Lactation professionals are losing ground to the Fed Is Best movement. In their frustration they are preparing to lash out, taking a page out of the Donald Trump playbook.
How is the lactation leadership like Trump?
Let me count the ways!
[pullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]They are thin-skinned, lack self-reflection, are monumentally aggrieved, project criticism, abuse the regulatory system and are exposed by whistleblowers.[/pullquote]
1. They are incredibly thin-skinned.
Ever notice how lactation professionals — the same folks who have institutionalized shaming mothers through the “Baby Friendly” Hospital Initiative — are incredibly sensitive? They can’t take the kind of criticism that they routinely dish out to others.
They insinuate or even claim that women who can’t or don’t wish to breastfeed are lazy, self-absorbed and don’t love their children enough to do what’s “best.” They accuse health professionals who disagree with them of taking industry money even though they have no evidence of any kind. They create memes to demonize formula and humiliate the women who use it.
But if you criticize them they, like Trump, collapse into self-pity. They seem to think they are perfect and insist that those who criticize them are haters.
2. They lack the capacity for self-reflection.
Breastfeeding has become the leading risk factor for newborn hospital readmission, leading to tens of thousands of unnecessary hospitalizations per year at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars. This is a massive healthcare scandal and no lactivist organization denies this is happening. Shockingly, they are making no effort to do anything about it.
They won’t even engage in self-reflection. They don’t ask themselves what they are doing wrong, because, like Trump, they believe that they are incapable of doing wrong. Individual women are crying out to them to stop the pressure, yet they continue to ramp it up with gratuitously cruel tactics like formula “consent forms” and advocating that formula be available by prescription only.
3. A monumental sense of grievance.
When you cannot accept that you might be wrong, any criticism is perceived as persecution. Like Trump, they are always sure they are being treated “unfairly” by their “enemies.”
Someone sent me this to warn me about the impending attack:
Is there anyone who has been targeted or harassed by Fed Is Best and has not contacted us yet. Please do so ASAP.
Real medical professionals (like real presidents) don’t view every criticism as harassment.
4. Projection of criticism.
I recently read an Op-Ed that claimed that everything out of Trump’s mouth is either projection or a lie. When lactation professionals discuss the Fed Is Best movement, nearly everything that comes out of their mouths is either projection or a lie.
They accuse feeding safety advocates of harming babies and mothers (without any evidence) when it is they who are responsible for the tens of thousands of unnecessary newborn hospitalizations and the soul searing guilt of new mothers. They accuse Fed Is Best and myself of profiting from advocating for safe infant feeding (a bald-faced lie) when it is they who are profiting from promoting UNSAFE infant feeding.
5. Abuse of the regulatory system.
Trump is a master of this, repeatedly attempting to subvert various government agencies to punish his enemies.
Lactation professionals are privately advocating for “reporting” various feeding safety advocates to their licensing boards. The recent treatment of Midwife Cath for daring to write the truth is a case in point.
The thing with lactation is we ALL can lactate but we ALL don’t lactate the same amount… don’t feel bad if you can’t squirt this much milk”.
The Instagram post continues, “Rather than babies going hungry or sitting on a pumping machine … remember that #fedisbest”.
Lactivist midwives subverted a regulatory agency to punish a woman who deviated from the party line.
6. Whistleblowers
There are many lactation professionals who are alarmed by the growing number of babies and mothers harmed by lactivist orthodoxy. They provide me and others with a steady stream of private social media messages that highlight the contempt in which lactation professionals hold women who can’t or don’t wish to breastfeeding, the stunning lack of self-reflection, the sense of grievance and the efforts to punish enemies.
I don’t know exactly what lactation professionals have planned for their forthcoming campaign but when it arrives I suggest you compare the attack to the types of attacks orchestrated by Trump.
Ask yourself:
Are the lactation professionals involved incredibly thin-skinned?
Have they avoided self-reflection?
Do they demonstrate a monumental sense of grievance?
Are they projecting?
Are they trying to abuse the regulatory system?
Were their actions revealed by whistleblowers?
In short, don’t let lactation professionals fool you with a page from the Trump playbook.
