Breast Is Best: That’s The Objective Fact

by Melissa Clouthier | June 28, 2010 11:44 am

[1]

Every year, some woman justifies her decision to bottle feed her kid and uses some form of the logic, “It makes no difference anyway.” Every year, I write a response that consists of, yes, you’re free to feed your newborn fried eggs and ham, or pureed lima beans, or formula if you want, and the baby will probably survive but it is not as good for your baby as breast milk. Period.

So here’s the latest woman running through her justifications:

HANDS OFF

After nine months of denial, lardiness and bad shoes, as soon as the birth was out of the way I want my body back. (And some wine). Not that I had anything particularly useful to do with my body, except — paradoxically — care for my baby. I also wanted to give my boobs at least a chance to stay on my chest rather than dangling around on my stomach, which, after two pregnancies, still has ‘tonal’ issues of its own.

They’re part of my sexuality, too — not just breasts, but fun bags.

And when you have that attitude (and I admit I made no attempt to change it), seeing your teeny, tiny, innocent baby latching on where only a lover has been before feels, well, a little creepy.

FORMULA WON

I don’t think I’m the only one, either — only 52% of mums still breastfeed after six weeks. Ask most of the quitters why they stopped and you’ll hear tales of agonising three-hour feeding sessions and — the drama! — bloody nipples. But I often wonder whether many of these women, like me, just couldn’t be fagged or felt like getting tipsy once in awhile. My reasons for not breastfeeding might not be in the league of ‘my boobs are falling off’, but they make sense to me and I hope some women can be reassured by my honesty.

So I take it she believes she couldn’t use her “fun bags” sexually if they were squirting milk? Some dudes pay a lot of money to see videos of that online.

Also, many women suffer in breast feeding agony because of lack of knowledgeable female support. Our generation is the second in the line of women who almost wholesale bottle fed.

These days, one wonders why such foolish, superficial women get pregnant. Is it to have the cutest new accessory (designer bottle, of course)?

This woman’s silliness did garner a response[2]:

The UK Department of Health (DoH) recommends breastfeeding for six months and launched a controversial “Breast is Best” ad campaign to convince mothers to put down the bottles. According to the DoH, only one in 100 British mums actually does breastfeed for that long.

It’s all well and good, by the way, for a rich, entitled woman to protect her bags o’ love. She has the money and resources to buy formula, etc.

A woman who lacks resources and then, is under the stupid impression that her body will be destroyed and so chooses a bottle over breast milk is harming herself many ways, and her child too[3].

But the Feminist side of this argument is the one that gets me most. I do not understand women who claim feminism and then ignore actions that are uniquely feminine. A man cannot carry a baby or give birth. And a man cannot nurse a child. Period. Only a woman can do this. Why in the world would a feminist not assert her femininity in this way?

Worse, why do women consider these parts of womanhood so menial and meaningless?

There is no question that nursing can feel like a task at times. It takes time and energy and interrupts other things. But that, in this busy world, is just the point. Nursing forced me to focus on the child, to slow down and find that hazy mom place for my kid. Every couple hours, my child got me, fully me. And if I wasn’t around, he got a bottle of me.

Now, while it’s wrong to make the case that bottle feeding is just as good as nursing, which it clearly isn’t, being a Nurse Nazi isn’t right. There are women, who stake their whole self-worth on their breast. This is equally narcissistic. The one woman views her boobs as sex objects, the other woman views her boobs as validation of worthiness. In both cases, it’s all about them and not the baby.

Some women, often radical feminists themselves, believe that nursing is a political statement and do their best to offend everyone by flashing everyone at the mall, horrifying their mother-in-law and just generally being an annoying breast-wielding harpy who will lecture a bottle feeding mother within an inch of her life.

How a woman feeds a baby is her choice, but there is a better choice. When I see a bottle fed baby, I don’t assume I know all the issues surrounding a woman’s choice. It’s America, people can do what they want. That doesn’t mean that some people aren’t superficial and stupid. Thankfully, kids are resilient.

Endnotes:
  1. [Image]: http://libertypundits.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/06/breastfeeding.jpg
  2. garner a response: http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/baby-expert-kathryn-blundell-calls-breastfeeding-creepy-bemoans-loss-of-fun-bags/story-e6frfku0-1225885023419
  3. harming herself many ways, and her child too: http://www.womenshealth.gov/breastfeeding/benefits/#a

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