Have it your way - Burger King adopts corporate policy to allow breast-feeding in restaurant

wbay tv ^ | 11/22/03

[11th_VA]

Salt Lake City-AP -- From now on, mothers who wish to breast-feed their babies are welcome to do so in Burger King restaurants.

The fast-food chain announced its new policy Friday, one day before a planned "nurse-in."

Members of an international group that promotes breast-feeding had planned the protest after a mother in suburban Salt Lake City was asked to feed her baby in a bathroom or leave the restaurant. A customer had complained to Burger King employees.

Under the new policy, employees are told if a customer complains about a mother who's breast-feeding, they are to explain that breast-feeding is permitted in the restaurant and suggest that the complaining customer move.

Burger King says its new policy had been in the works and wasn't timed to defuse the threatened protest.

[Bonaparte]

"I could ask the same of you with regards to experiments and data..."

Yes, you could. And I would reply that I rely on the abstracts and articles compiled in the Index Medicus for the most reliable and current medical information available. That, IMO, is far more reliable than anecdote or generalizing from personal experience.

[PleaseNoMore]

And a "missed feeding" always refers to schedule feeding, not the kind of feeding you do, which is demand feeding.

No it doesn't. You can miss an "on demand feeding" simply by not feeding your infant when he or she is ready to eat. Again, by on demand feeding I mean when the infant is hungry and nursing mothers usually know before their infant even cries in hunger that their child is almost immediately ready to nurse. You can forego a feeding using either method and it would still be a missed feeding.

[PleaseNoMore]

I would consider human interaction the most reliable. Not the most recently written article by someone who, most likely, hasn't worked first hand with the group of persons he or she is writing about.

[Doc On The Bay]

SIGH!!...."then WHY would Pediatricians recommend that practice??...

ALAS!--because MANY "Pediatricians" are MALE (I am NOT), & have Little or NO experience with Human Lactation!!

Doc

[Bonaparte]

What on earth are you talking about? Are you saying that pediatricians and obstetricians involved in medical research have not worked with patients? Most of them are in practice and they most certainly work with experimental and control groups consisting of human beings in just those groups we are discussing.

[Bonaparte]

Uh huh. And the female pediatricians recommend that practice only because they want to curry favor with the "good old boy network" in medicine, right?

[PleaseNoMore]

There are physicans who analyze data compiled by other attending physicans and write their research papers. Not all of them but there are many who do. Of course, I would accept the opinions of the involved physicians.

[PleaseNoMore]

Find me a female physician who is also a mom and who advocates making an infant wait to eat because of the social inhibitions of others and I will concede.

[Tribune7]

Burger King is a private company and has every right to set what ever policies it wants.

OTOH, if these policies upset more customers than it pleases, it is a very stupid decision.

If I had a restaurant I don't think I'd have this policy.

[TJFLSTRAT]

Here in Florida women have been allowed to breast feed in public for about 5 years. I have only witnessed this once, in a doctors waiting room. About a month ago a woman was asked to leave a resturant for breat feeding, the resturant, to avoid a lawsuit, had to issue a public apology.

[Bonaparte]

You give up far too easy. There are plenty of women who know breast feeding does not have to be a public performance. And some of those women happen to be MDs.

[Bonaparte]

Thanks for the update. Interesting developments in the sunshine state.

[PleaseNoMore]

No, it doesn't have to be a public performance and as has been stated here many times, it is normally not. I am simply not against a woman nursing her child in public. Oh, I haven't given up. I stand by my convictions.

[Bonaparte]

Good for you! Enjoy them!

[Doc On The Bay]

Sorry to "Disabuse You," but 'Docs are NOT organised enough to offer ANY opinion on this subject!

Doc

[August West]

Yes, you do advocate violence. If the case of a simple (in my case, polite) request for modesty resulting in an immediate, unprovoked attack is not unprovoked violence; then I don't know what is. I agree that a husband/father is obliged to defend his family with his life, but the action you describe endanger you and your family - even if the other party doesn't fight back. (e.g. you hit the guy once, his head slams on the floor and he dies. You're looking at possible life-imprisonment. Would that be preferable to simply refusing the request?) I am certainly not a pacifist, nor a vegetarian. However, I don't go looking for fights (notwithstanding, psychotic responses such as yours)and have the cool-headedness to realize that walking away is almost always the best course of action - which, in case you didn't know, does not constitute a pacifist. From the perspective of one protecting his family, the issue should be what is the safest course of action for his family, NOT what satisfies his sense of machismo. Urination and sexual intercourse are just as natural as breast-feeding, but many people find each of them extremely inappropraiate in a public place. (Why do you preclude sexual intercourse from being a nuturing, loving act?) In any case, there is a time and place for these things; in full view a public place isn't one of them. You claim that I take it upon myself to decide what is acceptable and unacceptable. No, I'm just following common courtesy. Actually, most restaurants don't allow the consumption of outside food or drink, so wouldn't breastfeeding be breaking the rules of the establishment? In short, breastfeding being a "loving, natural act" is irrelevant. A woman can breastfeed to her and her infant's hearts' content, just not in full view of me in a public place - especially when I'm paying to eat in a restauarant. That is the point at issue here; patrons being able to eat in comfort at a restarant.

[Bonaparte]

"Actually, most restaurants don't allow the consumption of outside food or drink, so wouldn't breastfeeding be breaking the rules of the establishment?"

LOL! That's a good one, AW. Wish I'd thought of it.

[PleaseNoMore]

Again, someone is equating nursing a child with a sexual act and elimination of waste. For the life of me, I cannot understand what is so disgusting or immodest about a woman nursing her child in a public place. It seems to me that Americans are so overly sexualized that something as innocent as nursing becomes a lewd act simply because a woman's breast is involved. Either that or there are a lot of prudes out there.

[Doc On The Bay]

"SIGH!"

I Guess that sometimes one must Ignore the "Rantings of the Millions of Idiots!!"

When one is Ignorant of the Subject, it is better if one KEEPS HIS MOUTH SHUT!!

Doc

[I_Love_My_Husband]

Boy there's some screaming harpies on THIS thread eh?

And as a fellow SF'er I can relate just a few choice morsels of the disgusting "mothers" I've seen:

*On a public bus, with 3 other screaming BRATS, she pops out her breast for all to view and starts feeding one of the brats, looked about 2 years old or older. I wanted to move my seat (I was with hubby, but hubby said no....too crowded)

*At a school, parent came in with 3 year old and pops out boob and proceeds to feed. Then child poops immediately after and smells up the office for hours.

I really don't want to see other people's saggy gross breasts, and their child feeding on it. It's akin to running into the public gay sex at Golden Gate Park or other "accidental park surprises" that have happened to me.

Please COVER UP or ...BRING A BOTTLE! Sheesh, how hard is that? We all survived before people were showing off their ugly breasts.