f-word and breastfeeding

[slemslempike]

Virtually every time I read an article on the f-word, think "my word, that's a pile of crap" and click through to comments, it turns out to have been written by Abby O'Reilly. Today's was no exception:

Why Facebook's photographic stance is actually perfectly reasonable and in no way anti-breastfeeding.

In particular, I was irritated by the ways she starts out by saying that she doesn't upload photographs of her own naked breasts that she's taken, which leads into the justification that therefore nursing mothers shouldn't upload pictures of their breasts. I hadn't actually been aware of the thing about facebook no-breastfeeding stance. FFS. I am also heartily sick of feminist writing taking a pretence at "reasonableness" and objectivity when actually it's just ill-thought through bullshit.

Comments

[metamorphosa.livejournal.com]

Meh. HOW can it be right to remove photos of breastfeeding when it's okay to have icons of women shoving their arse suggestively at the camera??

Okay, see, I know very little about feminism [1] ,and I think I understand what you mean about hiding under the words of 'reasonableness' and objectivity, but what I do know (and I think is different to that) is that discrimination of all kinds is wrong, and that often people are so incredibly blinded by their own deeply-held personal preferences/beliefs/choices about what is and isn't discriminatory that they end up projecting these onto others as 'right' or 'wrong', rather than stepping into other people's shoes and seeing whether they would be discriminatory from *the other's* perspective. I don't know enough about discrimination because I haven't encountered much of it personally nor people who have been subjected to it, and yes I have basic starting points which I'm aware don't really scrape the surface, but I do think people rely - quite rightly - on their subjective feelings as a result of personal discrimination but forget about observing how others may feel discriminated in a way that is different to them. That is why those people (and myself included) should not wave these flags unless what they are saying accounts for those differences.

If that makes no sense, or is offensive in some way, I am sorry because I didn't mean it to be.

[1]I know that is a ridiculously broad and possibly stupid statement but I don't like to claim I know anything about anything until I know enough of it to justify my claim, if that makes sense?

[slemslempike.livejournal.com]

I'm afraid I didn't quite understand what you meant there! Perhaps because I wasn't clear myself? I tend to object to people setting themselves up as "reasonable" in this way because feminists have frequently been attacked as inherently unreasonable and hysterical, no matter what their claims. Saying that you are being "reasonable" implies that the other people are being unreasonable, and has some sort of pretence to objectivity, when I don't believe that there is a non-subjective viewpoint. So I felt that this article had an undertone of "calm down, hysterical ladies, I am here to tell you what's what from my standpoint of unimpeachable objectivity", which I dislike.

[metamorphosa.livejournal.com]

Sorry. I thought that might be the case. Things make sense in my head, but very rarely make any sense at all when I write them down or try to voice them. For slight clarification, I do agree with what you said entirely, and was going off on a tangent of thoughts, rather than arguing your point. If I wasn't cold, tired, and stressed, I may have tried to say it another way, but as it is it'll probably sound even more confusing!

But I like hearing your take on the subject, and what other people comment, so I'll keep reading them. :)