Topless Women

This is truely enlightening.

I can see where all of the points made are valid opinions,well almost all.Name-calling is never a good tool but when someone really feels something it is hard to retain composure.

I dont have a prob with women feeding their children whenever and where ever they see fit. I think breast milk is the best thing for most babies and a woman should give her child the best that she has to offer. Period. There is something about that babies presence that makes it a non-sexual thing for me.

I think that there is already enough sexual images and undertones thrown at the citizens of our country. This may be part of the reason that I view breasts like I do. Am I crazy about boobs because I was raised in America or am I just feeling my natural human male instinct. I really have no idea. I just know I like them.

There are so many more important issues that need to be addressed before we start in on this one.
Peace,
Johnny Appleweed

 

please find the study on the 900 societies..i'm not going to go off on a wild goose chase on something you *believe*.

As for the laws being discreet, no, its not law that they have to be. The laws are not meant to allow women to walk around topless with a baby attached to one breast. If you think thats what they intended, i think you're misguided and naive.

As i said, i'm not against breastfeeding in public. There are places for it, and there are places it shouldnt be. A restaurant isnt one..and dont look at it? i dont! i HEAR IT!. Take the kid to the bathroom and do it...or better yet, bring a bottle of milk to feed the kid. To breastfeed a kid in a nice restaurant is low class and tasteless, not to mention rude.

as for hands? hands are needed to function in society by yourself. Exposed breasts arent.

 

btw, read this carefully

My state is considering enacting breastfeeding legislation. Is all breastfeeding legislation good, or are there certain types that should be avoided?

Answer: Not all breastfeeding legislation is positive. Any legislation that restricts or takes away the right to breastfeed should not be supported, and if it has already been enacted, steps should be taken to amend the statute taking out the restriction. For instance, Georgia and Missouri enacted laws trying to support breastfeeding mothers in public, but put restrictions on it requiring the mother to be discreet. This comes from a misconception that if discretion is not required, that there will be problems with women exposing themselves. Yet, the purpose of legislation is to try to change these outdated views about breastfeeding, and encourage more women to make this healthy choice. Thus, such language has a chilling effect on mothers, and is not encouragement, and would authorize anyone who didn't think it was discreet enough to throw the mother out. This is why many of the states provided that a woman has a right to breastfeed even if there is exposure during or incidental to breastfeeding. Recognizing this, Georgia has submitted a bill that would delete this restrictive language.

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The only way female breasts are considered more sexual than a males is because of censorship. I think that they are the same, infact my nipples seem more sensitive than my girlfriends. THEY ARE NOT A SEXUAL ORGAN. You do not need them for sex, only to feed babys. If you cover something up and make it forbiden people will want to see it or do it. You reveal it and after awhile nobody cares anymore. The only reason topless females are viewed as obscene and wrong is because we made it that way. There is nothing wrong with it, and if the common perception was changed it would not be an issue, and would not harm anybody or anything. Men would not stare because it would be normal.

 

well she was close.. it's actually 190 societies. i doubt you can find this online anywhere, but here's the info in case you want to go to the library for it:

Ford CS, Beach FA. Patterns of sexual behavior, 1st ed. New York: Harper & Row, 1951.

and this is from
http://www.lib.umich.edu/taubman/res/eres/Walker/NU546/AveryMelissaD.pdf

In Ford and Beach’s cross-cultural survey (19), individuals from only 13 of 190 cultures reported that men relate women’s breasts to sexual attractiveness or involve any manipulation of female breasts as a precursor or accompaniment to sexual intercourse. According to Detwyller (17), sexual pleasure derived from breasts is a learned behavior. Art, advertising, film, television, the news media, and popular literature all influence the learning of sexual behaviors (13,14,17). In American culture, breasts are often equated with femininity and sexuality (14). Because breasts are associated with eroticism, breastfeeding, except in private, may be viewed as indecent and a mother may feel uncomfortable nursing in the presence of others (3). Social, cultural, and sexual values and trends create paradoxical situations that can place breastfeeding in a potentially controversial light and may influence a mother’s breastfeeding behavior (13).

anywho.

i say yay for boobs, let them be free!

 

Take the baby into the bathroom?!?! Would you like to go eat in a bathroom?

It is not tasteless or low class. It is how babies are supposed to be fed. NOT with a bottle. Ooh, let's all go hide to feed our children because some people are uncomfortable with it. Grow up.

 

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sounds like it is nakee time!!​

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anyhow i think toplessness is ok when it done tastefully, some girls take it to far and are like "look at my boobies i am a slut" not to offend anyone by saying slut or anything. I think its ok when you are just being comfy, natural etc.... but i woldnt do it just to get attention ya know??​

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so if it just to keep kool or give yur boobs a little free time i am all for it ​

 

There is nothing "low class" about breastfeeding in any restaurant. We are there to eat so why shouldn't a baby. Maybe next time you are offended by breast feeding while at a restaurant you could take your meal to the restroom to eat.

The sexual status of breasts has been created by society and society's views on the female body.

Everyone should lighten up and give our sisters the same freedom to be topless us guys have.

 

Sorry mate i was only replying to this

"I'm sick of these males running everything... "

as if there was a big male conspiracy were we all meet up and make plans to oppress women, when in the case made its the women doing the complaining. I did not mean to sound offensive.

 

I find there are only 2 kinds of women that breast feed in public:
#1 Hos
#2 Trailer home inhabitants

Everyone else seems to keep their boobies inside the tent!

 

Thank you, Nova, it is 190, I got the actual number a bit off. Still, 190 to 13 is enough to show it is a conditioning thing and not an innate desire. (Well the desire for the human breast is normal......in infants and small children. If you live in a society where the breast has healthy positive connotations and is connected with feeding you won't have a sexual desire for it as an adult. No more than any other non sexual body part, anyway.

You won't find the actual study on the net, at least not where I can find, Any medical library or Stuart-Macadam and Dettwyler's book will have it.

There is plenty of info that is not on the 'net, Meg. The Ford and Beach study is one of them.

Would YOU eat your lunch where people poo and pee? I sure wouldn't want to. Neither do babies, and I am not going to even go into all the problems with "just put it into a bottle" My children NEVER had bottles (except my first one, who got such severe Nipple Confusion from the bottle nipple and radically different type of sucking that, if I hadn't been so determined, would have caused a premature weaning) MOST totally breastfeeding mothers have good reasons not to "put it in a bottle." just to make some people with hang ups feel "more comfortable" in public places. I see things in public which offend me every day (Coca cola or blue Kool Aid in a bottle is one of them) but I have no right to ask those people to stop or go elsewhere because it is outside my "comfy factor." It ain't my business, so I have no right to ask them to stop. ("Hey would you mind taking that kid with the snotty nose and you have neglected to wipe for the last hour and the shitty diaper you haven't changed and the blue Kool Aid in the bottle into the bathroom, because it is offending me." Not really my place, or my business, but IMO, a worse offense than breastfeeding in a resturant.) Meg, how many kids do YOU have?

Nursing an infant is not something to be done where people eliminate. You don't like it, look away.

I like your perspective 'appleweed. You have a healthy outlook about the female breast. IMEO your desire for breasts is because you have been conditioned for them to be sexual. It isn't your fault, most people who live in USA or Western Europe have similar conditioning. Most of the rest of the world does not. <Shrug>, you didn't really have a hand in your own conditioning.

 

Do you have a reference for this?

Hmm, I've never lived in a trailer (can you really tell what someone is like by where they live? I don't think so.) I am certainly not a "ho." I've breastfed 4 kids well into toddlerhood, and if they wanted to nurse while we were out, they did. And we know for a fact that the higher a womyn's educational level, and income bracket, the MORE likely she is to breastfeed, and breastfeed exclusively. When one breastfeeds exclusively, one does not take bottles to public places to avoid the "shame." One has the brains, the knowlege and the confidence to simply feed the baby the way babies are supposed to be fed. Womyn in these brackets also have less inhibitions about offending people who might "take offense."

I have worked with about 10,000 breastfeeding womyn, and I have, to my knowlege never worked with a prostitute,(a "ho?") and most of my clients breastfeed in public, so I don't know where all these breastfeeding prostitutes are.

 

as if there was a big male conspiracy were we all meet up and make plans to oppress women, when in the case made its the women doing the complaining. I did not mean to sound offensive .............. said Graham

It's not a conspiracy, males do run the world and women are oppressed... do know that they are not paid fairly? Again check out Jean Kilbourne and you will see all the abuse that goes on with women
Hey guys would you like it if tomorrow the law was no guys could wear shirts?

How silly and just immature for any guy to put down breast feeding. This really shows no intelligence, just imaturity. This is one of the beauties of human nature. I'm not sure if this should be argued anymore when these boys are just making a mockery of themselves and the females intelligent responses.
And for the record, I do not think all guys are like this and many guys that are oppressing women do not even realize it and I do feel like many women do not realize it because they have been raised to be weak and fragile creatures.
http://www.mediaed.org/videos/MediaGenderAndDiversity/KillingUsSoftly3

I know u can't see the whole thing of Jean Kilbournes film and I'm pretty sure you can't rent it at blockbuster, but just go there and see some of the clips that she has available. You'll have a whole new understanding of the shit women go through. Yes some, MANY women allow themselves to be victims of such unequality, but this may also be because they do not realize they're oppression. They use their bodies to get what they want. But how many women are on diets and how many men are on diets? If you plan on debating the comment of males not runnign the world and treating women unfairly please view those short video clips first.

peace

 

Didn't know my OPINION would be such a hot spot. It's only my opinion and life's observation. Good girls don't breast feed in public.

 

As right as you are that it is merely your OPINION, don't make generalizations. Good mothers breastfeed when their babies are hungry. Why should they feel ashamed and shunned? What is so dirty about feeding a child? Babies are SUPPOSED to be breastfed. Why else do women lactate? And, in case you didn't know, hungry babies really don't want to wait until their mother is in hiding and seclusion to feed them.
And besides, it's not like BF mothers are taking their shirts off and shaking their breasts around. It is not obscene, rude, low class, etc. It is nature. It is normal. It is healthy.

 

thank you supernova for posting that study...interesting..though not shocking when considering places like africa or parts of asia.

Anyhow, its a personal peeve i have against women breastfeeding in restaurants than a personal crusade to change it....though i still dont find it acceptable in a nice restaurant to do that...but to each their own i guess.


As for how many kids i have? none....i've grown up in an extended(i think thats the term) household though with lots of kids.

And yes i agree...there are many nasty things involving kids, like leaving a kid in a dirty diaper.

 

I must go off topic on this post - Maria, why is it that you feel that women are so opressed? There are women senators, governors and dentist... They can vote, and win anything a man can win, and recieve aid for any college a man can attend... they can where a shirt like a man can wear, but your getting all mad because you want your chest bare. Im sorry lady but we dont care. We dont want to see a mans chest covered in hair, but he doesnt have boobies and that makes it okay, why dont you complain about my shovinist way. Maria I have a pair of testicles below my dick. If you can show ur boobies then I can let them stick... out from my pants because they are just so uncumfy, why dont you smoke on a blunt see, chill the hell out and quit trying to powt, because we know thtas what yoru all about

-peace

 

I being a female, feel that no one should bare their breasts in public. Male or female. I think its gross when a man walks down the street without a shirt on. I don't want to see that. There is a time and a place for that and in a public place is not one of them. If you want to bare it, go to the beach or lounge in your back yard. and as for breast feeding in public, I think its fine whatever. A baby needs too eat as much as everyone else does. But being me, when I have kids, I'll cover it up with a blanket when I'm in a resturant, because I know there are still people out there that find it unappetising especually while your eating.
Now if you want to bitch me out about how opressed I am and how I've been brainwashed by man to believe in this, then go right ahead, but I know it's just more about respect for me and baring my breast in public is not respectable, it's rude and inconsiderate. Just like when men do it.

 

Ihave no problem with relatively discrete breastfeeding on public, i.e. no need to take everything off. And there are of course other sorts of nudity like naturist areas, old paintings etc. Nudity is currently very disturbing to people but I think we need to get over it.

 

Here on an island off the west coast of Canada we have a clothing optional beach. Its sweeeeeeet. Theres breasts penises vaginas and bums hangin out all over the place. No one thinks a thing of it either. I'm nursing sunburned breasts right now tho. ouch! its just a body we all got it. Personally I'd rather see a pair of breats right out there in the open than squeezed together with some tacky push up bra. Hangin out naked helps people get over there hang ups about bodies. We've pretty much all got the same bits theyre just different sizes.