Public Breast Feeding and Society

On July 27, 2006, Newsweek came out with an article directed at the topic of breast feeding. More specifically the August 2006 cover of babytalk Magazine. The cover showed a woman's exposed breast with a newborn baby feeding off it. Breast feeding in public has become a major issue in today's western society and this addressed it head on. The magazine baby talk has a reputation as a wholesome and clean parenting magazine, not known for pushing the envelope the way it did with this cover. So why were so many readers outraged over this natural feeding act?

Some say it showed an explicit sexual image and promoted such acts in public areas. The idea of sex was brought into a non-sex act. Why was it deemed sexual? "A breast is a breast — it's a sexual thing," said Gayle Ash, of Belton, Texas ("Eyeful" 2006). She shredded the magazine in an effort to censor it from her 13 year old son. "He didn't need to see that," she later went on to say in a phone interview. Our society is a very visual one and when we see an image associated with sex, even when it is not necessarily in a sexual environment, we trigger our minds to correlate it to that sex act. From a constructionalist viewpoint, where did this line get drawn that makes a mother breast feeding her infant "gross" and not acceptable in today's society? (Brown, 2006). This is exposing a possible moral panic that is occurring in our society.

Looking at the article and some of the reactions people have toward public breast feeding, one could say this issue needs to be addressed. Breast feeding fits right into the characteristics of a moral panic, but obviously on a much smaller scale then other major panics such as AIDS or same sex marriage. This threat is being recognized by the population, more recently from celebrities getting flack when their picture is taken during feeding (Brown, 2006). In the news lately is Katie Holmes's new born baby and her breast feeding it in public ("Eyeful" 2006). This is how the media is covering the issue. The mother doing the feeding is the villain and the people walking by viewing the act are the victims needing protection. This issue is becoming more and more divided as sides are being taken and lawmakers are beginning to take action.

No universal law has been passed, as it is different in every state, but the law is very much still up in the air as debate is ongoing. We are not yet at the fourth stage of the panic, that will develop after rules and laws become static. This is when the issue will blow over and society will subside (Brown, 2006).

We are the agents of social control, so if a society wants to, they have the ability to use the seven threats of social control to do it (Brown, 2006). This is what is happening to public breast feeders. Political sanctions, threat of ostracism, ridicule and gossip, persuasion of intimates, and internalization of norms are all being used