The arguments in favor of public breastfeeding, which I support, are that it’s perfectly natural, the kids need to eat when they’re hungry, it’s good for baby and mom and a host of others. If you’re offended, look away. They’re just breasts. It’s no big deal.
How do these same arguments not apply to public urination? It is illegal is most places. The only difference that comes to mind is one of sanitation but I hardly believe that that’s the primary reason that public urination is illegal. In Oklahoma, the crime is called “Outraging the public decency”, as if decent people don’t have to pee.
I’m confident that this has to be a false analogy but I’m struggling to see it. Also, I really don’t want to see more people peeing in public. But it is perfectly natural. It’s good for you. It’s just genitalia. Etc.
We can start with “breasts aren’t genitalia”. They’re secondary sexual characteristics, to be sure, but then so is a beard. And would you mind covering up that Adam’s Apple? So gross. Wear a turtleneck, for gods’ sakes. Have some self respect.
But that’s just pushing the question back a bit to, “why can’t we show our genitalia in public when performing bodily functions?” and the answer to that is a rousingly unsatisfying, “because.” Taboos are taboos, and there’s little to no logic to them. I fight that, because I want logic and precision, but at the end of the day we’re chimps with keyboards.
I will say that the biggest argument I have against public urination has nothing to do with seeing genitalia; it’s the smell.
If I peed in a bottle and dumped that on the sidewalk, would that run afoul of public urination laws? Or is it the exposed genitals that are the problem? I’m under the impression that just having one’s dick out would fall under a different rule than dick out and peeing, but I don’t make a habit of either.
Breastfeeding in public is one thing. What you’re comparing it to, would be a woman expressing her milk openly onto the sidewalk or into the bushes.
I think it would be fair to say if a [lactating] woman pulled a breast out and started squeezing milk out of it and just let it drip/spray all over the place, she’d face similar charges as man that was publicly urinating.
I feel this is the key point. Even if you equate milk and urine as two bodily fluids, there’s still the factor that the milk is being consumed while the urine is being left at the site.
And as I said in the OP, I approve of public breastfeeding and disapprove of public urination although I have been known to have to pee behind a tree if no other option was available. I’d guess that about 99% of men have.
This is merely a mental debate that I am having with myself. It may not classify as “Great” but I’d assumed that this was the appropriate forum for it.
Another difference is that we have designated places for urination, but not for breastfeeding. In both cases, you can say “Well, I have to do it”. But with urination, the response is “Yes, but do it over in that room that’s for urination”.
And no, the bathroom is not the place for breastfeeding. If any place in a building could be said to be “for breastfeeding”, it’d be the dining room.
My understanding is that it is a social custom in some parts of India that the women gather in the fields to defecate together, gives them a time and place to share the village news. So it’s basically just Western culture that finds this euwgy.
What if the urine is being consumed? Some people are into that, and they don’t leave a stench like leaving it on the ground.
Also . . . I was once in line at the supermarket, and the elderly man in front of me had a very strong smell of urine. I had to stand back several feet. He didn’t seem to be wet anywhere. Was he violating any laws?
You owe me a new keyboard.