Book Review: ‘Lactivism,’ by Courtney Jung
14th December 2015
A rara avis, a book review in the New York Times that doesn’t parrot the latest SWPL fad.
If you’re a parent with young children, you’ve likely encountered a sanctimommy. Sanctimommies, of course, are that modern species of sanctimonious mothers who liberally dispense parenting advice laced with the subtext, “I’m not saying you’re a bad parent, but. .?.?.” Smug in their maternal superiority, they crusade perhaps most vehemently against moms who choose not to breast-feed.
If this moralism were limited to sanctimommies, it might be written off as nothing more than parenting blog fodder. But according to “Lactivism,” Courtney Jung’s riveting exposé of the forces that have turned the simple act of feeding one’s baby into a veritable battlefield, “to breast-feed or not to breast-feed” has become a question with far-reaching implications spanning medicine, politics, religion, feminism, commerce, race and social class.
Judging by recent history, ‘and soon to be a major motion picture’.