When you were in high school, were you in one of those classes where you had to carry around a fake “baby”? An egg or other food item? You and your partner would dress it and take turns caring for it through band or basketball practices. It was to teach us the responsibility it takes to have children.
Because that sack of flour in a basket did a really convincing impression of a screaming infant. Maybe a bit more realistic would have been helpful.
A Melbourne high school canceled a live breastfeeding demo for a life cycles class. Sarah Simmonds, a volunteer from the Australian Breastfeeding Association’s community education program, was to breastfeed her 4-month-old son in front of the class at Hume Central Secondary College in Broadmeadows.
But when she arrived, she was surprised to discover that the teens in the class didn’t have parental permission, so they couldn’t watch the breastfeeding demo.
Because–you know–we wouldn’t want to expose our teens to the indecency of natural infant food, straight from tap.
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In a world where wardrobe malfunctions and the popularity of Brittney Spears are totally acceptable, somehow breastfeeding isn’t appropriate without parental permission.
Simmonds said,
Our message was it’s natural and you can do it anywhere – except here. It was such a mixed message for the kids. We were trying to convey that this is something that every mum should be able to do and every child should have the opportunity to be breastfed and that we shouldn’t have to think about where we are and whether it’s appropriate.
According to Babble Australia,
Principal Glenn Proctor said he had to be “sensitive” to all the nationalities at the school and he felt parental consent was necessary before children could watch a woman breastfeed her baby.
But…breastfeeding in public isn’t even illegal! And–get this—Ms. Simmonds was allowed to demonstrate how to bathe the infant. So apparently infant genitalia is appropriate for high schoolers, but a nursing mother is not.
Now the next question: what would the school have done if Simmons’ son got hungry during her visit? Find the appropriate bathroom, so no one would have to witness that atrocity?
Image: Daquella manera on Flickr under a Creative Commons License.
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I’m pretty darn conservative when it comes to issues of sexual morality, but this is absolutely ridiculous. A brief glimpse of the nipple as it’s going into the baby’s mouth is not obscene. As a mom, I’m a million times more concerned about the skimpy attire worn by many teen girls than of my child watching somebody breastfeed an infant.
I certainly think that this situation could have been handled much better and ended up sending the wrong message. However, I applaude the Teacher for bringing breastfeeding up for discussion and for attempting this demonstration.
I may be in the minority here but I actually agree with the school on this one. I’ve made this argument before and I doubt I’ll stop saying it- breasts are sexual objects AS WELL AS food sources. I’m betting most readers on this blog are women so we can’t say we know what it’s like to be a teenage boy. From my experience with them though, well, I doubt they’d be interested in the baby. Do I really want my teenage son oogling the breasts of a stranger at school? Probably not. Would I want him to see breastfeeding as part of a natural process? Certainly! That’s why it’s important that the parents talk about this with their children at home. Heck, as a high school girl I would have felt very uncomfortable in that situation. It’s not that breastfeeding is wrong. It’s just that a public school isn’t the place to have women opening their shirts to show how to do it.
I’m very pro-breastfeeding – wherever and whenever. I think that it might have been better to do a “mixed media” demonstration, though. Video of what is involved in breastfeeding, with Q&A with an actual mother who is experienced with breastfeeding (preferably well beyond a few months old – one of the big questions I get from people is “what about when they get teeth” especially with the WHO guidelines saying 2 years – I nursed my 1st to 2.5yrs and my 25mo is still nursing so I’m very comfortable discussing baby-has-teeth issues). You also can’t be sure that baby is going to be hungry/interested in nursing on cue when it’s demo time, so a video would have solved that issue as well as giving some of the emotional distance necessary with teenagers (my husband is a high school teacher, I’m a former teacher). I applaud the teacher for even bringing the issue up for discussion, but there may have been other ways to do so that would have provided more information as well as being received more efficiently. Let the kids get the “ew/wow boobs” stuff out of their system while watching a video, then discuss and question, etc.