Might just be your personal issues, cuz it never bothered me at all when friends or relatives did it in front of me.

 

mitchelltc1, as far as glancing around normally, there's nothing wrong with that. A woman breastfeeding knows people look at things in general and any glance in her direction will only be taken as a glance in her direction. If you look, see her feeding her child, just smile or nod your head at her and go about your business, lol.

As far as your girlfriend's sister, why don't you just tell her you feel awkward around her when she's breastfeeding... not that you want her to not do it while you're around but that this is what is going on with you and you're working on it. You might actually have been looking a bit odd being nervous and not making eye contact with her, lol.

Even though this is a you problem, it's been implanted there by society. Formula and bottle feeding was so forced and such the norm for so many decades that this is the end result. You are one of quite a few people who feel this way. Hopefully with all the research about formula feeding and with better breastfeeding education, this norm will die out.

 

I think only now is the socially acceptable time ever to do this in public, in states like ours. Red backward states down south, still have a ways to go.
Because of our society's modesty since, america was founded, i think 10-20-30+ years ago breast feeding would have been a much bigger no-no than now.

 

Maybe not... you would think the hippie community would be more open about that... and it is, well, natural.

to the comments above, I feel better already. It's just that my girlfriend's sister is very attractive too, so I don't want to accidentally eye up her titty... Oh my, the things you reveal to strangers on SL.

 

"eye up her titty" has got to be one of the better lines I've heard in a while.

 

I believe it was the 50s when the bottle feeding/formula craze began, like overnight. I can only assume women before then weren't shunned away if they needed to feed a child... but then again, women were pretty regularly shunned from a lot of stuff back then I think.

LOL... mitchelltc1.

 

Sounds like you've done a lot of research!

 

mitchelltc1 – So how do you talk to her when she isn’t breastfeeding?.... If she is comfortable enough to be in the same room while she’s breastfeeding, then she probably won’t have a problem with you speaking to her normally.

 

Lol, I understand your point, and am sure she is comfortable around me...probably cause I don't try to "eye up her titty"...ha. So how do I talk to her when she isn't breast feeding? I don't get it...I talk to her like every other shirted woman.

Ok, so I suppose I see the point of all this... It's like do you feel awkward around someone with a handicap... or does your awkwardness make it more awkward for them, when they've probably accepted it and can talk freely about it.

Well, through the peculiarity of this somewhat interesting thread, I think I've changed my mind(or have learned to understand) breast feeding in public, and have come to accept it... I'll just have to keep my eyes up like any decent guy should...

 

I guess your handicap analogy is okay... except there's nothing out of the ordinary going on. Mother's feed children.

If she feels she needs more privacy, she would go into another room. She's comfortable feeding her kid around you, it's okay to look at her while she's doing it (unless you're all up in her face, moving her blouse).

 

i'm all for it!!!

 

Please not while driving! It's bad enough she's putting on lipstock and eyeliner while texting at 75MPH, don't let her breastfeed, too.

And as to the bottle baby really taking over in the early '50s, that's pretty much true (though more the late '40s when the mass of soldiers came back from WWII and all the women, who before the war had pretty much been home in the kitchen raising kids got pregnant all at once (baby boom).

Those women who were working in offices and factories while their men were away didn't want to go back to being barefoot and pregnant stay-at-homes.

By the late '40s and early '50s those women were all having babies and dragging them around to public places and the new, more "modern and scientific" baby bottle became not just common and convenient, but preferred over the old natural "animal" ways.

It has taken a long time to get back to the better, more natural ways again here in the land of the puritans.

Should women breast feed babies is really the first question. The answer is yes.

The second question is should they be restricted as to where they can do that? Only to the extent that they should not do it at any place or time that it would be hazardous.

(Not while driving, not in some filthy public bathroom, not where it would overly distract the males around her from keeping their primitive minds on their tasks, but never should they be stopped because of Mrs Grundy's frail sensibilities just not thinking it's proper.)

The heck with Mrs. Grundy and all her ilk! Check with ANY baby - they know what a breast is for, and they know just how to use one. It's only the adults who get faint at the sight of a bare breast, little kids understand them instinctively...



Tom

 

That kid knows what a titty is for.......LOL.
the creator put teats on women for a purpose. I have absolutely no problems with breast feeding... in public or otherwise..
Those who do have a problem with it should just either GROW UP or go back to your simpleton cave and STAY THERE! while you suck your thumb....or what ever trips your trigger.

 

Wouldn't bother me but i was never a titty baby,lol.

 

Tomas, good post. And I always love seeing that picture. How friggin' cute is that?

Tomas and Saddlesore, it's good to hear you're both pro-BF'ing.

 

I have absolutely no problem with breastfeedin in public. I really don't see what the big deal is anyway and personally I think America as a whole are becoming a bunch of wimps. These groups whine about how offensive breastfeeding is or showing nudity on T.V. is "corrupting" our society. Europeans are totally open to this which is the way it should be because this is totally natural. What really ticks me off is how its acceptable to show man a$$ on T.V. yet a woman feeding her baby in a public place is "morally wrong".Give me a break.

 

Slightly off-topic, but generally in the same vein: Our society's definition of obscenity as out of whack.

Are we so perverted in our sensibilities that the mere sight of a female breast is enough to set us all atwitter? (Remember Attorney General Ashcroft and how upset he got that the sculpture of the lady Justice had a bare breast, that he had some hideously expensive drapes made to cover her decently?)

Our censors, the 'determiners of value' for our society feel that a glimpse of the human body (CLUE: We all have one.) is so obscene that TV networks are fined major dollars for the accidental split second flash of Janet Jacksons breast, but think nothing of shows on that same network showing mass killings in 'extra-gore-slow-motion'?

Don't get me started on that. You really don't want to. We're warped.

(If it is the overly religious who believe the body is obscene - and it usually is - why don't they instead think that since it is 'made in God's image' and 'is a temple to Him' we should be proud of it, rather than think it is horrible? Nevermind.)

Meh, time for me to shut up again.

Tom

 

I lived in the Dominican Republic for 2 years and this is normal there. Women just whip it out and go to town wherever. They also breast feed their children a lot longer than women in the U.S. do. I've seen a 5 year old kid walk up to his mom and say, "Mami... leche." He then proceeded to pull down his mom's shirt and then grabbed what he was looking for. I see no problem with whipping it out in public, but I do have a problem with 5 year-olds sucking on their mom's goods.

 

Hmm, never seen it in public personally, but hey, if the baby is hungry, wat can ya do. I guess i would be ok with it.

 

Many people find it odd for a woman to breastfeed past 1-2 year old.

I haven't too much of a problem with extended breastfeeding. It's not for me though.