It’s a modern breastfeeding mother’s conundrum when faced with feeding her hungry child; breastfeed her baby in public and be met with disapproving stares and tuts, or breastfeed in a crowded and unhygienic toilet cubicle where she is free from judgement.
Mother and photographer, 28-year-old Tamar Shugert from Israel uploaded this photo onto a Facebook photography community called 52 Frames under the theme of “Make a Statement”, and make a statement she has indeed.
Tamar captioned her photograph with the words:
“I should feed my baby where???
My baby eating is not a gross side-effect of having children.
If you are not willing to eat your lunch in the bathroom, then don’t expect me to feed my kid there!”
To create the image Tamar spliced together a photo of herself breastfeeding in her own bathroom with a picture of her husband, Daniel also in their bathroom but eating spaghetti.
The mother of two told The Stir that she wanted to highlight what breastfeeding mothers go through by comparing breastfeeding in the loo to an adult eating their lunch in there too. “I believe passionately that mums have a right to breastfeed wherever they want,” she said.
Tamar admitted that many of her friends felt pressure to hide in a bathroom to breastfeed their babies, but she didn’t feel the pressure herself while breastfeeding her two sons in public.
While many breastfeeding supporters have applauded Tamar’s image, she has also received considerable criticism after commenting that she believes breastfeeding women should be discrete and consider covering up while breastfeeding in public.
“Telling me to go breastfeed in a bathroom is an extreme one way,” she told The Stir. “But opening your shirt and whipping out your breast in front of someone trying to enjoy their spaghetti is another extreme. A good compromise is nursing covers, which give mums who breastfeed the very freedom they’re after.”
In Australia women have the legal right to breastfeed wherever they choose to. The Australian Breastfeeding Association outlines that a mother has the right to breastfeed her baby wherever she happens to be, a right that is legally supported through the Sex Discrimination Act 1984.
Photo via Tamar Shugert Photography
