If you spend any time in the Mormon feminist community, you may have read this story. Basically, a friend of a blogger has been released for breastfeeding (uncovered) in church and will be asked to cover or nurse elsewhere if anyone else complains about it.
I find my position on this is a bit different from the majority over at FMH, so I decided that taking a position on my own turf would be a safer move on my part.
Here's the thing: I don't think it's all that unreasonable to ask a woman breastfeeding in church to use a cover. If you want to nurse uncovered in a park, restaurant, store, or train station, go ahead. You have the right. It's a public place.
But church is a little different. We're a part of a culture where nudity isn't acceptable, but that's even more potent at church. Yes, it's an issue of culture, I don't deny that, but the norm here to to nurse with a cover. Cultural standards may be arbitrary, but people still find them important. More importantly though, you can leave or move or turn the other way in a number of public places, but at church you don't have the option to leave and choose another place, like you would with a park or store or restaurant. We are required to attend with our ward at a scheduled time and I don't think it's okay to nurse uncovered where people don't have the option to leave.
And really, it's such a small request. I just can't fathom that someone would get repeated complaints and then insist on breastfeeding uncovered. I just don't buy oft' repeated line that there are babies who "refuse to feed with a cover." 99% of women manage it just fine.
So yeah, I'm not falling with party lines on this. It's really quite selfish to insist on doing something that makes so many people uncomfortable, when you've repeatedly been asked not to.
3 comments:
I'm going to weigh in on this since I have now experienced being a breastfeeding mother in church. I am not one to breastfeed without a cover ever so that has not been a problem for me. My main issue is that I have never felt like the church is okay with women breastfeeding even with a cover. I have just never seen anyone do it and I have heard of people doing it and being asked to leave the room/class. I feel forced to go to the nursing lounge even though it'd be nice not to miss out on big chunks of sacrament meeting and Relief Society feeding my baby. I have breastfed with a cover once at a ward talent show in a darkened room and no one noticed or said anything so maybe I can just keep doing it until someone complains? I think the whole breastfeeding debate is a bit ridiculous. Covers are annoying especially since babies often hit a certain stage where they try everything they can to pull it off but so far it has always worked when I have needed it to. I think that our society has turned breastfeeding into a more sexual and abnormal thing than it is supposed to be and while I wish it wasn't that way I am not going to breastfeed my baby for the world to see just to make a point. I don't think that things are going to change just because I show off my boobs. Anyway, hopefully that doesn't offend anyone because I know there are super pro public breastfeeding people out there and while it really doesn't bother me when people breastfeed in public it is just something that I would never be comfortable doing. And I hope this all made sense!
I'm with you on this one. It's not like the issue was sacrament meeting - it was YW. It seems like a lot of people over at FMH were focusing on the "it's only girls!" aspect of it. I think the bigger issue is the captive audience angle. A lot of teenage girls are uncomfortable with body issues, and I don't think it's fair for a leader to be like, "You WILL be comfortable now!" If the breastfeeding mother were sitting in the audience of sacrament, who cares? Anyone who wants to look away can. But if she's at the front of a classroom, then there's really nowhere else the girls can look. In short, this thing is blowing up kind of over nothing, in my opinion.
I actually agree with lots of what has been said here. My only quibble is that when I nurse uncovered, you see practically nothing. Maybe I just have super small boobs, (likely) but I usually wear two layers, lift up one, pull down the other, and put baby on, esp. when I'm worried about offending anyone. (My description may not have made much sense, but roll with me) One sees nothing. I've had my 15 year old brother sit next to me and have no idea that I was nursing. Even when I get all Leche League and just pull my shirt down, Clara's head covers most everything.
I get being uncomfortable with seeing nursing boobs. Wish it weren't so, but it is, blah blah blah. So if someone was whipping the whole damn thing out and leaving it there, okay. But most of the time it is so discreet (even more so than the huge covers that loudly announce I'M NURSING) that I can't figure out why everyone is so alarmed.
TL,DR: nursing really doesn't have to show boob. If you do, a cover doesn't totally suck. Also, why would anyone complain about an excuse to leave church. I jest. Not really.
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