NYTimes: U.S. Opposition to Breast-Feeding Resolution Stuns World Health Officials

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Clarissa

July 8, 2018

US stands up for women’s rights while Russia, a country in the grip of a major patriarchal movement against women, opposes.

Disregard the article’s anti-woman qualifiers and look at the facts it reluctantly presents. Finally, the US has broken the iron grip that the religious fanatics of the LLL have had on its policy for years. This is really big and undeniably positive.

Of course, ideally women would be in a place where intimidation by anti-feminist attachment parenting fanatics wouldn’t have an effect but that’s not the case. A resolution that encourages the bullies places an even heavier burden on women. I’m glad the US at least tried to stand up against it even if it predictably folded to Russia in the end.

P.S. For those unfamiliar with the subject, here is an explanatory post by a feminist OB-GYN I admire. She is the most prominent US activist in the fight against the anti-feminist backlash known as “attachment parenting.”

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17 responses to “NYTimes: U.S. Opposition to Breast-Feeding Resolution Stuns World Health Officials”

Alex The Physicist

July 8, 2018

The US started off opposing the resolution, but once Russia declared their support the US shut up. Sounds to me like US diplomats know who’s in charge.

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1. Clarissa
  
  July 8, 2018
  
  As I said, this was sadly predictable. But at least, we did stand up against it at first. This is more than has happened since the 1970s on this issue.
  
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  1. jilltatter
    
    July 8, 2018
    
    Does the resolution outlaw formula and bottles? Would it outlaw the “fed is best” movement and common sense? I’m genuinely not understanding how it would have been antifeminist. The link doesn’t have any “meat” to it either. So can you please share with me why a pseudo resolution would force people to breastfeed or how breastfeeding, if a mom wants to, is antifeminist? Cuz in the US, it was individual feminists who brought it back and feminists who brought about free the nipple to make breastfeeding easier. It’s the conservatives who want to hide it.
    
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    1. Clarissa
      
      July 8, 2018
      
      On every feminist website, there’s always someone who goes, “But what’s antifeminist in saying that women are weaker, less competitive and more about serving the needs of others? Isn’t that just common sense?” And everybody immediately begins to flap their wings and explain why he’s wrong.
      
      Chances that I’ll play this game is pretty much nil. :-)))
      
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      1. jilltatter
        
        July 9, 2018
        
        LMAO!!! Weaker? Where did I mention anything that anyone could possibly construe as weaker? Obviously, being able to do something that biological males can’t do definitely doesn’t make anyone weaker. A woman who CHOOSES to stay home isn’t weaker either. Why th else would they have shows showing how funny it is watching people who aren’t used to it trying to hack it? Real feminism means woman can choose. Ya know, pro choice and all that, doesn’t just refer to whether or not to carry out a pregnancy.
        What are you even referring to as less competitive? In the DC area, plenty of nursing moms, who are professionals are running rings around their coworkers, if that’s what you mean. My gosh! Are most nursing people in your area, non career people? Not here. Most breastfeeding moms, that I know, have no issue with using a combo of breastfeeding and bottle feeding.
        
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        Clarissa
        
        July 9, 2018
        
        It’s great you disagree with the substance of antifeminist trolls’ arguments. All that’s left is to reject their methods of conducting discussions. 🙂
        
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        jilltatter
        
        July 9, 2018
        
        I have no idea which methods you mean. I can only be me, not use some formula prescribed by someone else, judged as I find myself.
        
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David Gendron

July 8, 2018

And now, Bernie supports the NYT about it.

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1. Clarissa
  
  July 8, 2018
  
  I’m sure Bernie is a huge specialist in breast-feeding. 🙂
  
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Vic Crain

July 8, 2018

I read several pieces on this today, most linked back to the NYT article. Issue: promoting the interests of Big drug companies and Nestle who were very present at the World Health Assembly versus those encouraging breast feeding. Nestle was already fined for some years ago for selling substandard formula to African mothers. The Trump administration supported the drug companies. Russia supported women’s right to breast feed if they so chose. The Trump administration threatened Ecuador with trade sanctions unless they withdrew as sponsor of the resolution. At which point Russia stepped up. Trump refused to threaten Russia. Russia looks like the advocate for women’s rights. The US looks like a thug. Russia has positioned itself as the protector of the Third World against big bad USA.

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1. Clarissa
  
  July 8, 2018
  
  Vic, this is a long-standing feminist issue. Women are being bullied by the so-called lactation activists into nervous breakdowns. Babies suffer actual physical harm. This is all done in the service of ultra- patriarchal, religious organizations that oppose women working like LLL.
  
  Please, please, do not refer to Russia as ” an advocate for women’s rights” on this issue because this is promoted only by ultra-, religious, patriarchal organizations. Feminists have been writing about the harm done to women and babies by these organizations for decades. I don’t like Trump either but on this issue the administration is truly on the side of the angels.
  
  You just don’t know what’s being done to women in the hospitals under the guise of this agenda. Nursery rooms are being closed, women are being bullied, shamed, persecuted, threatened. It’s really really bad. This is not something that arose all of a sudden. This has been three decades in the making. How many more babies need to be driven into malnourishment and failure to thrive to service the agenda of the crazed maniacs from LLL?
  
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  1. Clarissa
    
    July 8, 2018
    
    About the nurseries, in case people don’t know. Maternity wards used to have nurseries where moms could place babies for a couple of hours and get some sleep. Many women discover that they can’t sleep with a newborn in the room, even if the newborn is asleep. I was one of those women. After 53 hours with no sleep at all, I was starting to hallucinate. It was bad. Nurseries allow to give Mom a break and sleep for a bit.
    
    These nurseries are now being closed down in many hospitals. Why? Because of the mandate to promote breastfeeding. That’s the only reason. Moms are not supposed to leave the babies for any period of time at all because they are supposed to be trying to breastfeed. That mom is a human being who might need a break is of no interest to anybody. As a result, postpartum depression is skyrocketing.
    
    This is only one consequence of the seemingly innocent mandate to promote breastfeeding. This is what the US finally stood up against today. Finally.
    
    I have many more stories on the subject because, as I said, this has been a pressing feminist issue since 1980s.
    
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    1. jilltatter
      
      July 9, 2018
      
      Yes! They absolutely need to bring back the option to send your baby to the nursery. Having my oldest fed by the nurses a couple times, instead of breastfed was how i learned that nipple confusion didn’t affect every baby, at least not mine. Sometimes “not knowing better” is a good thing.
      
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Dreidel

July 8, 2018

Medical alert:

This article is a prime example of why “medical news” articles appearing in lay publications and written by people with no medical background should NEVER be taken seriously.

Since the authors have no expertise in the medical subjects discussed, the lay writer invariably blindly quotes “expert opinion” from a single partisan medical source, and never acknowledges that other medical experts disagree strongly with the opinion expressed in the article.

So whenever you see a “medical” article published in Time, or The Atlantic, or any newspaper at all, treat it as one-sided propaganda written by a gullible hack writer.

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1. Clarissa
  
  July 9, 2018
  
  Very true. It always stuns me how bad such pieces tend to be.
  
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lyra211

July 9, 2018

If we’re talking about the US and other developed nations, I agree with you and Amy Tuteur. Fed is best, and there are trivial to no advantages of breastfeeding over formula feeding according to the gold-standard sibling studies, so moms should do whatever they want and everyone else should butt out. But the NY Times reporting was crap on this subject. If we’re talking about the WHO, representing developing nations (like Ecuador, specifically mentioned in the article), then breastfeeding does save lives, specifically because of a lack of access of many parents in developing nations to safe water supplies. There’s a whole nasty history of large corporations coming in and promoting “newer, more modern” feeding methods with lots of babies dying of all sorts of horrible diseases as a result, and the Trump administration’s motivation was pretty clearly pandering to formula companies, not looking at the evidence (which, as I mentioned, doesn’t support LLLI lactivism in the US, but does favor supporting breastfeeding initiatives in developing countries). Of course, the NY Times (and Amy Tuteur) glossed over those nuances, which pisses me off but doesn’t surprise me.

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1. Clarissa
  
  July 9, 2018
  
  I don’t want to pose as a savior to women in Ecuador where I’ve never even been. I can only speak to the situation in North America and, partly, in Russia. Which is what I’m doing.
  
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