Thanks for the mammaries or, our nation's weird obsession
Posted by:
psloth on
February 13, 2009 at
10:33AM CST
I must give credit where credit is due. That’s not my bit. It’s Dave Blaska’s. He used it on Joy Cardin’s week-in-review show Friday on Wisconsin Public Radio.
Blaska, an online blogger for Madison’s Isthmus weekly newspaper, pulled that one out during the panel’s discussion of the “right to breastfeed” bill. The bill had a public hearing earlier this week before a state Senate committee.
It was clear the three men — Gene Purcell filling in for Joy Cardin and the Isthmus’ Bill Lueders, the other guest on the show — were a bit uncomfortable discussing a topic like breastfeeding.
That’s when Blaska dropped the bomb (in homage to Bob Hope, at least that’s who he credited). Funny or not, the joke helped the three men segue into another discussion.
No sooner had I changed the station when I found another group of guys talking about breastfeeding. This time it was the zany folks at Jonathon Brandmeier’s drive-time show from Chicago giggling about the actress Salma Hayek nursing a baby in Sierra Leone.
It wasn’t clear if they were giggling about breastfeeding in general or Hayek nursing a stranger’s baby in particular, but giggling is giggling and that is often a response from someone who is uncomfortable about the subject, especially if it’s guys talking about breasts.
This is odd considering Brandmeier (who is often hilarious) is no stranger to breasts. He often hosts zany radio gimmicks like getting scantily-clad women (often the well-endowed variety) to parade around, presumably for some kind of prize.
So here we are. In a nation with a weird obsession about breasts (the source of food for humanity for millions of years), states like Wisconsin are asked to protect nursing moms from a public that doesn’t flinch at a lady in a bikini selling the image of breasts, but gets a little squeamish when a mom uses her breasts for their intended purpose, in public god forbid.
It’s no wonder that some people shake their heads at the fact that Wisconsin’s only real action on the issue of breastfeeding has been to remove it from a list of lewd behaviors. Nice.
Wisconsin has a long way to go, so does this country for that matter, before “thanks for the mammaries” is anything more than a punch line.
Breastfeeding makes a lot of people uncomfortable. I did not have the opportunity to breastfeed my son so I can't remark directly on whether or not using a small blanket to cover the baby's face and mom's breast would have been extremely uncomfortable. My sister and both sister-in-laws breast fed and they used those tiny baby blankets when feeding - even when only in the presence of family members--they didn't seem to mind much.
I think the problem is that watching a baby feed from a breast is really fascinating so it's hard not to look or watch if it's right there in front of you. But it's hard to not feel like you might seem to be staring at the breast (for men). Or maybe men don't like to be reminded that breasts, like other body parts, are actually part of reproduction?
I think that many men find breastfeeding conspicuously uncomfortable due to the fact they wish they were feeding, not the baby. In my opinion, the main reason breasts hold fascination, sexually, is that those of us breastfed as infants remember, instinctually, the warmth, comfort, and well being of being fed by mom. There is nothing perverse or wrong in this, it's a natural human response...jealousy.
"...a weird obsession about breasts (the source of food for humanity for millions of years)." Okay, well vaginas and penises (penisi?) have been the means by which humans have urinated for millions of years, too, right, so what's the big hang up about them? Why don't we all just pee in public, too? BECAUSE, they also have a very definite sexual component and, culturally, we've decided that we'd prefer that they not be "whipped out" in public. It's as simple as that.
Weird obsession indeed ... Well, last time I checked Poguey, neither vaginas nor penises provided nourishment. It seems odd that you would equate breastfeeding with urinating. Last I heard, no one asked to "whip" anything out. They just don't want nursing their children to be compared to "peeing" in public. It's as simple as that. I'm guessing you don't want to hear that though.
The argument in favor of public breastfeeding is that "it's perfectly natural." So is urinating, and defecating, and flatulating, and procreating, and doing lots of other things that, over hundreds of years, our society has decided are not appropriately done in public. It's okay for animals to do these things, but people are expected to be held to a higher standard--or at least a different standard. Sorry if you didn't get the memo.
Now, social mores and norms can and do certainly change over time, and maybe public breastfeeding is becoming more acceptable and maybe someday even commonplace. But it's not yet. Frankly, I don't really have a position either way. But, Paul, YOU'RE the one who decided that you're the appropriate authority to decide which otherwise generally accepted social conventions are "weird obsessions." And since you're obviously so "open minded," I'm sure you'll be glad I pointed it out.
Posted by: psloth on February 21, 2009 12:21PM CST
Sorry Poguey I don't buy you're line of reasoning. If I understand you correctly, you are comparing nursing a child with procreating, urinating and, yes, even farting. This is what I mean by "weird obsession." We don't mind the use of breasts as a sales tool, but we do mind when women use them, discreetly in public, for their intended purpose -- feeding their children. Any higher standard we hold ourselves to should include elevating feeding a child naturally above "letting one rip." As far as deciding who is an appropriate authority on any given subject, blogs are about one individual's opinion. I have no "authority." I just choose to use this blog as a way to share my opinions. Some choose to respond. Others don't. Thanks for responding.
Posted by: Poguey on February 23, 2009 12:13PM CST
I guess we're just going to disagree about this, nothing wrong with that. It seems to me, though, that you're being just as arbitrary as you accuse society of being--feeding good, farting bad, peeing bad, f***ing bad. But why? Why is injesting food kosher, but, uh, processing the food not, other than because society has decided as much? Likewise, why, in your mind, is publicly sucking at the teet acceptable while publically sucking t*ts not? Not trying to be crass, but just the fact that it comes off as "crass" proves my point--society has made certain judgments about certain things, and even your position very clearly accepts some of those judgments as correct ("letting one rip") while rejecting others (decrying the skittishness about public "nursing"--a euphamism, btw--as a "weird obsession"). So how far would you go? Do you also think that prohibiting women from walking around topless is "weird"? How about the public breastfeeding of an 8 year old? A 10 year old? A 13 year old? Some societies do it. And do you REALLY think that feeding is the only "intended purpose" of breasts? I suspect that, in certain situations, you may have a different opinion altogether.
While I write on a daily basis, as a reporter, I'm new to blogging. Rather than mix business with pleasure, I've decided to use this blog for writing about subjects different from my work on the Education Beat. Since this is all new frontier to me, it may be a few days before I start a blog here devoted to education related topics, but I plan to do so. I'm no one trick pony. On this blog, I will occasionally wax poetic on a variety of delightful topics, like the ethics of Charlie Brown or finding spiritual nourishment from bad TV. All I ask is that, if you must comment, be kind. I do not suffer fools gladly. Enjoy!
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