Unlike driving, smoking, and suing the guy whose house you broke into because he came between you and his Wii with a bat, breasts are a privilege, not a constitutional right. And with that privilege comes a unique responsibility and obligation toward its most loyal onlooker: man.
When a man kills someone, he goes to jail for murder. When a man takes money from his employer, he is charged with embezzling. But when a man does something illegal or immoral in response to seeing a bare breast — be it in the context of seeing a breastfeeding mother, spying on his neighbor, or viewing porn — he’s clearly under the influence. It’s not fair to expect men to know the difference between Heather the Harlot and Betty the Breastfeeder. It’s their biology.
Facebook is in good company with its obscenity rule, and the rest of us should take note. Airlines, local governments, and owner-operated businesses (who argue with local governments that their customers should be allowed to smoke but not breastfeed) are among the few in this country who are willing to take a stand against any customer who would dare bare.
People of civilized nations (you European and African types, I’m so not talking about you) like the United States and all Muslim countries know the real deal: if you don’t cover it, they will covet it — and that will be everyone’s undoing!
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Robert M. Barga
All persons agreed to the terms when they signed up. Furthermore, they checked a box confirming that the photo was acceptable. Really, I can not find how they have grounds to bitch
2 - El Bicho
It's their company, so why shouldn't they be able to set the rules as silly as they may be? I don't remember anyone being forced to use facebook nor it being a Constitutional right.
3 - Russell
It is Facebook's policy if you do not agree go elsewhere.
4 - Dr Dreadful
Facebook says they took the action solely based on user complaints.
They didn't say how many complaints.
Two, maybe?
5 - Jaime Anderson
I totally agree with Facebook. I do not want to see women breastfeeding while searching through facebook. The argument that they want to "memorialize a beautiful moment in nature" should be saved for their hard drive and not the general viewing public. It's a personal moment between mother and child. I could argue that having marital relations with my husband, sanctioned by God is a moment I want to preserve in time. Fine - but not for the entire world to see!!! Give it up, it's their website, they can decide what gets deleted. If the moms don't like it, then turn in your facebook account.
6 - Eric Roth
Witty deconstruction of absurd puritanical rules that keep the United States from becoming the enlightened nation our founders envisioned.
Why are Americans in 2009 still more afraid of bare breasts than violent psychopaths?
7 - Robert M. Barga
@Dread, I would complain about that picture, simply because facebook is accessible by anybody over 13, and to me, those images are inappropriate for them
8 - diana hartman
jaime, why are you comparing the act of breastfeeding to the act of sex?
9 - diana hartman
mr. barga, do you seriously not know that many a breastfeeding mother with older children will feed her infant in the presence of those children without cover and that, if called in, no one at social services is going to take issue with that or call it "inappropriate"?
10 - Dr Dreadful
Jaime, you say that feeding is a 'personal moment between mother and child', but I somehow doubt you are offended by this photo.
And if not, why not? After all, it makes no difference to the baby.
And in answer to Robert: I understand perfectly that Facebook is entitled to set its own terms of service, but I am equally entitled to call them silly if I want to.
11 - Robert M. Barga
say you have a chick walking around in a super market without a shirt on, how is that appropriate (I say the same about a guy wALKING around, i bear no sexisim here)
A mother with her children =/= public
12 - diana hartman
mr. barga, are you comparing exhibitionism to breastfeeding an infant?
13 - Matthew T. Sussman
What Bicho said.
Also: we've beaten every other injustice in this world and we're onto the right for women breastfeeding in public? That's fantastic news! I can't wait until men are able to roam Times Square freely jamming medical suppositories into themselves without getting frowned upon.
14 - Robert M. Barga
You are showing a breast, how is it different?
15 - diana hartman
if breastfeeding and exhibitionism are the same in your mind, there's no where else to go with that...at best, that's misguided; at worst, that's just creepy...
16 - Robert M. Barga
I do not see how a breast is appropriate for public in this country.
17 - zingzing
never take your shirt off again, robert.
meh. you must be kidding. look at the happiness to boobs-in-public indices of various countries. you will find that the less pent up you (male, you) are about seeing women's breasts, the happier you are. shit, i'm happy to see them. makes my day.
but a mother feeding her baby in a natural way is not in the least bit sexual and therefore, has little to do with it.
when a doctor gives you the "turn you head and cough" or the greasy thumb, do you also equate that with sexuality?
wait. what country are you in?
18 - Mark Saleski
so is cleavage OK in public?...or should that been banned as well?
cleavage Ok but breastfeeding not?
19 - Matthew T. Sussman
Really, this is all about public vs. private. Nobody is saying "breastfeeding is bad," they're saying "breastfeeding shouldn't be something seen in public." Other natural, non-sexual acts:
• giving birth
• going to the bathroom
• checking for various cancers of the naughty bits
Then there are some non-natural, yet still non-sexual acts involving sex organs, such as circumcision, changing diapers and inserting a tampon, all which are and should be handled away from the public eye.
If pictures of any of those acts would show up on Facebook, I can see them taken down. If any of those acts are done in a public setting, I can see arrests being made. What I can't see, though, is if someone posts a picture of himself pooping, and the picture is removed, I don't envision a collection of pro-excrement activists staging a public poop-in.
20 - Matthew T. Sussman
By the way, next time I notice grown men on the Internet debating the goodness and badness of breasts, it damn well better involve cup size.
21 - Amanda Lee Bittle
There's something I don't understand about the American public breast taboo.
As a woman, I could walk down the street with hardly any covering at all over my breasts. The crucial cover-up spot? My nipples.
But men have nipples. And men walk around sans shirt in public quite often. Yes, I realize that they can't enter a variety of business establishments, but they CAN mow their lawns and walk their dogs.
AND post pictures of these acts on Facebook.
NIPPLES. The very naughtiest part of a woman's breast, the only part that absolutely positively MUST BE COVERED UP. Right there in public! In front of elementary schools! Outside grocery stores! In government-funded parks!
Seems inconsistent, right? The difference between men's and women's "breasts" is the amount of fatty tissue. BUT this is the part that's apparently okay to show (cleavage, teeny tiny bikinis).
22 - Amanda Lee Bittle
Great article, by the way.
23 - Robert M. Barga
Okay, fine, think of it like this
if you breast feed anywhere that needs to follow the health code then it is wrong
the park is fine
24 - zingzing
facebook has no health codes.
25 - Robert M. Barga
Facebook is their own site, they have the right to do it
I think that it is obscene, but our argument on that is fallacious simply because it is an opinion. So I migrated to one only based in evidence, the health code one
Also, at comment 17, I don't take my shirt off in public unless at a forum fitting for it (say a pool or a beach or a locker room)