Woman Kicked off Plane for Breast-Feeding Her Baby

Or: The Uptight Morons Always Get Their Way

http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2006Nov14/0,4670,BreastFeedingPassenger,00.html
from JoeUser Forums
Emily Gillette, 27, of Santa Fe, N.M., filed the complaint with the Vermont Human Rights Commission late last week against Delta Air Lines and Freedom Airlines, said her attorney, Elizabeth Boepple. Freedom was operating the Delta flight between Burlington and New York City.

Gillette said she was discreetly breast-feeding her 22-month-old daughter on Oct. 13 as their flight prepared to leave Burlington International Airport. She said she was seated by the window in the next-to-last row, her husband was seated between her and the aisle and no part of her breast was showing.

A flight attendant tried to hand her a blanket and told her to cover up, Gillette said. She declined, telling the flight attendant she had a legal right to breast-feed her baby.

Moments later, a Delta ticket agent approached and said the flight attendant had asked that the family be removed from the flight, Gillette said. She said she didn't want to make a scene and complied.

"A breast-feeding mother is perfectly acceptable on an aircraft, providing she is feeding the child in a discreet way,"that doesn't bother others, said Paul Skellon, spokesman for Phoenix-based Freedom
In a discreet way that doesn't bother others? What others, uptight religious assholes? I am so sick of the immature attitude about the human body in this country. It wasn't even a sexual thing.
13,975 views 38 replies
Reply #1 from JoeUser Forums Top
We are forced to accomodate all the others out there when they flout their morals in our faces, why not the prudish?  I dont think it was unreasonable to ask her to be discrete.  if it was an imposition, that would have been one thing.  But a blanket is an imposition?
Reply #2 from JoeUser Forums Top
We are forced to accomodate all the others out there when they flout their morals in our faces, why not the prudish?


Because prudishness is immature. This is the 21st century, not the 19th. As I said, she wasn't displaying her breast for sexual reasons. If someone can't handle the sight of a breast when a baby is feeding, they're the ones with a problem. From what the report says here:


"She said she was seated by the window in the next-to-last row, her husband was seated between her and the aisle and no part of her breast was showing."

I think that was enough discretion.
Star Control: Origins
Reply #3 from JoeUser Forums Top

Because prudishness is immature.

My mother would disagree with you, as would my grandmother.  Respecting someone's sensibilities is what the 21st century is all about.  Are you saying that it is only ok to respect some sensibilities and not others?  And then who decides which to respect.

BTW:  I dont know how many flights you have been on, but the bathrooms are in the back and you get a full frontal walking down the aisle.

Reply #4 from JoeUser Forums Top
Respecting someone's sensibilities is what the 21st century is all about.


In other words, political correctness. Unfortunantely, a lot of people are de-evolving.

Are you saying that it is only ok to respect some sensibilities and not others? And then who decides which to respect.


They have the right to their opinion, but if their opinion is outdated, it shouldn't count for shit.
Reply #5 from JoeUser Forums Top
I think I met that woman when I lived in Santa Fe . . . I could almost swear that I did! I even think I have a picture of her somewhere . . .

And if it is who I think it is . . . the flight attendant was just jealous.

Oh, and by the way, I love the fact that you include this:

Copyright 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.


Reply #6 from JoeUser Forums Top
And if it is who I think it is . . . the flight attendant was just jealous.


Have you seen the attendant?  

Oh, and by the way, I love the fact that you include this:


Some people here get upset if you don't give credit where credit is due.
Reply #7 from JoeUser Forums Top
They have the right to their opinion, but if their opinion is outdated, it shouldn't count for shit.


At least you are consistent. And very non-PC!
Reply #8 from JoeUser Forums Top
At least you are consistent. And very non-PC!


Thanks. I think "outdated" might have been a bad choice of words. Maybe "prudish" is better.
Reply #9 from JoeUser Forums Top
I defend a woman's right to breastfeed in public, but there is NO excuse to display any part of the breast while doing so. I know women who breastfeed in church, in the chapel, and you would have to be looking awful close to even realize she's doing it.

But more to the point. This woman was apparently being discreet. If so, then she has a very strong case against Delta Airlines, and I hope she sues the shirt off their backs!

And don't go throwing that "religion" crap around, it's as tiresome as the whole "should she or shouldn't she" question about discreet breastfeeding.
Reply #10 from JoeUser Forums Top
And don't go throwing that "religion" crap around, it's as tiresome as the whole "should she or shouldn't she" question about discreet breastfeeding.


You're saying there are prudes who don't base their opinions on religion?
Reply #11 from JoeUser Forums Top

Iconoclast -

In keeping with the IP desires of the Associated Press (which you included in the post at the bottom).  Please condense the article to a synopsis and provide a link to the full one.  It explicitly states that the article may not be redistributed, which you have done here in your post.

Reply #12 from JoeUser Forums Top
I think a woman in her twenties should be able to flop her breasts out anywhere(preferably in my vicinity )....but, that's just me.

~Zoo
Reply #13 from JoeUser Forums Top
Done, Zoomba.
Reply #14 from JoeUser Forums Top
I think a woman in her twenties should be able to flop her breasts out anywhere(preferably in my vicinity )....but, that's just me.


Not only you.
Reply #15 from JoeUser Forums Top
This is about as stupid as the 10 year-old kid that got suspended from school, because he asked his teacher for a hug. Link

It's falling apart at a pretty good rate these days.
Reply #16 from JoeUser Forums Top
Iconoclast:
You're saying there are prudes who don't base their opinions on religion?


If there were a religious connection stated in the story, I'd have just let it go... but there wasn't. It was simply you interjecting your own distain for religious people where it didn't belong.

Sure, I know a lot of religious people who have a problem with women diplaying their breasts in public, I also know a lot of atheists and agnostics who do to. So what does religion (or lack of) have to do with any of it?
Reply #17 from JoeUser Forums Top
Sure, I know a lot of religious people who have a problem with women diplaying their breasts in public, I also know a lot of atheists and agnostics who do to. So what does religion (or lack of) have to do with any of it?


On what do the atheists and agnostics base their disapproval?


Reply #18 from JoeUser Forums Top
On what do the atheists and agnostics base their disapproval?


You seem to be implying here that atheists and agnostics do not have any sort of moral standards or social sensibilities. I would have to disagree as they obviously do.

Why does everything have to be about religion? Looking for every opportunity to knock religion, even if the topic has nothing to do with it, is just as absurd and obsessive as those people who seek every opportunity to interject religion even when the topic has nothing to do with it. Two sides of the same zealot coin.

As to the actual topic, I have to wonder if the lady was really being all that discreet. If she had been she wouldn't likely have attracted the attention of the flight attendant. Either way, a woman does have the right to breastfeed her child. But she should try to respect the feelings of others at the same time. While it wouldn't bother me at all, some people would feel uncomfortable with it for whatever reason.

This may well be one of those cases where both sides were at least partly in the wrong.
Reply #19 from JoeUser Forums Top
I am a religious person, and my wife breastfed on a plane. Worked out well, kept the baby from screaming. I bet she was being completely discreet. But that's beside the point. She has the legal right to breastfeed her baby. If the stewardess has a problem with that, she can go eat her lunch with a blanket over her head. And Delta and Freedom and the stewardess should have to pay out the butt to make up for taking away her right... but more importantly, for the interruption of a toddler's meal!
Reply #20 from JoeUser Forums Top
Reply #19
I am a religious person, and my wife breastfed on a plane. Worked out well, kept the baby from screaming. I bet she was being completely discreet.


See, that's exactly what makes me wonder about "the rest of the story". Women breastfeed infants on planes all of the time. I suspect that there is more to this than the face value of the news article.
Reply #21 from JoeUser Forums Top
Flight attendants give people hard times all the time. One gave my wife a hard time because she wanted her car seat backwards in the seat. Is there a reason it should be the other way? I doubt it. So she made one up...
Reply #22 from JoeUser Forums Top
People need to relax about the breast feeding issue. If you're religous then I would think you approve of woman feeding their baby the way God intended. God didn't make bottles and formula. He did make breast milk and it is the perfect food for your baby. I agree that breast feeding mothers should use discretion and I honestly have never seen a breast feeding mother who didn't. It's not a show, it's about feeding your baby.
Reply #23 from JoeUser Forums Top
I breast fed my kids on planes lots of times.

I used a great baby blanket with a latch for just this purpose, and everyone was comfortable.

There are so many variables here. Was any skin showing? What kind of tone did the stewardess use? I know from traveling and chatting with stewardesses that some of them DREAD babies (because you never know when one will scream the whole flight). So maybe seeing the kid put her in a bad mood so she was snotty with the mom. And the mom told her to well, you know.

Who knows.
Reply #24 from JoeUser Forums Top
You seem to be implying here that atheists and agnostics do not have any sort of moral standards or social sensibilities.


I'm saying if someone isn't religious, they shouldn't be so concerned about things that religious people would consider obscene.

This may well be one of those cases where both sides were at least partly in the wrong.


Yeah, maybe the attendant saw what was going on before anyone else. Maybe it wasn't about an exposed breast, maybe she was only trying to get the woman to abide by the rules.

If you're religous then I would think you approve of woman feeding their baby the way God intended.


Yeah, but there's that whole obscenity thing.

Reply #25 from JoeUser Forums Top
I wouldn't want to have a filthy airline blanket near my mouth while I'm eating. I'm not sure why anyone thinks that's a reasonable solution to the breastfeeding "problem".

I breastfed my youngest in public, as was my right. I never used blankets or "hooter hiders" as I felt those drew far more attention to what I was doing than NOT using them. I never got any negative comments, but I can tell you this...if someone had a problem with it, TS.

Wherever it is lawful for mother and child to be, it is lawful to BF. No restrictions are placed on how it must be done.

People are free to look away. Or not. Whatever.

I'm not one to just pop a boob out in public, but if that's what it takes to get baby to latch on well, so be it. Anyone who watches television, movies, or reads magazines has seen far more scandalous things BY CHOICE.

I'm due next week, and I'll be BFing my new baby wherever we happen to be. I plan to print out my state's laws regarding BFing in public and keep a laminated copy with me so that idiot clerks and others like the flight attendant in the news story can see that they have no right to impose discretion or modesty on me or any other BFing mother.