"Breastfeeding Moms Protest H&M"

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Collin wrote:

But besides that there's still the issue of private property. The owner of a bar, restaurant, store... has a right to decide what is acceptable in his store. If he doesn't want people comming in topless he has a right to tell them to wear a shirt or leave. The same goes for breastfeeding. This person's livelihood depends on his business and his customers. If his customers complain he can say it's his property and he decides what is allowed and what is not, but he could very well risk losing a few customers if he allows the mother to stay. He could of course offer her to go somewhere more quiet, away from the dining guests... But no, some of you, I don't know where you stand anymore, feel there's no need for compromise, that others' rights can be trampled on... and I don't agree with that.

I don't think breastfeeding mothers have the right to trespass. So why should they take other people's feelings into consideration, well, first of all, you might be on their property and you might actually be costing the owner money because of your breastfeeding (well, because of people who cannot stand breastfeeding).

Actually, that's not true. kcherub & comebackgirl pointed out quite some time ago that "Thirty-nine states, the District of Columbia and the Virgin Islands have laws with language specifically allowing women to breastfeed in any public or private location."
http://www.ncsl.org/programs/health/breast50.htm

It's the breastfeeding woman - not the store owner - who has the right in these situations.

Collin

Jeanie wrote:

Sure he can do something about it, but then I hope he doesn't go getting all upset when his customer decides to boycott his restaurant, or rally other people who feel his expectations are unreasonable with regard to his stance and stage a protest outside his establishment. I can't see that being too good for business!

Just as people did when restaurant owners and shopkeepers and bus services and movie theatres etc decided that they wouldn't serve or allow black people into their establishments OR expected them to only patronise the establishment in a segregated area. Or as people have done when proprietors have limited access to their establishments for people with disabilities. This is how change is brought about. Obviously right now there is still many people that cannot cope with a woman breastfeeding in public but I can't see that being the status quo in the future because people, like the women that have protested outside H & M, will continue to educate, bring awareness and stand up for what is right.

Well, that would be not respecting his rights, imo. It would be trying to impose your will on him.

I don't see the connexion with the African-American civil rights movement, Jeanie.

A proprietor has a right to decide nudity is not allowed in his establishment. A topless black person, a topless white person, a topless man or a topless woman... he can all tell them to either wear a shirt or leave.

A breast is a breast, and a naked breast is a naked breast regardless of its purpose.

A proprietor cannot deny access to their establishment because they have a certain skin colour or are a certain gender, or have a certain disability. He cannot deny access to a mother with child (for all these cases, I'm sure there are exceptions of course). But he can say nudity is not allowed.

So, I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.

I would also disagree with naturists who protest in front of a restaurant because another nudist was kicked out.

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Collin wrote:

And yes, I do consider feminism a bad thing.

I see this as your core issue, Collin, and I think it's deserving of its own thread.

Collin

scb wrote:

Actually, that's not true. kcherub & comebackgirl pointed out quite some time ago that "Thirty-nine states, the District of Columbia and the Virgin Islands have laws with language specifically allowing women to breastfeed in any public or private location."
http://www.ncsl.org/programs/health/breast50.htm

It's the breastfeeding woman - not the store owner - who has the right in these situations.

In these situations, yes. There are more than 39 states, however.

edit: that doesn't change the fact that a little mutual respect is probably the way to go.

comebackwoman

Collin wrote:

In these situations, yes. There are more than 39 states, however.

Those are just the states that expressly provide protections for breastfeeding. However, it is allowed in every state.

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Collin wrote:

I understand how important a child is to a mother.

Do you? Perhaps we should have started with this question to begin with. I don't claim to fully understand how important a child is to a mother, especially since I don't have children and because I'm not that mother of that child. But you claim to have this knowledge?

Collin wrote:

You are on someone's else property. Yes, you do have a right to feed your child but the owner has rights too.

Once again, I think you overestimate the rights of the store owner.

Collin

comebackgirl wrote:

Those are just the states that expressly provide protections for breastfeeding. However, it is allowed in every state.

I can read the site. Not all states allow breastfeeding on someone else's property without the owner's consent.

catefrances

scb wrote:

Do you? Perhaps we should have started with this question to begin with. I don't claim to fully understand how important a child is to a mother, especially since I don't have children and because I'm not that mother of that child. But you claim to have this knowledge?

no youre wrong. it is actually how important a mother is to the child. left alone and unattended without artificial intervention the child would die. and by child i mean baby.

catefrances

facepollution wrote:

Yep, I could go along with that.

but you know, tis irrelevent if you do or dont.

Collin

scb wrote:

Do you? Perhaps we should have started with this question to begin with. I don't claim to fully understand how important a child is to a mother, especially since I don't have children and because I'm not that mother of that child. But you claim to have this knowledge?

I'm not a mother either But I am a child and I have a mother, and no one has sacrificied more for me and my brother than my mother. I've only recently discovered how much it was she exactly sacrificied for us... but I can tell you this, her love for us must be very very strong...

Once again, I think you overestimate the rights of the store owner.

I missed the link kcherub & comebackgirl's link... You pointed it out to me.

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Collin wrote:

And by the way if her lover is next to her I'd think he could help out, like putting the blanket in its place, picking it up when it falls... What kind of a father would let his partner handle that all on her own when he's just sitting there?

Who said he was the father?

Collin

scb wrote:

Who said he was the father?

Touché!

OysterJam01

I think its a matter of respect really - you need to go to the loo so many times a day - or even fart say, but you are strategic about where you do it! I think women should be able to feed thier babies but there is no harm in making sure you are somewhere where therer are thousands of people - for the babies sake also. . .

catefrances

OysterJam01 wrote:

I think its a matter of respect really - you need to go to the loo so many times a day - or even fart say, but you are strategic about where you do it! I think women should be able to feed thier babies but there is no harm in making sure you are somewhere where therer are thousands of people - for the babies sake also. . .

babies dont notice where you feed them .:)

Jeanie

Collin wrote:

Well, that would be not respecting his rights, imo. It would be trying to impose your will on him. .

Well I suppose you could see it that way. I don't. I see it as someone doesn't agree with his action and therefore they are publicly calling him out on it and hoping to effect a change in attitude. Don't forget this person that the proprietor is imposing his will on is also a customer. I grew up in a time when the customer was always right and that a good customer was a repeat customer. If he's not going to value all his customers there will be consequences for that. A good business man would know that.

Collin wrote:

I don't see the connexion with the African-American civil rights movement, Jeanie. .

What if Rosa Parkes had never got on the bus? What if MLK had never done what he did, said what he said? What if all the little people that were subjected to discrimination based on the flawed premise that they were less because of the colour of their skin had simply used discretion, taken on board that other people were embarrassed or uncomfortable seeing dark skinned people and they'd never stood up and fought for their basic human right? To be acknowledged as equal? It's a flawed premise that the human female breast should not be seen in public because it is also viewed as a sexual organ. The breast is designed in mammals for the function of feeding and the offspring of mammals require the sustenance of their mother's milk. It's their basic human right to be fed and it's the basic human right of their mothers to feed them. Hopefully if people keeping standing up there will never be qualification placed upon that act in the future. When a child needs to be fed it will be fed wherever that may be.

Collin wrote:

A proprietor has a right to decide nudity is not allowed in his establishment. A topless black person, a topless white person, a topless man or a topless woman... he can all tell them to either wear a shirt or leave.

Breastfeeding is not nudity.

Collin wrote:

A breast is a breast, and a naked breast is a naked breast regardless of its purpose.

I disagree. I thought we'd covered this with the penis a few posts back?

Collin wrote:

A proprietor cannot deny access to their establishment because they have a certain skin colour or are a certain gender, or have a certain disability. He cannot deny access to a mother with child (for all these cases, I'm sure there are exceptions of course). But he can say nudity is not allowed.

Sure he can say nudity is not allowed but again breast feeding is not nudity.

Collin wrote:

So, I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. .

Ok.

Collin wrote:

I would also disagree with naturists who protest in front of a restaurant because another nudist was kicked out.

But we're not talking about nudity, we're talking about breast feeding.

catefrances

Collin wrote:

I'm not a mother either But I am a child and I have a mother, and no one has sacrificied more for me and my brother than my mother. I've only recently discovered how much it was she exactly sacrificied for us... but I can tell you this, her love for us must be very very strong...

you attack my children, you attack me. my children are the only people i would die for.

facepollution

Jeanie wrote:

Why then were you embarrassed? If they're just another body part to you, why is discretion required?

Because at the age of 14 you probably don't have enough life experience to understand such a situation. It's not one which you would likely have experienced before, and the element of "uh what do I do? what is appropriate here? am I supposed to leave the room" or something along those lines kind of comes to mind.

Jeanie wrote:

So you're suggesting that as a child I have choices about where I live and that men exposing themselves at me is my fault because I need to find new places to hang out? That I, as a child, brought it upon myself simply by being there? I guess then you, being exposed to a female breast for the purposes of breastfeeding while you were a young man, must bear some responsibility for being where you were then?

What can I say, I'm sorry Jeanie if you were exposed to such situations, but you have to admit it's hardly the norm for men to do that sort of thing in front of young girls. I would hope you would have had a parent you could have told if you were having men constantly exposing themselves and doing those things in front of you, but perhaps you didn't.

Jeanie wrote:

Right point taken. I'm just wondering do you place the same expectation of discretion on those in the Sun as you do breast feeding mothers?

That doesn't really make sense, do I place a level of expectation of discretion on a picture of a woman topless in a newspaper, a picture which has already been taken? How can you expect a woman to show discretion in a picture which has already been taken?!

Jeanie

facepollution wrote:

Because at the age of 14 you probably don't have enough life experience to understand such a situation. It's not one which you would likely have experienced before, and the element of "uh what do I do? what is appropriate here? am I supposed to leave the room" or something along those lines kind of comes to mind.

Yeah, fair enough. I can understand that, but as you've gotten older and probably been exposed to more breast feeding situations you come to be more "comfortable" or perhaps tolerant or accepting of it yes?
Being a teenager is horrifically embarrassing so much of the time isn't it?
Perhaps I am really blase about women breast feeding now because I've been exposed to so much of it, I really don't bat an eyelid when it goes on around me anymore, it's just another part of life.

facepollution wrote:

What can I say, I'm sorry Jeanie if you were exposed to such situations, but you have to admit it's hardly the norm for men to do that sort of thing in front of young girls. I would hope you would have had a parent you could have told if you were having men constantly exposing themselves and doing those things in front of you, but perhaps you didn't.

Well it's not great and apparently it's not the norm, although I didn't know that at the time I guess. Just that I was mortified and more than a little scared. Timing wasn't great with the parents so years later I was able to tell them but not at the time. I only brought it up in the first place because I don't think, regardless of the exposure being not of the norm and highly innapropriate, it's not done any long term damage as far as I can see and now I guess I'm more than a little blase about nudity in general. I suppose to that end I don't really view breastfeeding as nudity, I see it more as a nurturing thing. Hence me not understanding the need to place "descretionary" guidelines on it. If that makes sense?

facepollution wrote:

That doesn't really make sense, do I place a level of expectation of discretion on a picture of a woman topless in a newspaper, a picture which has already been taken? How can you expect a woman to show discretion in a picture which has already been taken?!

Ok, what I'm saying is that many people in this thread seem to be saying that breast feeding in public is ok "as long as" and then there are whatever expectations people feel are necessary in order for them to feel that a women is behaving appropriately. So I see people saying we don't object to the exposure of the breast so much as long as certain requirements are met in order to appease our sensibilities. What I wonder is, if you open your newspaper and there's a girl on page three with her breasts fully exposed purely for entertainment purposes what kind of requirements do people feel they need of the paper or the women topless in the paper in order for their sensibilities to be appeased and if they don't, why not? It just seems that many people would just open the paper, take a look and then move on to the sports section or the horoscope and not give it any more thought, why then is it different when we're talking about breastfeeding?

Jeanie

catefrances wrote:

you attack my children, you attack me. my children are the only people i would die for.

Jeez cate! And I thought you loved me!

I'd die for you! OOH!! A TOOL moment!!

catefrances

Jeanie wrote:

Jeez cate! And I thought you loved me! ; )

I'd die for you! OOH!! A TOOL moment!!

i do love you, you know that, but come on girlie you know me better than anyone here, my children are it.

though yeah id die for adam jones.