Yes Mark, you’ve added a lot of things that were on my mind. The Islamic thing re breastfeeding and yet the resistance to it even here and definitely with our social class – as if educated women don’t breastfeed. The stupid talk about breastfeeding not being useful beyond 6months. But yes, the current WHO standard is either one or two years (can’t remember, but i remember some organizations recommend one and some two – and most say “or longer if mom and child wish”).
And I agree on the hypocrisy of ppl uncomfortable w breastfeeding in public. It’s hilarious though that in Egyptian society women of working class breastfeed in the open and its the educated who cover it up or do it privately. I did, though, see ppl do it in public (but not showing flesh) when i lived in Houston. You need to be a mom of a constantly hungry child to understand that it’s not breastfeeding that is anti-feminist, but people making women uncomfortable having public lives while they breastfeed that is the problem. Once i felt liberated to nurse my kid in the car or to seek any place in public, my life got so much better. Otherwise i’d never go out!