Must read breastfeeding article from the New Yorker

Here is a link to a recent article from Jill Lepore, "Baby Food: If breast is best, why are women bottling their milk?" Lepore provides a great analysis of the curent value of mothering and mother's milk in a capitalist environment. Really interesting. My fave bits:

"More important, the name falls something short of capacious: only female mammals lactate; males, strictly speaking, are not mammals.

"By the turn of the century, the cow’s udder, or, more often, its head, had replaced the female human breast as the icon of milk.

"Year by year, bottles became less like breasts. The familial cylindrical bottle, called the Stork Nurser, dates from 1910 and is tied to the rise of the stork myth: milk comes from the milkman; babies come from storks.

"A brief history of food: when the rich eat white bread and buy formula, the poor eat brown bread and breast-feed; then they trade places.

"Non-bathroom lactation rooms are such a paltry substitute for maternity leave, you might think that the craze for pumps—especially pressing them on poor women while giving tax breaks to big businesses—would be met with skepticism in some quarters.

"It appears no longer within the realm of the imaginable that, instead of running water and a stack of magazines, “breastfeeding-friendly” could mean making it possible for women and their babies to be together. Some lactation rooms even make a point of banning infants and toddlers, lest mothers smuggle them in for a quick nip. At the University of Minnesota, staff with keys can pump their milk at the Expression Connection, but the sign on the door warns: “This room is not intended for mothers who need a space to nurse their babies.”"

Thanks to an online friend who posted this link at a forum I belong to.