Why Breastfeeding is a Feminist Issue
In our country, money speaks louder than the health of our children. The formula companies do all they can to undermine a woman's breastfeeding relationship with her child. From buying doctors' patient lists to sending extra formula samples to those women who join "baby clubs" and check the box marked "breastfeeding only" they attack every child's right to breastmilk. Marketing themselves as mothers' friends, they care little for the health and well-being of babies and mothers. Money may not be able to buy health and happiness, but companies that have enough of it are surely able to take it away.
If our culture truly understood the importance of sound nutrition and solid nurturing that a child gets only through breastfeeding, then many of the risk factors that children currently face would disappear. Imagine if breastfeeding were so valued by our culture that it was a priority to make sure that every baby got mother's milk. Imagine if every mother was valued for her unique role as a nurturer of children. Assertion of the importance of breastfeeding would mean healthier mothers since it would mean better prenatal care to minimize interventions during labor and delivery since such interventions may interfere in a nursing relationship. It would mean cultural expectation of support for new mothers monetarily (in the form of extended, paid maternity leave) and physically (in the form of similar leave to partners and other family members so that they could care for the mother as she cares for her baby). It would mean that mothers in poverty would not have to shell out huge amounts of money to feed their children or to secure medical treatment for formula-related illnesses. It would mean that a baby's cries would be taken seriously and frequent nursing (along with the holding, co-sleeping and baby-wearing that facilitates that) would be the norm lest the mother's milk supply be compromised. Without the pressures of trying to clean her house, get back to work or force her baby to sleep through the night a new mother would be free to simply fall in love with her baby. Lactation would be an honored state and so a mother would feel it to be in her best interest (as well as her child's) to nurse as long as possible. Having an intense relationship with a nursling would be respected and, perhaps, even become a status symbol.
We know that women deserve the same
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