I preferred to use a light blanket, and probably will again. I think it’s silly when people want nursing moms to go hide in a hole or something–we do like to get out of the house now and then!
Let’s see, where would it be inappropriate? …how about a formal dinner? You might want to head to a comfy couch in that case.
EJs, my church building has a cozy little room with armchair rockers and stuff for moms to nurse in comfort (with piped-in sound and a windowless door). Is that not common? I kind of assumed it might be.
I am very pro-breastfeeding, and don’t think there are many inappropriate places for it - but one of my wedding guests was giving her brat the tit, in the middle of the congregation, during my wedding service. Surely a little inappropriate?
I wish I were braver about it. I’ve never been one to bring disapproval down on my head intentionally, and the one time I did breast feed in public, I was asked to do that someplace else. Mostly, I run off to the bathroom and sit on the floor of the handicap stall. I hate it.
Leifsmama, you do know that whoever asked you to do that was breaking the law, don’t you? You have the right to breastfeed anywhere you otherwise have the right to be. So someone was way out of line.
IMHO, all these theories about why it is acceptable are missing the point. This is not an intellectual issue. It is a social one. You cannot define the rules of what is proper/improper by an appeal to any sort of logic. It makes no difference what it is or is not the equivalent of, how natural or unnatural it is, or what is or isn’t revealed. If people - for whatever idiotic reason - are put off by it, then it is inapropriate. If people are not, then it is not.
As to whether it is appropriate, I make no claims - surely if the posters to this thread are a representative sample of the populace then it is appropriate. But if this is not the case - if the posters here are more “enlightened” then the average person, who finds it offensive, then I would say it is innapropriate.
I just have to say, I would think it’s totally inappropriate if a woman was to take her top off, get up on a table, shine a spotlight on herself, and breastfeed her 8 or 9 year old son
Personally, I’m with Belrix. I would feel uncomfortable being around someone breastfeeding simply because I wouldn’t want them to think I’m looking at their exposed breast, so I too would find a nice stone to kick around or something thus adding to the awkwardness.
Perhaps a larger church might have facilities for nursing moms (and unruly kids, one would assume!) but mine is a small church and we aren’t equipped. I sit in the front, so I won’t be nursing in my pew, although I know at least one woman who has nursed in the back row!
Leifsmama, I have never heard anything so rude. tell the next person to mind their own damn business! Haven’t you looked closely at some of those bathroom floors?!? I would never change my child on one, let alone nurse them on it! If you can’t balance on the toilet while nursing, then do it in a quiet corner of the restaurant, perhap in a section that isn’t open. Ask your server or the manager, I am sure they will be very accomodating.
It is shocking how many ladies’ rooms don’t even have a chair…
Oh, a quick plug for the SoCal nursing moms- the best public restroom in the world is located in the Nordstrom at South Coast Plaza. It has several soft sofas, end tables for all your stuff, a seperate changing room, ample parking for strollers, and all that is totally seperate from the stalls/sinks area. It’s on the second floor in Petite Focus, near the personal shopper desk.
Hrm, Izzy, I don’t think I agree that if the ‘average person’ is offended/uncomfortable (for whatever reason), then it is automatically inappropriate. There are all kinds of right or neutral actions which ‘average people’ might be offended by.
We had a woman in our reception area breast feed her baby…discretely, like all the breast feeding women I have ever seen do it. She was waiting for her other child, who was having dental procedures.
After she and her other child left, a woman who was early for her appontment came up to my desk and started bitching about “women breastfeeding in public, like it was their own living room or something.” I said, “I don’t understand…she was breast feeding her baby, she had a cloth over the baby, what’s so offensive?”
Well, the woman went on and on about how the woman was exposing her breast in public. (She didn’t) And how people today have no standards. (Excuse me?)
So I told her that as long as a woman is not exposing herself in my reception area, I embrace the thought that she feels comfortable enough to feed her baby in my reception area. And that if anyone EVER behaved inappropriately in my area no matter WHAT they were doing, I would stop it. And that “this is a family practice, and that we will continue to allow people to breastfeed their babies in our reception area.”
My boss is an EXCELLENT dentist.
I never heard another word from society lady about that, and she is still a patient in our office.
God bless you, Scotticher. It’s knowing that there are people out there with your attitude, rather than society lady’s attitude, that makes me feel better during those times when I do need to nurse in a public area.
Well sheesh, Jan dear, it is a natural function of life, isn’t it?
You might be interested to know that when my mother was raising us hooligans, many years ago, almost NO ONE breast fed their children. Apparently the prevailing opinon of Docs at the time was that bottle feeding was better. Yes, I know I am dating myself.
Well, my mom was the only one of her “circle” who breast fed her kids. Her rationale was that if God had wanted her babies to have cow milk, He would have made them calves instead of human babies. Sounds reasonible to me. My mom was, if you will, a very mainstream lady…but she knew what she KNEW, and she thought that the prevailing opinion that formula was better than breast milk didn’t make sense, so she proceeded along those lines.
What would’ve been more appropriate, letting her hungry baby scream through your precious ceremony? No doubt you’d be bitching even more if she had.
Not to put to fine a point on it, if you didn’t want anybody nursing a baby at your wedding, you should’ve indicated that it was an adults only affair.
My church has a nifty lil room for nursing mothers only. Nobody else is allowed to go in there. It’s situated above the sanctuary that way Mom can watch/hear the service while the baby eats.
It doesn’t bother me. The first time I saw someone breastfeeding in public it did disconcert me as I had never seen that before. Still, it is a normal, natural thing which shouldn’t be a problem.
I had this conversation once with a few guys. They all agreed that it was fine, but they always felt uncomfortable… if they looked away too pointedly, they felt they were sending the message that they disapproved (which they did not). If they looked, well, then they were LOOKING. AHH! How to offer privacy (by not looking) without offering implied disapproval?
My advice was to make eye contact if it is reasonable to do so, give a slight nod or smile to indicate that you do not disapprove (no need to go as far as a full thumbs-up), and THEN look elsewhere. I can’t tell you how much having someone do just that meant to me the first time I nursed my first son in public. I just about cried from relief. (it was a very smartly dressed, proper-looking older lady with superior posture, the kind who can just destroy you with a glance… and she just met my eye, nodded in an approving way, and returned to her conversation…).
And yeah, I guess you can tell that I think nursing in public is fine. There are a lot of states that have specifically passed legislation saying that you cannot prevent a woman from feeding her baby in any place that she has a legal right to be. The legislation also usually specifies that exposure of body parts during or related to breastfeeding is excluded from obscenity laws, even if you flash the whole breast. Sad that it was necessary to go to that length in the first place.
Even though you struck pre-emptively on any differing opinions, here’s my two cents, legal tender:
Some women are overly obvious about public breastfeeding. Whether in order to banalize it or seek attention is a matter of opinion. Just the fact that these few obviously have an agenda bugs me. It’s like smoking pot in public, some folks can be discreet, others are all “look at me everybody!” These attention-seekers may feel that they’re providing a valuable public service by stimulating a debate but exhibitionism is not considered appropriate in any society.
Breast-feeding in public has been around forever and there’s nothing icky about it, but please get off the stage with your Earth Mother act, the gong has sounded long ago.
I would tend to agree with that if there is a moral component involved. For example, suppose people felt uncomfortable seeing you shaking hands with a black man, I would think you should disregard it. Reason being that the feeling in question is based on a morally wrong attitude. But barring that, I don’t see why the reason makes a difference. From a purely logical intellectual standpoint one might argue against anyone being uncomfortable with anything. But people have emotions - they are what they are.
Having said that, I don’t think the fact that some people might be uncomfortable is an automatic veto on your actions. It depends on how many people, how uncomfortable, and how important it is to you. My point is merely that you can’t argue feelings with logic, as many here seem to be doing.
So, out of curiousity, which states have laws permitting moms to breastfeed wherever they want? I’m really interested to see which states have passed laws.
