So they did weird things in addition to committing torture and genocide? Why not just use the term zealot, or something like that. Why Nazi?
I actually feel ok about them being the radical edge of lactivism.
I also agree this hurts the breastfeeding movement. But it also depends on what the movement's goal is. One would think that the movement's goal is more breasfeeding taking place. But items like this (dad cannot use a bottle) makes many women terrified to breastfeed because of the far reaching Myth that that means they are the only ones that can care for their child and that they will not have any help. It makes breastfeeding seem like something out of reach.
I myself fell into that trap when I was pregnant until my mother snapped me out of it. I didn't think breasfeeding would be realistic because I was planning to go back to work. She said then pump that way baby is still getting the milk, that is the most important thing. And it is. My son got nothing but breastmilk his full 6 months and never received formula (at 6 months he started solids in addition). It was great for him. I was even able to donate to a milk bank.
But he got a lot of milk through bottles. I wish LLL and other activist groups would promote the multiple avenues to breast milk for children rather than self promotion of the organization.
The people who object to removing the add should read the link the pp provided before commenting. The New Zealand government promotes breastfeeding. Part of that is to normalize breastfeeding by providing images of breastfeeding (instead of the usual bottle feeding image) Formula feeding a choice that consumers have. But using images of formula feeding goes against promoting breastfeeding as the norm. So its logical not to use that image.
I was asked to cover up or leave the room, at a thankgiving dinner by friends who invited me and my suckling. Leaving the room meant being excluded from the dinner, and the baby was sleepy and needed to be nursed. Covering up wasnt really feasible, but i did my best to pretent. (i sat on the sofa)
You see, they need to see more images of breastfeeding women.
At the same time, i also own a can of formula that i use if i have a babysitter, or so my kids get the chance to feed the baby as a bonding thing. ( I am glad i can buy this so yay! consumer choice!)
But breastfeeding is better (im so glad i dont depend on that can), and IS NORMAL, and good on the government of New Zealand for promoting it as normal. Why should they fund an image that undermines that policy?
Where i come from LLL talks of pumping alot, they have a group for working mothers. Ive never really experienced this zealotry people talk about. Ive met some really nice people at LLL , and they seemed pretty easy going. But it was wic, not LLL, who helped me the most in establishing a breastfeeding relationship with my firstborn when it seemed like it was never going to happen.
I find people who ban you to a room or cover up to breastfeed zealous and ignorant.
Maybe in some places LLL needs to improve their act. It has nothing to do with the issue at hand though.
You know, I guess I could *kinda* see the thought process of LLL being opposed to images of the mom bottlefeeding, but seriously, the dad? The dad is feeding his child. IMO, the image promotes a father caring for his child- something "american moms" could sure use a lot more of.
Mothers could sure use a lot more of fathers helping out with anything *other* than feeding. Babies need to be fed by their mothers.
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I donno, I think when your own base (I am speaking of LLL) here starts to say you have gone too far, the organization should probably listen.
Jesus I hope not. This isn't the time to start backing off and taking the movement backwards. My biggest problem with LLL has always been that they were too moderate and tried too hard to please everyone and not be controversial or confrontational. I'm hoping that the voices that I'm hearing saying that they shouldn't have spoken up on this issue are in the minority of the lactivist movement. It certainly would have been a minority opinion in this sub-forum years ago when I spent much more time here. Things have certainly changed.
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Taking extreme positions is never going to help the message
Holy crow! The position that our society promotes too many images that normalize bottlefeeding is NOT an extreme position for a breastfeeding advocacy organization to take! What the heck is going on around here??
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If they are losing someone like me then um, what makes them think they can win the public?
That has always been an unavoidable problem for LLL. There have always been so many people in this culture who do not support breastfeeding, that LLL was never able to win over the general public, no matter how moderate they made themselves.
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Not all women work because they have to. Plenty work for no reason other than they want to. Messages like the one you are supporting are that women should move heaven and earth to make sure they never even give their baby a bottle of pumped milk.
I, myself, am a career-minded woman. Right now my career is mothering, and I think it's the most challenging and fulfilling career in the the world. Some day, when my children don't need me at home any more, I am going to have a different career, and I would be determined to have it whether there were a financial need for me to have one or not. But I would never choose to work outside the home, parted from my child, during his first year of life, if there was no financial necessity. If a mother of a young baby chose to do such a thing just because she felt like it, I would think that she must just not know how important breastfeeding is. And that's why we need education. And it's also why we need to get images out of the media that normalize bottlefeeding. I personally would have moved heaven and earth to protect my breastfeeding relationship with my children, but I don't expect everyone else to do the same, and I never said they should.
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Going out for a night with friends? Working, either by choice or necessity? Having an hour alone in the tub while DH feeds baby after you've been touched out? Choosing to EP because you prefer it to nursing? Nope.
Again, choosing to go out for a night with friends, as a casual decision, just because you feel like it, even though you have a baby who's so young that they need to be breastfed every 2 or 3 hours? Sounds like the mother has been misinformed to the point that she's been convinced that a bottle can be *exactly* as good as breastfeeding -- or that the difference, at most, is insignificant. On the other hand, I fully support a mother taking such a break if she's really at the end of her rope and feels like she's about to go crazy if she doesn't get a break. Hopefully such an extreme situation wouldn't happen too often.
I think I've already covered working.
Feeling touched out? Again, I can understand it. I'm not saying a bottle of EBM is the end of the world. Personally I felt touched out many times and I went right on breastfeeding anyway, but I don't hold others to that standard. Hopefully things wouldn't become unbearable so often that it would be really frequent.
Choosing to EP because you prefer it to breastfeeding? I would only hope that, before this preference was acted on, the mother would fully educate herself on the differences, and on what the child needs, and why, and all of the things that can be affected by a lack of feeding from the breast.
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sometimes there's a lot to be said about "good enough."
Historically, that is a dangerous phrase. Countless humans never consumed a drop of human breastmilk because society convinced mothers that formula was "good enough."
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I hate to keep going back to PETA, but the parallels are too striking.
I have to say that's really ridiculous and unfair, and actually laughable. I'm familiar with many of PETA's tactics. They are purposely extreme -- WAY over the top, capitalizing on shock value. Deliberately controversial. Whereas LLL is just speaking out against the normalization of bottlefeeding in the media, which is a completely reasonable thing for LLL to do, and they have a history of being very moderate and welcoming. LLL and PETA are practically opposites.
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In the meantime though, we live in this world, where very few women provide their babies with only breastmilk and only a fraction of those never use pumped bottles.
And that's never going to change if we keep intentionally inundating everyone with "positive, heartwarming" images of babies being fed bottles. LLL shouldn't just support the status quo. They are supposed to work toward progress. They should try to create positive change. Trying to reduce negative forces that work against breastfeeding is one good way to do that.
But items like this (dad cannot use a bottle) makes many women terrified to breastfeed because of the far reaching Myth that that means they are the only ones that can care for their child and that they will not have any help.
I don't think it's reasonable to suggest that this action by LLL is responsible for such terror. There are plenty of ways for partners, other family members, friends, and society, to support breastfeeding mothers. But that doesn't mean the mother isn't the one who should actually be feeding the child. There's a difference between supporting her and actually doing the feeding for her, which doesn't meet the child's needs. Also, people other than the mother can change the child's diapers and help care for the child in countless other ways.
I didn't think breasfeeding would be realistic because I was planning to go back to work. She said then pump that way baby is still getting the milk, that is the most important thing. And it is. My son got nothing but breastmilk his full 6 months and never received formula (at 6 months he started solids in addition). It was great for him.
That's great. It really is. I'm so glad she said that to you.
It doesn't have to be all or nothing. If a mother has already decided that she's going to work outside the home, that doesn't mean the baby has to be fed formula. It's true that pumped milk in a bottle isn't as good as direct breastfeeding, but, as I said, it's a heck of a lot better than formula. You are correct that the human breastmilk is the most important thing. It absolutely is. It's not the only important thing, but it is the most important thing. Pumping is so much better than feeding formula, and you should feel good about that. There are so many babies that never get any human milk at all. I just want to emphasize that I appreciate the effort that pumping mothers go to. The pumping is definitely worth it, because formula is so inadequate. Human milk rocks!
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I wish LLL and other activist groups would promote the multiple avenues to breast milk for children
I doubt that they would have objected to an image of a mother pumping. One of the problems with an image of a baby being fed a bottle is that there's no implication that it's even human milk. And showing the father doing the feeding leaves the mother out of the picture altogether.
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I was asked to cover up or leave the room, at a thankgiving dinner by friends who invited me and my suckling. Leaving the room meant being excluded from the dinner, and the baby was sleepy and needed to be nursed. Covering up wasnt really feasible, but i did my best to pretent. (i sat on the sofa)
You see, they need to see more images of breastfeeding women.
If you don't see how telling women that they shouldn't work (by making "better financial decisions") and shouldn't go out for more than an hour or two at a time for a year or more isn't extreme, we are living on different planets.
If you don't see how telling women that they shouldn't work (by making "better financial decisions") and shouldn't go out for more than an hour or two at a time for a year or more isn't extreme, we are living on different planets.
Here is what I said isn't extreme:
A breastfeeding advocacy organization working to reduce the number of images in the media that normalize bottle feeding.
I never said that women shouldn't work outside the home. I'm a feminist, for god's sake. I don't even presume to tell mothers of young babies not to work outside the home. My position, as a lactivist, is that the best thing for children, in general, is if mothers of young babies, for whom it is a financial possibility, avoid jobs at places that part them from their babies.
Another position I take, as a lactivist, is that the best thing for babies who need to breastfeed every 2 or 3 hours, is that their mothers aren't parted from them longer than that, any more frequently than necessary.
Such are my views on my planet.
I don't understand how LLL speaking out about the media normalising bottlefeeding is being viewed as an attack on the choices of mothers?
What we see in the media very much influences the choices we make, and we are bombarded with images of bottlefeeding. We need people speaking out against this.
I really don't think that's typical of LLL. They are very supportive. I do know though, that mothers often become defensive and upset because of their own emotions that they bring to the situation, and they project. Something that I've seen happen very often is a mother feeling guilty or inadequate, and becoming oversensitive, and reading things into what other mothers say, and misconstruing their remarks, and thinking that they are judging her or accusing her or being unsupportive, when the other mothers are actually trying to be supportive.
I'm sorry you had a bad experience. Truly, nobody should be made to feel bad. That does not change the fact that LLL helps MANY women around the globe. I have felt nothing but comfort by lll, even when I was supplementing my first child and ultimately had an unsuccessful (by my personal to my own wants standard) breastfeeding relationship. Isn't is possible that maybe things have changed in the 17 or so years since this happened to you, and perhaps painting all of LLL with that broad of a brushstroke might be a little hasty?
The agenda of LLL is to support breastfeeding mothers. Regarding your friend, are you sure those are the exact words that were said to her? "You're not trying hard enough?" It doesn't sound like something that is likely to be said at an LLL meeting. What seems more likely to me is that mothers made various suggestions for things she could try that she may not have tried yet, and expressed an optimistic view that breastfeeding relationships can work even under challenging circumstances, and what she HEARD was "you're not trying hard enough." As far as mother-to-mother milk sharing, it's possible that a LLL group might have to take an official position against it, for liability reasons, but they can't tell her that she's not ALLOWED to utilize the milk of another willing mother. They do not have authority over her. It is her option. Something similar was said earlier in this thread -- something along the lines of a mother getting upset because LLL "was going to have her quit her job." LLL cannot "have" you do anything or make you do anything. All they do is make suggestions. The decisions are always the mother's to make.
It is true that every LLL is different and there are different individuals everywhere you go. I'm not saying it's impossible that anything unsupportive has ever been said at an LLL meeting. I am speaking of the organization in general as a supportive organization. In general, LLL tries to be open and welcoming toward all mothers who want help.
I did not say that if mothers weren't oversensitive everything would be fine. If you read my post again, you will see that I did not say that.
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