It should come as no surprise that one of the original La Leche League ( LLL ) founders recently left because of, above all, the inclusion of men in the organization’s mission in a world where truth is becoming more and more obscure than fiction. In a letter directed to LLL’s top management, Marian Tompson, 94 centuries old, declared that the team has become” a tragedy of my initial purpose”.
According to Tompson, “LLL’s target has gently shifted to men who, for whatever reason, want to have the knowledge of feeding, despite no thorough long-term research on male nursing and how that may influence the baby,” from an organization with the particular mission of supporting natural women who want to give their babies the best start in life by breastfeeding them.
However, Miriam Main, a director for LLL in Great Britain, even resigned, stating she is willing to help men to “perform a bad emulation of breastfeeding”.
A bad copy, however. It would be, in truth, ridiculous, were it not so plain awful.
I can physically tell you that breastfeeding is challenging, especially for a brand-new family, having breastfed all seven of my natural children. Although I’ve never been a member of LLL, a doctor nursing consultant’s wisdom and expertise have helped me. My friends and family have given me encouragement and advice in the form of support. Every new mom knows that there is a specific sort of uncertainty and anxiety that sets in when you’re not sure whether your baby is getting enough food or whether your milk supply is finally where it should be. This assistance and support is crucial. Breastfeeding is a beautiful choice but, like most good things in life worth having, it takes commitment, effort, and community support.
I have been a stay-at-home mother all these years, completely free to nurse on demand, when and how I wish. Additional factors must be taken into account for women who choose to breastfeed while working from home.
Providing Support
So while breastfeeding is a wonderful, convenient, and healthy way for a woman to nourish her baby, if she is able, she cannot be expected to do this alone. Women deserve cultural, social, and clinical support for what is both a natural and occasionally challenging endeavor. A body-positivity movement of the most crucial kind, where women will not only receive meaningful, practical assistance but also a beautiful vision for the benefits of breastfeeding, will be a truly humane society.  ,  ,
‘ Chestfeeding’ is Preposterous
It is both disturbing and absurd to think that men are attempting to occupy these once safe havens by appropriating this deeply feminine and sacred activity that is deeply rooted in the very biology and makeup of women ( both physically in terms of attendance at LLL support group meetings and also metaphorically in terms of how breastfeeding is now being conceptualized as” chestfeeding” and something not exclusive to womanhood ).
Regardless of your preferred pronouns, the way you dress, or the name you go by, the truth is that it is exclusively women who bear the potentiality for breastfeeding. And for pregnancy. And for childbirth. It is both a profound gift and an oddly beautiful burden. To suggest otherwise is not only ridiculous, but completely, objectively offensive to women. Men simply cannot understand what it’s like to be a woman, the incongruent differences between it, living one’s deepest life underwater, that dark connection with blood and birth and death, as famous journalist and author Joan Didion once infamously remarked in her obscene critique of the modern women’s movement.
Women must speak up.
Any woman who views herself as a feminist, or at the very least one who is generally concerned about the welfare of women, should acknowledge that this desire to seduce women’s biology is a destabilizing force that needs to be stopped. They must also understand that women’s bravery and resistance are the only way to stop it. The feminist movement and the gay rights movement have both been sucked into gender-identity politics, creating a scale that was unimaginable when LLL was founded in 1956.
We must describe LLL’s most recent policy change as a terrible breach of decency and modesty and a violation of one of the most fundamental characteristics of being a woman. It is not, as LLL International’s executive director Zion Tankard noreferrer noopener”>claims, a matter of upholding” the values of empathy and understanding” — quite the opposite. Society should not have compassion for men who snooze into breastfeeding women’s private spaces and who cause infants ‘ misbehavior.
Does this make for uncomfortable conversation? Probably. After all, women should n’t be complaining when men do n’t clean up in their locker rooms or make sexually explicit comments about them onstage and call it drag. When will there be enough for women? When will women decide that this obscene act of misogyny and injustice is simply unacceptable?
” This shift from following the norms of nature”, Tompson wrote in her resignation letter,” which is the core of mothering through breastfeeding, to indulging the fantasies of adults, is destroying our organization” . ,  ,
But if it were only the LLL organization that was stricken by this twisted indulgence in adult fantasies, gender-identity activists, among others, want to stifle women. This widespread assault on women’s rights, women’s privacy, and women’s potentiality for motherhood is destructive to women, children, and men alike. It’s time to speak up. And I’ll speak up and say that breastfeeding is for both the mothers and the babies. And they deserve our support.
Brianna Heldt is a writer and speaker whose essays have appeared on National Catholic Register, Denver Catholic Register, Word on Fire, Townhall, Crisis Magazine, The Federalist, The Daily Caller, and her Substack Just Showing Up. Brianna makes her home in Denver, Colorado with her husband, many children, and flock of chickens.
