Lactivism - The advocacy of breastfeeding.
Activists who educate the public about the issues surrounding breastfeeding and support the women who choose to breastfeed. They fight to implement legislation that would protect and promote breastfeeding around the world.
https://www.facebook.com/lactivistlilly/
I don't know how or when did ''lactivist'' exactly became a dirty, vile word. I can't tell when exactly did people, both activist and professionals, that advocate on behalf of breastfeeding women and for breastfeeding became the enemy. I know that the huge amount of misunderstanding of the movement in general, saddens me deeply, probably because I spent a fair amount of my time as a mother on the ''dirty'' side.
If I wanted to dismantle the number of lies and misinformation surrounding lactivism I could open a Steemit account doing just that and I would have something to write about every single day. But then I would be accused of being a part of the ''Big breastfeeding industry'', a mythical place as real as Narnia and Hogwarts. I take it back, I actually belive that Narnia and Hogwarts really egsist.
I know there are some genuinly problematic lactivists. Ones that are in it for the money (tho they chose the wrong industry. If somebody wants to make a living of breastfeeding exploitation they should go work for Avent.) Ones that have no empathy towards the women who got let down by the medical professionals and the society. Women who got no support and help to reach the breastfeeding goals they set for themselves. I saw the good, the bad and the ugly in breastfeeding advocacy but absolutely nothing lactivist do can compare to the malicious practices that are a common sails practice of formula production companies. Bad lactivist make women cry. Formula companies kill babies for profit.
Now, I have to write a huge disclaimer: Formula as a product is not bad, it is a good thing, vital even, for some babies and families. It definitely has it's place in medicine, in practical life and even in breastfeeding aid. A woman should never, ever be shamed for her choices of what she does with her body or the feeding choices that she makes for her kids. Anyone who has a friggin clue about any issue related to infant feeding practices knows that but fear mongering, guilt trips and white tears are often more interesting and definitely more profitable than actual lives.
I would like, with all my heart, that such a disclaimer was not needed but, the more I know of the subject the less faith I have that the well-being of women, children and families will ever come before profit. I will make sure to post on that subject as well because, personally, I find it very important.
Breastfeeding, in general, is a much more complex issue than a mere feeding choice, as we, and by we, I think about us privileged white women in the west, like to portray it. The disparity between on how much we on the west, where we have clean water, money to spend on formula, money to spend on lactation support, fairly good and available medical care and means to access information, whine about breastfeeding advocates and their work.
To understand the importance of breastfeeding advocacy one would have to first see the problem and that is, in the third world countries, babies literally dying from not breastfeeding due to malicious formula marketing practices, and number two is ridiculously low breastfeeding rates in the ''developed'' west. The number of women who actually meet their breastfeeding goals is disappointing and indicates how even with all that we have we still need lactivism, no matter how we hate it.
Many opposing breastfeeding advocacy, of which the recently most famously Courtney Jung and her book ''Lactivism: How Feminists and Fundamentalists, Hippies and Yuppies, and Physicians and Politicians Made Breastfeeding Big Business and Bad Policy'', can't seem to see beyond the usual ''mommy wars'' narrative: Fed is best. And never the less they keep on perpetuating it totally disregarding the real problems with the lack of breastfeeding support and those problems are definitely not white woman tears.
I was boobs deep in breastfeeding advocacy for the last six years. Those pictures up here are of me in my lactivist T-shirts. It started one sleepless night with my firstborn, she was about a month old and, due to my minor surgery, she couldn't be breastfed that day and had bad cramps after formula, so she kept waking up crying throughout the night. I was up and surfing on line so I wouldn't fall asleep. One link led to another and I got dragged in. Later, through my years spent in a parents association, researching, volunteering, education on feminist issues and even in a peer to peer lactation support training (which I gave up on eventually) I got a lot of different perspectives and the complexity of the issue and the influence it has on the society as a whole while being totally diminished and disregarded by the same society is mindblowing and heartbreaking at the same time. And it took a toll on me. I backed out of breastfeeding advocacy completely as I stopped breastfeeding my third in February of this year. The issue keeps being a passion of mine and maybe one day I'll come back from social media rants to actually be the change I wish to see in the world.
For more on why breastfeeding advocacy matters and a good reply to lactivism criticism read here:
By Melissa Bartick, M.D.: http://www.wbur.org/commonhealth/2015/12/25/breastfeeding-backlash
By Tracy Cassels, P.h.D.: http://evolutionaryparenting.com/i-am-a-lactivist/