A recent letter in response to mine (about breastfeeding and attitudes towards breastfeeding in Malaysia) had an intriguing statement but first, let me get the following off my chest.

While I agreed with the author on many grounds such as options for those breastfeeding in public and so forth, I couldn’t help but feel that she implied that breastfeeding attitudes were fine in Malaysia just because she hadn’t heard of any complaints on breastfeeding at the office or in public. Lucky her, honestly. Also, I think she misread my letter since I never mentioned anything about breastfeeding myself…only of my friends. Also, did I mention that breastfeeding meant exposing one’s breasts? Maybe I should have been clearer. O’well, can’t win them all.

Anyway, back to that intriguing statement. Here’s what she said that had me thinking for a while.

Even if “breastfeeding is a natural and good thing” I believe I speak for many breastfeeding mothers when I say that I wouldn’t be comfortable exposing my breast in public to breastfeed – even if no one stares at me. It is part of our Asian upbringing.

What is an “Asian upbringing”? Are we saying that only Asians are capable of being modest and that everyone else have no sense of modesty, shame or propriety? And for those of us who ARE Asians, does it mean that we are poor examples of our “upbringing” when we say things that it’s okay to breastfeed in public WITHOUT the need to hide? And I’m not referring to the whole “show your entire boob to everyone” but instead, I’m referring to that hint of skin…or even the fact that you have to sit in public, lift up your blouse, unzip your nursing bra and let your baby suckle from your breast WITHOUT a cloth covering all that or with your back facing people.

I think we all know that Asians don’t exactly hold the sole right to modesty and propriety. Assuming that, especially considering that her reply was directed to two women who were living outside of Malaysia (I could just be jumping to conclusions but…), is…well, so wrong and ignorant, to say the least.

Which, of course, brings me to my next thought tangent (which, I swear, is related to the above)…

A group, yes, a group of mostly non-Asian breastfeeding mums, was set up recently on Facebook to tackle the “issue” of one of the social network’s rules about pornography and such. Facebook recently started removing or forbidding pictures of babies at their mum’s breasts, suckling. Now, bear in mind that no nipple or areola was shown in these phones, just that breast “bump”, and yes, a baby. The question that came up after pages and pages of debate on this matter was this – “Can people be capable of separating the idea of breastfeeding from any sexual connotations of the breast?”

If breastfeeding is a commitment, if breastfeeding means a change of one’s role as a woman, then why is everyone else so hyped up over the possible sexualization of the breasts when the one doing the “dirty deed” is the woman’s child? Is breastfeeding just another one of those “chores” that we take on but not embrace? As a women and mothers, can we move beyond just seeing our breasts as a symbol of our womanhood and sexuality or does everything have to revolve around sex?

Or are we saying that who we are, what we do and all must conform to social rules and norms even though they can sometimes be outdated?

Now I’m not saying that all nursing women out there should get up, head out, take off their tops and expose their breasts in the name of breastfeeding. But more that if they do, they shouldn’t be judged as “immodest” or not “Asian”. And even these women have problems breastfeeding for whatever reasons, they shouldn’t have to feel that they are complaining without reason.