New Frontiers in Microaggression: It's Unethical to Call Breastfeeding Your Infant "Natural" Because It Reinforces the Cultural Stereotype That Only Women Have Breasts or Whatever

The lunatics aren't running the asylum -- yet -- but they do have control of its newsletter.

They don't say it reinforces the belief that only women have breasts -- I kinda made that up.

But I'm pretty sure they were thinking that, too.

It's "ethically inappropriate" for government and medical organizations to describe breastfeeding as "natural" because the term enforces rigid notions about gender roles, claims a new study in Pediatrics.

"Coupling nature with motherhood… can inadvertently support biologically deterministic arguments about the roles of men and women in the family (for example, that women should be the primary caretaker," the study says.

I'm pretty sure basic biology says she'll be the primary food-giver for infants. Even if a guy gives the baby a bottle, that bottle has to be filled by mom. (Well, yeah, you can use formula, but I'm told that is a less-preferable options.)

Are we now disputing that breastfeeding is pretty much only a real woman-only thing? A Swedish man (of course!) tried to disprove that bit of Culturally Socialized baggage and discovered it's not culturally socialized -- turns out, it's unalterable physical reality.

Let's read more. We should all love #Science.

The study notes that in recent years, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the World Health Organization, and several state departments of health have all promoted breastfeeding over bottle-feeding, using the term "natural."

"Referencing the 'natural' in breastfeeding promotion... may inadvertently endorse a set of values about family life and gender roles, which would be ethically inappropriate," the study says.

Meanwhile, Bill Nye the "#Science" Guy seems to want to talk about all sorts of sex in his #ShowForChildren, but somehow completely skips over the #Science part of sex that has to do with reproduction and propagation of the species.

Odd, that. It's like he only sees sex for non-procreative purposes.

Wait, that's wrong, in the season finale, he does see a link between sex and procreation and addresses that at length -- specifically, to propose "penalties" on people in "developed" countries who have children.

There's a book I've mentioned before, called Flicker. Good book. Thriller with weird premise about a weird but innovative (and largely forgotten) German filmmaker from the 1930s who is a passionate interest of some late 1960s California film buffs. They discover subliminal movies within his movies, and --

I don't want to spoil it.

How do I hint at this without giving away the reveal? Let's say there are some people for whom human existence seems such a damnable thing that they have constructed a political and religious ideology about fixing all that.

posted by Ace at 08:32 PM

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