Wed 10 Oct 2007
in just
Posted by bon under issue stuff
time for a little standing up around here.
the League of Maternal Justice is standing up to the baffling “take your boobs back to the strip clubs where i can ogle them and stop offending me by breastfeeding in public already” discourse of idiocy so prevalent of late, and i want to stand with them. they’re having a Breastfest: livestreaming/linking posts/gathering photos of babies eating. from their mamas. oooh. our virgin eyes!!! how, erm, totally natural.
of course, since O stopped nursing months ago and is now long in bed, if i were to actually webcast breastfeeding from my house in solidarity, my little fest would end up more on the side of the spectrum that Bill Maher apparently actually wants to see. i’m not so into indulging that fucker, thank ye, so all i got is the little old photo above, with Oscar four weeks old and me a little glassy-eyed. this photo, alas, has no boobies in it. not one. blame my photographer - i think he was afraid of me. 
but i didn’t want to let the day pass without also saying my little piece for the simple goodness of breastfeeding.
this entire controversy gives me whiplash - blew my naive little mind straight back from 2007 to 1964, with no warning. it’s not 1964, folks. if you’re titillated by breastfeeding, that’s your issue. if you’re offended, it’s probably the least of your issues. and in case you haven’t noticed, there’s a lot of REAL horrors out there to get one’s knickers in a knot about.
would that cheapshot comedians would use their mics to rant about the real scourges of society, rather than boobs. Mad and Jen and Hel and Susanne have put up what has to be their most gigantic roundtable yet of Just Posts this month….Mad, uber-librarian, even alphabetized them. i wish our Just Post crusaders had Maher’s audience, but they’re growing, you know? and they’re shaping this blogosphere of ours, and all our consciousnesses, bit by bit. now, when i flit about from post to post, i think about whether or not someone’s words have made me consider issues of fairness and equity and a better world, and if ithey have…i know who to tattle to.
we are marching towards justice, inch by inch.
October 11th, 2007 at 12:13 am
Thank you for mentioning The Great Virtual Breast Fest. I posted a pic on my blog too.
It really is outrageous that so many people have a problem with breastfeeding. Heaven forbid we use our breast for the very reason God gave them to us, and not just to fill out a swim suit!
Great photo!
I am new to your blog, and I just love it.
October 11th, 2007 at 12:43 am
Awesome mama - I just love your picture!
October 11th, 2007 at 12:44 am
Hooray for breastfeeding — whereever and whenever the baby needs food!
October 11th, 2007 at 12:50 am
You are so adorable in that photo that I’m nursing a girl crush on you!
Get it? Nursing?
OK, I’m lame. But I DO have a girl crush on you.
October 11th, 2007 at 1:02 am
I have no photos of me BF either of my kids, although I’m sure that’s one image I’ll never forget, looking down at them, the two of us in our own world. So many beautiful moments, thinking of it brings tears to my eyes.
I fed my kids whenever and where ever, and luckily, never had a negative experience. I’m sad and disgusted that anyone is having a different reaction. If I get a chance to set some ignorant f’er straight, I’ll take it, even if it’s on behalf of another woman.
October 11th, 2007 at 1:03 am
I am not sure I can follow up SM’s comment….
October 11th, 2007 at 1:21 am
Seconding the girl crush. But not in a creepy, stalker way. (although that’s likely because I’m too damn cheap to pay the bridge toll)
And I say it everywhere, but I’ll say it again.
ACK! BOOBIES! RUN AWAY!
It’s that bloody stupid. Sigh. I keep waiting for my ankle to be offensive. I want heboobies to be offensive. Can we start banning all nasty flabby he-booby pictures? Cause that totally grosses me out.
October 11th, 2007 at 1:44 am
It is so demoralizing that this stupidity keeps re-emerging. I was happy that the boob video used my pictures from 1973, 1975, and 1978. I had my first three babies in New York City. I was always a very modest woman, but I had watched my closest friend go stir crazy because she would not nurse her son in public. In Manhattan you are always in public; you don’t have a car as a refuge. I was determined to overcome my false modesty. A week after my first daughter was born, I took a walk and nursed her in both Riverside Park on the Hudson and in Central Park. It was hard, and I was very discreet. But I knew it was necessary, and each time I did it, it got easier.
I nursed my four daughters for a total of 12 years so I nursed them everywhere. I was fortunate; no one ever complained. I only nursed on the subway a few times when I had no choice. But I nursed in buses, trains, planes, the Staten Island Ferry, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Museum of Natural History. I nursed them in restaurants, theaters, museums, libraries, doctor’s offices, beauty parlors, parks, playgrounds, schools, family gatherings, dinner parties. I nursed them at church, at political meetings, at demonstrations, at weddings, in store fitting rooms.
I didn’t cover the baby’s head. I always wore push-up tops. I was modest and chose the most discreet place possible. I preferred playgrounds if I could find one. In restaurants we asked for a booth, and I sat nearest to the wall. I selected seats on buses, trains, and plains next to the window. After they were two, I became much more circumspect. I negotiated elaborate contracts with my older nurslings.
October 11th, 2007 at 1:50 am
BRAVO!!!
Julie
Using My Words
October 11th, 2007 at 2:30 am
Well said.
October 11th, 2007 at 2:34 am
yay!
I have no breastfeeding pix, either. I am a bit jealous of all those who do.
October 11th, 2007 at 3:03 am
I am amazed at how much time I’ve spent breastfeeding and how few photos I have to prove it. Pity, really, since it is something I’ll always remember as a warm and cozy time. I love your photo; you look glassy-eyed like you said, and like you’re in love.
October 11th, 2007 at 3:25 am
nursing a crush, indeed. thank you, sister.
October 11th, 2007 at 3:27 am
I love the glassy-eyed pic and that wee Oscar boy is delish. Dawns on me I didn’t give the mat justice women my photo link. Damn all that alphabetizing. It’s rattled my brain. Off to give a link…
October 11th, 2007 at 9:16 am
I have no breastfeeding pictures either.
My biggest parenting regret is that nursing didn’t work with either child. I regret that I listend to the nurses when they said they *had to give The Boy bottles, and I regret that we didn’t discover the girl’s lactose issues sooner. I tried re-lactating after we found out and I went dairy free, but it was too late.
October 11th, 2007 at 1:16 pm
I really wish I had some pictures of me breastfeeding Isaac. Something I will remedy with baby # 2. During the first two weeks, when BF was really hard, and painful, I would sit in my living room topless because I couldn’t bear having anything touching my tortured boobies. Which was a real education for my 68 year old father-in-law, who lives with us. He handled it like a trooper. Never complained, never kicked up a fuss, and by month two was tossing around lingo like “breast pump” and “latch” like a trooper. If my conservative, white-bread, ex-Navy FIL can handle a breastfeeding woman with aplomb, surely a supposedly “liberal” person like Bill Maher can too? Asshat. I almost think this whole thing is giving him too much credit.
October 11th, 2007 at 2:06 pm
Nice.
And thanks for directing me to the other blogs!
October 11th, 2007 at 2:19 pm
Gorgeous. I like to characterize my own glassy eyes as ’shiny’ — feel free to use that one
I can’t believe we’re still fighting this battle. It’s all so so stupid. But on the upside, I guess, we all get to reminisce about breastfeeding, and that’s kinda fun …
October 11th, 2007 at 3:46 pm
i have some breastfeeding pictures that i would love to post, unfortunately, my son is 13 and would sadly have issues with me doing so, not because he has a problem with it because he so doesn’t but because he’s 13 and is easily embarassed by the fact that some of his girl friends read my blog, lol … i can’t believe this is even an issue anymore : / and we march on and i shake my head wondering if we have really come as far as i like to think, sigh …
you seriously rock : ) xox
October 11th, 2007 at 3:54 pm
No BF picks, either. But I have a full-on boobie shot from mere minutes after Mme L was born and was about to nurse…What I couldn’t get over was how before children I was so sure that I was going to be modest and embarrassed about things - birth, nursing, etc. - and how unimportant and…erm, natural it was after she was born. I was just thinking this morning how absurd it is that this is a feminist issue in this freaking day and age.
Wonderful post.
October 11th, 2007 at 4:03 pm
What a gorgeous picture of you!
I am never, ever going to post a photo of myself from the early days of nursing - see, I’m busty enough to begin with, but when my milk came in each time, I would become comedically huge (we’re talking H cup. H.) and the pictures are JUST not flattering enough.
Vanity before Good Causes: that is my motto.
October 11th, 2007 at 4:42 pm
yeh, i just don’t get the outrage about this. i see more cleavage on magazine covers at the grocery store than i’ve ever seen watching someone nurse, because - hey! that damn baby’s head is in the way!
maybe the offense is actually that it’s not as sexy-lookin’ (in the cheap misogynist version of sexy) as people think boobs should be, and that’s really the problem. that, and we’ve taught women that if they don’t look like they should be on one of those magazine covers, they’re gross…so thus breastfeeding is equated with gross in many female minds. i dunno. i try…i really do. but i don’t get this at all.
i do get, though, that breastfeeding is hard. SianOna, and others who may have struggled or not been able to nurse - i didn’t mean this post to suggest that NOT breastfeeding is any kind of failure, though i know it feels that way for a lot of women. it felt that way for me, in the early days. O was a superslow eater, which meant i was pinned under him for an hour out of every two, around the clock. and then the colic started, and they were sure it was a dairy allergy…overall, i found it really rough. we bottle supplemented from about two months on, and a number of times i nearly quit altogether in despair. and i never even got the bleeding nipples i read about with such horror. so those mamas who don’t nurse or who quit, i sympathize.
but those who don’t think mamas should do it at all, in front of others’ eyes? cave folk, to me. can’t help the judgement. i just do not see what offense could possibly be caused, not when gratuitous tits are all over the place anyway, and these ones are actually being used for their intended, nurturing, mammary purpose!
off soapbox now.
October 11th, 2007 at 6:19 pm
Had a super slow eater myself. If I had stayed home to nurse, I would have never gotten out of the house. Now, THAT would be shameful.
October 11th, 2007 at 7:44 pm
Oh lordy…. is this really still an issue?!? I can hardly believe it!
I don’t have any breastfeeding pictures either, but I would share them with pride if I did!
Breastfeeding is NOT easy, and I know there are many, many very good reasons why it is not always an option. I also understand how emotional it can be when it doesn’t work out. My second son weaned himself long before I was ready, and I cried and cried about it.
October 12th, 2007 at 12:37 am
I should post some pictures of me breastfeeding Porgie. It seems like every picture of us in hospital has lots of boob on display.
October 12th, 2007 at 12:22 pm
Great picture, great post!!
October 12th, 2007 at 3:36 pm
Nursing rocks.
Awesome photo. So envious of the hair.