"The fact is if you don't manage to breast feed your child it is NOT the end of the world regarding health,your child is NOT doomed"
Because of course what bf advocates are saying is that it is the end of the world if you can't breastfeed, and ff children are indeed doomed.
Oh hang on - nobody's actually saying that are they?
Like nobody.
But so much easier to invent an unreasonable, patently stupid argument and then attack it, than challenge what bf advocates are actually saying, which is that breastfeeding improves health in the long, medium and short term, and for some individuals may prove extremely important.
I think this sort of tactic (setting up a false argument and then attacking it) is known as "straw man argument" and it's used all the time in the bf/ff debate, mainly by those people who want to discredit bf advocates.
Straw man argument (from Wikipedia)
- Person A has position X.
[Say - makes a case that bf is important for babies and that the majority of women could breastfeed if they were given appropriate support]
- Person B disregards certain key points of X and instead presents position Y.
[Say - "All women can and should breastfeed and that children who are not breastfed are doomed to inevitable ill-health.]
Thus, Y is a resulting distorted version of X and can be set up in several ways, including:
1.Presenting a misrepresentation of the opponent's position and then refuting it, thus giving the appearance that the opponent's actual position has been refuted.[1]
[For example, using anecdotal evidence to prove that some women are unable to breastfeed and that non-breastfed children are sometimes healthier than children breastfed from birth]
3.Presenting someone who defends a position poorly as the defender, then refuting that person's arguments - thus giving the appearance that every upholder of that position (and thus the position itself) has been defeated.[1]
[So if one person on a thread implies that it's selfish not to try to breastfeed, this opinion is attributed to the majority of those defending breastfeeding, as though this was a majority opinion.]
- Inventing a fictitious persona with actions or beliefs which are then criticized, implying that the person represents a group of whom the speaker is critical.
[Ah yes - the 'bf nazi', or 'bf militia', who slings her tits all over the place while bf her 6 year old twins whilst simultaneously casting the evil eye at any mother who dares to get a bottle out for her baby.
5.Oversimplifying an opponent's argument, then attacking this oversimplified version.
[ie most people can breastfeed becomes everyone can breastfeed; breastfeeding can reduce the risk of a range of common and serious illnesses becomes breastfeed your baby and they're guaranteed perfect health for life, even if you stuff them with lard every day afterwards; breastfeeding makes a difference to babies becomes breastfeeding is the be all and end all of good parenting and women who don't do it should be ashamed of themselves]
- Person B attacks position Y, concluding that X is false/incorrect/flawed.
This sort of "reasoning" is fallacious, because attacking a distorted version of a position fails to constitute an attack on the actual position.