The new religion and breastfeeding charities

[Filomene]

Have you noticed the parallels between the old religion and the new? Are you an atheist, an apostate, or born again? For La Leche League Leaders, you must be a congregant or face shunning. www.mothersformother.com/post/transgenderism-the-new-religion-of-la-leche-league?fbclid=IwAR0G_1YXJ-swu1M2K0c4JpN4MUvYEgi0priEeFj4vQSPGkc3I4iWznGNyeU

What an outstanding article, passionate, women centred and clear. So many powerful points but this stood out for me:

The trans lobby works on a combination of science denial, blurred boundaries, linguistic gymnastics and confusing and contradictory bits of ever changing information. Chaos is a built in feature of this ideology; it is not a flaw. The trans agenda is built on feelings, not facts .

Excellent article, thanks for posting OP

And yet it seems that not all La Leche League leaders are true believers. Hopefully they won’t get burned at the stake for heresy!

Thanks for sharing this here. I hope that the organisation doesn’t destroy itself by selling out mothers and babies.

What a betrayal!

You have to wonder though about the difference between those actually running things on the ground around the world and the women at the top writing policies and such from their ivory towers in the USA. They are very likely worlds apart.

The local group leaders must know they have to make ordinary mothers feel welcome and comfortable rather than centring everything around a minority religion, of which the sacred caste are unlikely to be ever seen at La Leche League meetings and even the true believers must surely be a rarity.

It continues to amaze me how organizations, which have previously been quite open and secular in the sense of being open to pretty much anyone with any religion or set of beliefs or views, are captured by all of this so thoroughly.

The parallel with shunning is insightful and apt.

La Leche League has been captured. Please contact the Board at [email protected] to voice your concerns. Keep LLLI a secular voice for ALL women and children!

Maybe addressing LLLGB if you are in the UK would be good as well.

www.laleche.org.uk/contact/

There is even more happening in La Leche League around religion:

La Leche League Policy or Religious Freedom: Choose one
"No longer are Leaders just agreeing to uphold LLL's mission and policies on breastfeeding—with the new policy they are now signing up as supporters of transgenderism in one fell swoop, whether or not it conflicts with their personal belief system."

This new policy puts Leaders in a terrible dilemma—should they follow their faith and risk disaccreditation or ignore their own personal or faith based beliefs?

And this is why I left LLL. And (see another thread on this board) didn’t join ABM. I raised it through all the proper channels, but no one was listening.

My local Leaders (who had always operated a ‘no men’ policy) got it and were lovely, but figured it would never be a problem in practice and that (in the absence of any local NHS breastfeeding support) they should continue. I respect that, but ultimately I couldn’t square my conscience with continuing paying dues to LLL.

This article about the capture of the ABM also mentions LLLI. Seems that one of the founding mothers tried to stand up for sex based language

yolandaforster.substack.com/p/the-association-of-breastfeeding

@ObviouslyNotNow

It looks like the NHS is also going to be supporting men who want to "breastfeed".

Those NHS hospitals that have signed up to the NHS Rainbow Badge scheme are required to answer this questions as part of the assessment.

"Does the service have sensitive guidance in place to support a non-carrying parent to breastfeed/chestfeed?"

This copied from my post on the ABM thread:

Supporting a “non-carrying parent” to breastfeed is appalling! What happened to respect for the mother-baby dyad? Where are the concerns about safeguarding, I’d be wondering about coercive control if a “non-carrying parent” wanted to be involved in breastfeeding which means in all honesty coming between the mother-baby relationship and totally scuppering breastfeeding.

All the evidence we have suggests that mother and baby need to be kept close together from birth, immediate skin to skin and as much thereafter as the mother is happy with. There is a balance to be established between the baby’s needs and the mother’s supply, the mother grows in confidence as she builds a close relationship with her baby learning to read and respond to the baby’s cues. Fathers are discouraged from giving a bottle “so they can be involved” or “bond with the baby” not only because it causes nipple confusion but also because it reduces time at the mother’s breast and displaces her milk altering her supply accordingly not only that but there will be a knock on physical effect on the mother as it will disrupt her hormonal balance. The mother and baby should be regarded as one, any third party butting in to that relationship does not have their best interests at heart and is serving only his or her own interests.

I was very involved with our local LLL throughout my children's early years.

I have been sorely concerned that on their social media page they are referring to breastfeeding and chest feeding.

We had a recent 'social' for some us old hands who hadn't met up in 10+ years...

I was even more concerned that i did not feel able to bring up their recent 'chest feeding ' language, despite having previously been very vocal in the group. I😪

I used to be a trustee of a local and independent small breastfeeding and baby feeding charity which provides a weekly drop-in session to discuss and seek information/advice with any feeding issues (not just breastfeeding, but BF remains the focus and speciality), or just a safe space to feed your baby and chat. It's a lovely group and well-used locally. While it's not a woman-only space (we welcome fathers if they want to attend - some dads of newborns want to - and there's always a private room to feed in if mothers don't want to feed in front of a man) in practice dads tend not to hang around! Which is fine by us. In practice it's virtually always women-only.

However. Our brief has migrated somewhat over the years, and I do wonder what would happen if, for instance, a transwoman who had adopted brought their baby in. Clearly we want to support the baby, and our brief says we support parents (and mentions mothers in particular). But I don't feel we can or should attempt to provide a support service for a biological man who believes that they can 'breastfeed'. I could see this looming potentially on the horizon and have been troubled about how this would be negotiated - and more importantly, the impact on all our mothers who bring their babies in every week, and are not expecting to see a man in that role. (breastfeeding, not the parenting role)

I left the board for a number of personal and logistic reasons but I still feel very guilty that I've left without asserting what I know to be true - that only biological women can breastfeed, that the group should never attempt to facilitate a biological man to lactate (because that fluid isn't going to be a healthy substance for a baby, because it runs the risk of accommodating breastfeeding fetishists, because it will alienate our mothers).

There is a big grey area in the mission statements of most small groups like this, I'd imagine, and it can (and will) eventually be exploited by men who want to infiltrate mothers' groups for validation or sheer voyeurism. Yet we do of course want to support fathers and gay parents. It's a bloody minefield.

I used to volunteer as a breastfeeding peer supporter in a very diverse area in north London where many mums spoke English as their second language. New mums struggling to breastfeed are very vulnerable. They might be in pain following a difficult birth or feeding might be painful. They can be exhausted and overwhelmed. The groups we ran often alongside midwives and health visitors were a space for women to be together, help each other out and provide clear unbiased information and signpost on for further support/ help if needed. The very nature of breastfeeding especially as a new mum means you are going to be in a state of undress with your post partum body. If men had access to these groups, women would not come and would struggle alone. In more serious cases that could have devastating consequences for mother or baby.

i feel very passionately that lll should be clear in their language and protect breastfeeding mothers spaces but I’m unclear what would be a useful complaint to raise with them? Has anyone else contacted them and if so what did you say?