do where I don't have to see it. Keep a leash on your little bastards.

I happen to think that having to watch you eat in an airport restaurant is pretty disgusting, too. So, you take your lil' old lunch tray and park yourself on the pot in a bathroom stall to eat, and I'll do the same with my baby. Fair's fair. You first.

Are there ANY sane people left in the world? WHAT, may I ask, is wrong with going to the bathroom? Is it some kind of embarassing insult? You go to the bathroom to change a diaper (that's why there are changing stations there), why is it so inconceivable to go there to breast-feed (especially since many bathrooms now offer pumps)? Not to mention covering up with a blanket (by the way, I think the 'dirty airline blanket' is a thin excuse grasping at straws, but if that was actually a concern, she could carry her own clean blanket). I would think that one would want to do this for the sake of their own privacy. Lord knows there might be pervs hanging around who get off on that sort of thing. But no, these are the sort of people more concerned with making a statement rather than doing perfectly simple, reasonable things. I'm guessing the statement being made here is something to the effect of that motherhood and breastfeeding is a beautiful sacred thing that we should all be thankful for the opportunity of beholding. Bleh. I have a natural right to urinate, but I don't have the right to whip it out wherever I want, especially when there are accomodations provided for me to do so in privacy. This applies even if I happen to believe that the penis and the human body are beautiful things and that there is no shame in carrying out normal human functions. Yes, yes, I know, I'm a horrible baby-hating monster for making such a comparison. Uh huh. This is exactly the kind of crap that lets conservative take broad swipes at 'feminazis' and 'wacko liberals' and gives the rest of us a bad name. And, you know, this is SUCH an important cause for women around the world. I can't think of anything more important that these women could be fighting for.

SOMEONE tell me what the problem with going to the bathroom or covering up is. Indecent exposure is indecent exposure, regardless of what you happen to have attached to your breast.

Just so's you know.

Bathrooms are fine places for removing waste products from the body. I don't think anyone's denying that. Yes, moms and dads change diapers in there... and the bathroom's a fine place to do that. But nursing a baby takes a while, and if you hadn't noticed, bathrooms REEK. They're a "get in and get out" place, not one where you want to put up your feet and hang out for a bit.

For those of you who haven't nursed a baby or had a nursing baby in your family... it takes time. How much time? Depends on the kid, anywhere from 10 minutes to half an hour or more. I really would like all the people who suggest women should nurse in airport bathrooms to take their own next meal in there and see how much fun it is.

Yes, most women cover up as much as they can when they nurse. But babies squirm, and (heavens) a flash of a boob might happen here or there. Get over it. This isn't about indecent exposure, or titillation, or sexuality. It's about LUNCH. Just because a generation of women followed faulty advice and used bottles, and people choose that option today for a whole host of reasons, does not mean that bottles are "normal" and breastfeeding is "weird." Breastfeeding is just as reasonable an option as bottle feeding, and we prudish Americans need to get over ourselves. Don't suggest that breastfeeding women should just "use a pump" so they don't have to nurse in public. Pumping is complicated, time-consuming, and messy, and unless you've done it, don't go suggesting it without understanding what pumping entails.

Wasn't it John Ashcroft who had the giant mammaries on the statue in the Justice Department covered up? Ferchrissakes. Grow up.

Much as it pains me to share space with some of the people who write in here who can't for example spell "whelp" or use it properly in a sentence (or "bastards" for that matter) the point is there's nothing wrong with nursing a baby, although covering up seems a civilized thing to do. The point is this wasn't a baby. This was a 22-month-old child. A walking, talking, getting-ready-to-be-potty-trained CHILD. And frankly, that's creepy to watch. Once a kid can not only eat solid food but toss it across the room why does it even need a bottle, much less a breast? And even if you think they still need breast milk, what's wrong with putting it in a bottle and handing it to the fully ambulatory child?

I understand that nursing provides important bonding and immunities and all that. But there's more than a streak of narcissism and exhibitionism in all this "You MUST let me nurse wherever the hell I want or you're an evil oppressor" garbage. If I'd been on that flight I would have been creeped out and probably would have asked that poor flight attendant to say something. Just because an act is natural it doesn't mean everyone has to be made a party to it. Forcing total strangers to partake in your personal intimacies is just plain bad manners.

My daughters were born in 1992 and 1994. In '92 we were living in Idaho, of all places; in '94, Ann Arbor. My wife breastfed them both pretty much on demand, in the car, in restaurants, theaters, parties. She was discreet but not furtive and for damn sure never acted ashamed. The only time I can remember anyone commenting at all was in Ann Arbor, where an archetypical Ann Arbor type came up and gushed about how fortunate we were to live in Ann Arbor where people were so tolerant and open-minded. Just like the folks in northern Idaho.

What's the big deal? To anyone but adolescent boys, I mean. Crying babies are a hundred times more disruptive than nursing babies. So are running-amok toddlers, both the charming ones and the other kind. I find all babies distracting. I like to make faces at them. But I don't bother anyone when they're eating, not even a baby.

Fundamentalists of the Falwell-Robertson-Haggard ilk have to be behind this. Can there be any lingering doubt that they're really against sexuality of any kind, including babies?