Breastfeeding is Revolutionary
01 October 2007
by Anna Lea Jancewicz
AnaiRhoads.org - After the recent nurse-outs protesting a Kentucky woman being hassled while breastfeeding her babe in an Applebee's, Bill Maher made some disparaging comments about lactivism in the "New Rules" segment of his television program. You can watch a clip from the show and hear what he had to say in full.
Nevermind the misinformation he gives by stating that this nurse-out was the world's first, or his obvious ignorance of the way breastfeeding works when he suggests the incident at the Applebee's could have been avoided by the mother "planning ahead". Let's even disregard for a moment that he laughs off the idea that breastfeeding is a human right, although the United Nations and World Health Organization has recognized it just that, with the Innocenti Declaration, and that the manager who told Brooke Ryan she would be required to cover her baby's head with a blanket was clearly in violation of Kentucky state law KRS 211.755 that states no one shall interfere with a woman breastfeeding her child and that a woman may breastfeed anywhere she and the child are otherwise authorized to be. (39 states have similarly languaged laws, and in all 50 states women are afforded the right to breastfeed in public. Here you can find the specifics in a state-by-state listing).
I'd like to focus primarily on Maher's comment that "...this isn't really about women taking their breasts out in public, as much as I'd like it to be. It's about how petty and parochial our causes have become, how activism has become narcissism."
The personal is always political.
And I think that these days, little is more political than breastfeeding.
It's a revolutionary activity.
Artificial infant feeding has a devastating effect on world health, and a great negative environmental impact. Breastmilk is produced and delivered to the consumer without any pollution, packaging or waste. Formula feeding contributes to a vast array of health problems for both baby and mother. The Ecological Impact of Bottle Feeding is a comprehensive overview of this, written by Andrew Radford of Baby Milk Action.
Maher overlooks not only the environmental activism involved in breastfeeding, and the women's and children's health issues that lactivism addresses, but also is blind to what breastmilk does to alleviate poverty. Not only is breastmilk free, but the immunities and health benefits conveyed by mothers' milk reduce doctor's bills for the poor, as well as reduce Medicaid and WIC expenses to those receiving public assistance. Additionally, breastfeeding can empower women living in poverty (and otherwise) and change the way they view themselves and their abilities: "When we trust the makers of baby formula more than we do our own ability to nourish our babies, we lose a chance to claim an aspect of our power as women. Thinking that baby formula is as good as breast milk is believing that thirty years of technology is superior to three million years of nature's evolution. Countless women have regained trust in their bodies through nursing their children, even if they weren't sure at first that they could do it. It is an act of female power, and I think of it as feminism in its purest form," says Christine Northrup, M.D.
In general, the positive emotional benefits of nursing are ignored. I think a lot of the emotional isolation and other related psychological and social problems that are so ubiquitous in our modern culture are caused largely in part by parenting practices that have become par for the course over the last century, practices that promote detachment, such as artificial feeding, CIO, and the philosophy that babies are a hinderance and need to be left with sitters, put in daycare as early as possible, and be separated from the everyday adult sphere. I think these last few generations of Americans have grown up profoundly detached from their parents. Aside from all the practices and gadgets and equipment we rely on to distance our children from our bodies, we regularly put them in the care of strangers, have more latch-key kids, and rely on TV, video games, computers, et cetera, instead of taking the time to interact with them. This hurts our families and our society and makes emotionally crippled adults. Breastfeeding promotes strong bonds between mothers and children. The kind of attachment parenting that involves your baby travelling everywhere with you and being fed on demand, even in public, fosters strong, healthy families, and well-adjusted, confident children who trust their parents and will grow into compassionate adults who will be less likely, hopefully, to be petty and narcissistic. These children may just become the sort of adults who oppose tyranny, violence, and yes, Mr. Maher, even war.
All this from a boob? Yes. All this from a gloriously revolutionary boob that my baby has a right to anywhere, at any time.
The fact is that the biggest cause of women abbreviating their breastfeeding or foregoing it altogether is the lack of support in our culture. Far too many women feel that they can't do what is best for their babies, themselves, their society, and their planet because nursing is seen as obscene, or inappropriate. Every time a mother feeds her baby from her breast in a public space, she is doing the heroic act of normalizing this practice. She is doing an act of defiance against a culture scornful of motherhood. She is being a revolutionary. She is showing all of her sisters that it can be done, and will be done. She is showing all the brothers out there that breasts are not merely sexual objects meant for their pleasure, that breasts have an important function that is not sexual at all, and that a woman's body should be respected as life-giving and nourishing.
Bill Maher thinks that life-giving isn't so special. He says that giving birth isn't a great accomplishment, because even a dog can do it. Yes, even a dog can give birth, given that the dog is a female. Even a dog can give birth...but you can't, Mr. Maher...you, sir, cannot.
This is exactly the denigration and disrespect we fight every time we nurse in public... every time we nurse with that revolutionary boob.
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