Boobie twits silenced
You remember Terran Echegoyen-McCabe and her friend Christina Luna who we discussed yesterday and their poster campaign to promote breast feeding in uniform. Well, it seems that they are members of the Washington Air National Guard which compounds the idiocy of their cause. How often will a guardsman need to breast feed in uniform? It appears that their commanders have come to that same conclusion and told the two to shut up about it, according to the Spokesman-Review;
[Capt. Keith Kosik, state public affairs officer for the Washington National Guard] emphasized that the issue is not about breast-feeding in uniform.
AdvertisementRather, he said, military regulations prohibit the use of the “uniform, title, rank or military affiliation to further a cause, promote a product or imply an endorsement.”
“If you look at the press coverage that’s out there right now, it has been misconstrued as a battle against breast-feeding,” he said Thursday. “It leads one to believe they are being persecuted for breast-feeding. The fact is they’re not being persecuted. The fact is breast-feeding was never an issue for us.”
The military has no rules specifically regarding public breast-feeding while in uniform. The real issue is that servicemen and -women are not allowed to use the uniform to further a civilian cause, Kosik said.
Our frenemy, Adam Weinstein of Mother Jones couldn’t wait to make the military look like a pack of Neanderthals beating our chests over the outrageous photos of boobies. After quoting a female Marine who said that she wanted her Marines to see as nothing more than Marine, Weinstein puffs out his feminist chest-bone;
The commenter assumes, of course, that the appropriate archetypal image of a Marine is sexless. (Or, at least, boobless.) Which leads to another assumption: that there’s something inherently sexual about a woman nourishing a child with breast milk. Neither of those assumptions holds. No one is asexual (least of all Marines, at least in my experience), and no nursing mother should have to accept a cultural taboo that marks her as a sex object for doing what comes naturally.
I wonder how many Marines would agree that their mission in the greater scheme of things like national security is sexual. It was always my impression that women (and gays, because somehow Weinstein equates breast feeding to the recent repeal of the military’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy) wanted to be equals with men. We integrated women in the services, we quit booting them when they got pregnant in my early years of service because they claimed that they only wanted to be in the military and serve alongside men (and then, straights).
Service in the military isn’t about sex, Adam, well, at least it wasn’t while I was in the infantry. We were more concerned with battle drills, weapons maintenance and physical conditioning. All of this other crap is ancillary cultural bullshit. It looks to me like the social engineers are just trying to turn the military into one long high school lunch period or college dorms instead of the life-taking, destructive force that is supposed to defend us from foreign and domestic enemies.
Category: Military issues
Glad to see this. Very, very glad.
It still doesn’t matter why they were exposing body parts or wearing the uniform improperly. They need to receive the same punishment that any other military member would receive for using the uniform as a prop for a personal agenda.
It’s nice to see a CoC doing the right thing for a change.
There it is!
It looks to me like the social engineers are just trying to turn the military into one long high school lunch period or college dorms instead of the life-taking, destructive force that is supposed to defend us from foreign and domestic enemies.
All of the post-Vietnam events simply pale when compared to this.
*sarcasm*
Surely you jest — WEAPONS designed to KILL ??
Isn’t that opposed to the Sacred U.N. Charter ??
(especially if Commies may be dead) ??
I had to BF while in uniform as a member of the Guard. I am overly irritated by all the negative feedback about this. The Army has for several years been trying to embrace breastfeeding…all this publicity is just shite. It also irritates the fuck out of me that the Air Guard gave them permission to pose in uniform for those photos and now their commanders are bitching about it. Typical.
Have not seen anything about the CC’s giving permission for this – got a source on that?
If they did, however, they need to be punished as well. The military is about the individuals conforming to the needs of the service not the military changing based on what individual members want at the moment.
jane – where do you see their commanders gave them permission? Looks to me like they had no permission, and are appropriately being bitched out for having posed in uniform.
I will check for a source, this is what I read yesterday in passing from some article on FB. I’ll see if I can track it down.
You can make all the case you want about how the someone is making the military a “soshul experimunt” yet again, but on this issue, I stand with those two Airmen. Part of my irritability also stems from the fact that the only person in my company who was mature about my situation was a young LT. I had to endure humiliation by my 1SG when he pulled me in front of the company and said “Welcome back, gi_janearng! When the BN’s electricity bill is higher than normal the next few months, we’ll know why!” and gave a good jolly laugh while my female platoon sergeant stood by and did nothing to correct her peer.
Yeah, jane, would have to agree that you are overly irritated by this. But, it also sounds like you were singled out unnecessisarily as well. But that is life in the military. Most of us WERE the object of some sort of scorn at one time or another. How one handles it determines whether you will or will not be accepted as a member of the team.
Waiting for the ‘Facebook petition’ and the Good Morning America interview and news circuit for these two new “heroes.”
(Errr, scpellin never wuz mi strawng soot.)
The issue, gi_janearng, isn’t with breastfeeding. The issue is the fact that these ladies (1) did so in public (2) while wearing their uniform improperly in public (3) while also being photographed (4) and allowed that photograph to be used to further a political cause.
Sorry. In my book, all of the above are just plain wrong. And unless these ladies had the explicit permission of their chain of command to act as spokeswomen for the ANG concerning the subject, the final 3 are clear violations of the UCMJ (Article 92, failure to obey a lawful order or regulation). Regulations exist which cover wearing the uniform properly as well as the conditions under which one may use one’s military status or uniform to make a political statement. Just ask Stein or Thorsen.
I say, they brought the smoke down upon themselves, jackwagons!
Nothing to see here, people. Move along…
Even if they had permission from their command to be a part of the campaign, it is quite another matter to prove that permission was given to violate regs concerning wearing the uniform to do it. That is why it is important that, if such permission was given, that the Command structure also be punished because they simply do not have the authority to do that.
Again, this is not at all about what body parts were exposed (it could have been a bare left foot – same rules apply) or which parts of the uniform were being worn incorrectly (shirt, pants, doesn’t matter). No member of the military can seriously have an expectation that a photographically documented, clear violation of regs will go unchallenged by someone.
After this fiasco, whatever value they might have had to the ANG prior to this incident has probably pretty much evaporated. Sure hope their 15 minutes of fame was worth it to them.
I was involved in along discussion about this yesterday. It isn’t about breastfeeding personally I don’t give a shit what or how your baby eats. Your baby your choice, what I do have an issue with is the uniform. When you are in uniform you give up certain rights and one of them is breastfeeding. You want to feed breastfeed your kid pump and keep extra on hand. There really isn’t a reason to do it in uniform.
Why does a female member need to breast feed her children in uniform or are kids allowed to go to work with moms now?
Still… we need to start with the MRE-Infant formula mixes… to “Conserve the fighting strength.” It is the next step… crawl?
Hi guys, sorry about the lapse in following up…life and all that stuff. I went back through my feed and the group that is on the AF base that ran this campaign is now keeping mum after the publicity they’ve received over this and the photographer’s website that I believe had this “disclosure” about the Airmen having permission is down. Google cache is not giving me a whole lot but I found a disclosure the photographer posted that I’m thinking people are misconstruing for permission. The Airmen’s FB are free from these images, they might have removed them before I started looking to keep away unwanteds. @Hondo, I agree and disagree with you. I get the regs on the wearing of the uniform. BTDT. It’s all about what society sees that dictates the necessity of these regs, and this is a perfect example. You say it’s not about BFing but society has made it that way. And bottomline, we would not be having this discussion if America would get over their robot programming of seeing a pair and automatically associating it with sex or obscenity. @OWB, being singled out for BFing is not “such as life in the military.” This is not high school. I BF/pumped for nine months. It was not single incident I had to endure. It was almost daily. I could have made a complaint, but I didn’t. I was humiliated about enough as it is. The Army teaches a level of professionalism. I can handle random sex jokes but innuendos about BFing when I was merely trying to balance doing my job and being a new mom was over the top and chauvinistic. I am appalled you would pass it off as anything else. @JustJason, your entire paragraph is a contradiction. You first say it’s a woman’s right to feed her children however she wants but then in the same breath say she gives it up when she’s in uniform? GTFO and go get educated on the possibilities of having the child brought to the worksite for feeding times if the mother doesn’t want to pump.… Read more »
Exactly, jane. The military is not high school. The consequences of poor choices by members of the military can and do affect the entire force. We gave up a lot of our liberties when we agreed to wear the uniform in the prescribed way and follow the regs for the safety of all.
My unit, I discovered the hard way, also had a mother who was breast feeding. I only know that because I walked in on her pumping in our tiny locker room. The difference here was that she was being as discreet as was possible about it. I interrupted her – she didn’t force anything upon me or expect any concessions from those in her work group to accomodate her personal choice.
gi_janearng: You really don’t seem to “get it” on this one. Breastfeeding truly has nothing to do with what’s wrong here.
What these two did is no different than being photographed in uniform mooning the cameraman with “Save Darfur” (or some other political slogan) written on their butts in greasepaint, then allowing said photo to be used to further that cause. And it’s just as wrong.
They were photographed intentionally wearing a military uniform improperly in public. And they were also using their uniform and military standing to further a political cause. Both of these behaviors are clearly against DoD policy and regulation.
Service regulations prescribe the proper wear of the military uniform when in public. And DoD regulations proscribe political advocacy, verbal or nonverbal, while in uniform. That’s true regardless of the nature of the political cause being supported.
You really need to step back and grab a big steaming mug of perspective here. You appear to be fixating on a trivial detail while losing sight of the overall picture.
I get it Gi Jane, you want to be able to bring your kid to work and breastfeed. Well sorry, doesn’t work that way. I am not aware of very many civilian jobs that will allow you to bring you infant to work so you can feed them, so no you cannot bring your kid to work in the military either. You want time to pump milk I’ll give you that, but you want to keep your kid at work so you can have him or her have a meal on demand no.
Jason, if you are not aware of civilian jobs letting their working mothers bring their children in, you are not paying attention. It is more common than you are led (or want) to believe.
Seems to me that gi_janearng is just avoiding the issue. Trying to make this a case of “OH MY GOD, YOU CAN’T PERSECUTE MY BABY FOR FEEDING!”.
Listen, chick…it’s got nothing to do with Breastfeeding…Hell, my wife breast fed both of our children, in public…WITH A DISCREET BLANKET.
it’s not about the act…it’s about using the military uniform for a political statement. END OF FRIGGIN’ STORY!
Hope both of them get reduced in paygrade…then they can get out and cry and whine about anything they want with no problems.
I can name three or four soldiers who have had to pump at work, or even in the field, in my unit in the last few years. It’s never been an issue; reasonable accommodations are made, and most people never even know it’s happening.
Also, CPT Kosik is a good guy. I’m starting to get old; I swear he was 2LT Kosik just a few months ago…
Jane, humiliated? OMFG, stop whining over a nonissue. I knew several Marine colleagues who pumped for the first few months of their kid’s lives. The only reason I knew was because I worked in the office with them, and they would step out for a few minutes to do so in a bathroom or changing room/closet. I really don’t think they would have cared had they been teased. That’s part of being in the military. I definitely was the subject of scorn on occasion, just like everyone else. Be a big girl, and have a sense of humor. There is no war against motherhood, it’s just an opportunity to have a laugh. That’s what you do in the military. Suck it up.
And those two airmen were being highly unprofessional by taking photos of them breastfeeding in uniform. You don’t bring your kids to work, and I’ve only seen rare instances that a kid had to be at work temporarily if something unexpected came up. Basic professionalism means you don’t run around breastfeeding in public places in uniform. Period.
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