent revulsion at breastfeeding. “Inconsiderate”? “Lactating Messes”? “inconsiderate wretches”??
You sound like a Taliban commenting on public hand-holding.
October 10th, 2006 at 3:15 pm
Because most of these milky moms have no consideration for the fact that some people may not be comfortable watching you breastfeed.
If you’ve read my prior post on the topic (which you obviously didn’t) you would see that in cases where the mom is discreet, all is right with the world. The problem is that most of these La Leche Leauge moms tend to whip out the old boob in the middle of anyplace they see convenient and just start feeding, then proceed to get outraged when people dare express discomfort or displeasure with it.
In other words, their attitude is “Fuck consideration for you, be considerate to me.”
They make these great inventions now. They call ‘em breast pumps. You can pump a bunch of milk into bottles and feed your kid a bottle when he or she is hungry.
Of course, that wouldn’t be the spectacular “I’m a martyr, I’m a martyr, I’m an oppressed womyn” mentality they seem to hold so dearly.
October 10th, 2006 at 4:46 pm
“Because most of these milky moms have no consideration for the fact that some people may not be comfortable watching you breastfeed.”
This particular “milky mom” (like your mom, and mine, btw…they ARE milky) said:
“Out comes the nursing pillow, down goes the baby, up comes the shirt and I toss a coverup over my shoulder.”
She didn’t exactly, as you put it, “whip out the old boob in the middle of anyplace they see convenient and just start feeding.”
Just seems a weird thing for you to get so upset about, that’s all. A woman goes somewhere, breastfeeds discretely, and upsets nobody.
October 10th, 2006 at 8:43 pm
All this breast feeding crap is just that - crap.
Honestly Vinny, 50 years ago no one had issues with it, why now?
Do we have absolutely NOTHING left to bitch about that we have to fixate on something so insanely innocent as breastfeeding? Are we that far gone?
Why not focus your attention to things that actually ARE disruptive and unfit for children to see? Such as, Oh I don’t know - two people groping, fondling and making out so hard in public that you’d swear one of them was about to climax?
Or, people smoking dope at the bus stop, shoot up by a restaurant - you get my drift.
There are BIGGER fish to fry than breastfeeding.
To me, it doesn’t seem like it matters to you whether she covered herself up or now - you seem to have this thing out for breastfeeding mothers.
And, by the way, breast milk only stays good for so long in a bottle. If you want to keep it for a few hours it needs to be in the fridge - it’s not the same as regular milk, it’s not treated or anything and has a different chemical make up. It cant be thrown in a bottle and tossed in a diaper bag at noon and used at 3, even if it was cold prior to that.
Also, some women cannot use breast pumps - as ironic as that sounds, some women have difficulty using the machines or they find that they cause pain and/or bleeding. So, what are they to do hrm when they’re baby is screaming at the top of their lungs and they’re 30 minutes from home in a busy mall? Let the child go hungry or find somewhere to sit, cover up and feed?
Like I said, I’m sure you can find a bigger issue to start ranting about. It’s never been a problem before so WHY NOW?
Is it because of all this politically correct bs? I think we are getting a little ridiculous with it. First christmas, now breast feeding? What’s next - pregnant women not wearing clothes that conceal the tell-tale bump?
October 10th, 2006 at 8:53 pm
K… Halo… With all due respect…
Take your head directly out of your anus and read my previous post on the issue.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.
I DO NOT GIVE TWO SHITS if someone breastfeeds. What I cannot tolerate is “statement breastfeeders” who, without any concern or consideration for the people around them just whip it out and start feeding.
Notice, if you bother to read it, my prior post had some anger directed toward the idiots on United who made that other woman cover up.
There’s a world of difference between her and someone who sits in the middle of a busy retail store facing computers people are using and salespeople manning the store, and whips a tit out to feed her kid in the hopes of illiciting a reaction.
THAT is what I can’t stand. I can’t make it any clearer so cut the slippery slopes and straw man arguments. They make you look like you don’t bother reading what you’re commenting on.
The idea that it’s “never been a problem before,” which basically amounts to an “everyone knows” argument, is that it wasn’t always like that before. In general, women were more discreet in the past. Deny that and I’ll laugh at you because anyone who asserts otherwise doesn’t know what they’re talking about.
October 10th, 2006 at 10:17 pm
Vinny,
The absolute most assinine thing you can do is say ‘with all due respect’ and then insult the person you’re speaking with - I figured you were above that.
As well, I read your blog every day at work and as such I -did- read your previous post about this issue.
Go ahead and laugh at me, Vinny and tell me I don’t know what I’m talking about when I tell you that where ‘I’ come from and where my parents were raised it is not and never has been a large issue. Women on park benches would “whip it out”, cover the baby and go on with what they’re doing. Even where I live now, I see women on transit, in malls, banks, church etcetera breast feeding and always have seen them without a fuss being made. So yes, in ‘my’ world it “has never been a problem”.
But go ahead - tell me I don’t know what I’m talking about and laugh because really - you should know more about my history and where I come from than I do. /sarcasm.
October 10th, 2006 at 10:22 pm
Ummmmm… You obviously don’t know what you’re talking about if you think breastfeeding itself is my problem.
I have no problem with the women who cover up, but women these days don’t cover up as readily as they used to.
That, for the final time, is my point. No more. No less.
I don’t like the martyr women who make no effort to be discreet and then get offended when someone else is offended by their brazen disregard for others.
It really is that simple.
No womyn-hating agenda. No ulterior motive. No reaction to a PC world, and no bigger issue at hand.
Just plain old lack of consideration and feigned oppression and martyrdom.
October 10th, 2006 at 11:21 pm
“I don’t like the martyr women who make no effort to be discreet and then get offended when someone else is offended by their brazen disregard for others.”
But the woman you’re ranting about in this post DID make an effort to be discreet. And no-one was offended, except you. And you weren’t there.
Am I missing something?
October 11th, 2006 at 2:22 pm
Purposefully going to the busies spot in the store and purposefully finding a spot where you’d be sitting next to other people does not seem to be making an effort to be discrete!
And to the person upset about seeing “people groping, fondling and making out so hard in public that you’d swear one of them was about to climax” - isn’t that too a natural act? Why should we be upset to see people engaged in sex in public? Why should they be discrete? It is a perfectly natural act!
October 11th, 2006 at 7:37 pm
James,
I never said *I* was “upset” about it but I figure screwing your girlfriend on the swings at the local playground is a fairly bigger issue than breastfeeding your baby.
October 11th, 2006 at 8:15 pm
So breastfeeding (either the act or the viewing of it) is something to be ashamed of? Women should have to go into hiding to breastfeed their children? *shrugs* If the woman in question in this article was abruptly rude, forceful, or impolite with her actions, I might have a problem with the end result (her breastfeeding her child). However, the space she took up was not in use, would not have likely been in use, and obviously no one had a problem with it.
*shrugs* I have a problem with some people’s driving. I do not immediately jump on a bandwagon and lobby for them to only be allowed on back roads….