Robert L. Jamieson Jr., may I kiss you?

My wonderful husband just forwarded this article to me. How refreshing it is to have men publicly taking up the torch in support of women doing what they feel is best for their children -- wherever and whenever they need to.

Here's a link to the article:

Nothing Shameful About Breast Intentions

Here is the full text. Couldn't have said it better myself.

Nothing Shameful About Breast Intentions

By ROBERT L. JAMIESON Jr.
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER COLUMNIST

I am a breast man. That is what my mother says.

When it came to feeding time, my baby lips steered clear from the rubber nips. No bottle-feeding for me.

Fortified by my mother's choice long ago, I now have no choice but to carry the flag in the ongoing dust-up in the mommy wars: Public breast-feeding is healthy, natural and perfectly acceptable -- or it should be.

This being America, some people become unhinged by the sight of public breast-feeding, those tender moments shared without fuss between mothers and their babies everywhere else on the planet.

A lactose-intolerant posse in the United States refuses to quietly let nature take its course.

The perfectly natural and utilitarian act of feeding makes some people uncomfortable.

Barbara Walters, the queenly television commentator on ABC, recently said on network television that seeing a woman breast-feeding on a plane wigged her out.

Her comments got the less regal but equally shrill Ken Schram of KOMO/4 in a royal froth. He opined about how squeamish folks can get when a woman "pops it out" and starts suckling little Johnny.

"Yeah, I know. It's natural," Schram said. "Well, so is urinating, but most folks don't up and pee in a glass in the middle of the mall."

He added: "For guys, it is nigh on impossible to switch from breasts as something sexual to breasts as takeout food."
Schram ought to stop watching titillating tapes from Blue Video and start taking a refresher course -- Breast-feeding 101.

He would learn urination is not on par with providing a basic human need. He would come to appreciate that anyone whose brain screams "SEX!" when a woman uses her bosom to nurse a baby needs a serious head check.

Study after study extols the benefits of a mother's milk. The American Academy of Pediatrics encourages women to feed babies breast milk exclusively for the first six months -- and continue doing so for several months after that.

Breast-fed children tend to be healthier than kids who are not. They are less prone to some cancers and experience stronger immune systems.

Equally as significant is the emotional and psychological bond that breast-feeding forges between a mother and child.

Most important, when a child has to eat a child has to eat.

Many states allow mothers to breast-feed in any public or private place. Washington is one of 15 states with a law that exempts breast-feeding from public indecency laws. The Evergreen State is one of 10 states with "infant- friendly" laws that support breast-feeding in safe, sanitary and private areas of the workplace other than restrooms.

Seattle-based Starbucks opens its store doors to female customers with infants. "Bottom line -- nursing mothers are welcome at Starbucks," company spokeswoman Audrey Lincoff tells me.

Such progressive thinking makes sense in this day and age.

Still, a pervasive culture of shame empowers mall security guards to crack down on breast-feeding mothers, fuels restaurant owners who interrupt nursing babies and offers pundits ammo to blast away on how grossed out onlookers might feel.

The discomfort of Americans is curious because our society is a big patriarchal, puritanical hypocrisy.

We are hyper-sexualized.

We enjoy breasts -- female, supple and bared -- on the boob tube.

But heaven spare us nursing moms baring a bit for kids' sake.

No wonder women -- in private conversations and online chats -- express a reluctance to breast-feed in public. Who wants to do something that Western society deems as being downright dirty?

Most breast-feeding moms try to be modest. They try to cover up. They try to be discreet. Yet they are made to feel nasty and uncivilized for being maternal.

There is another reason for hope on the breast-feeding front, smart laws aside.

It comes from people such as Rachel Kimbro, who wrote an online tip sheet for Salon.com to help people handle breast popping-out moments:

"1. For God's sake, don't leave the room.

2. Keep the conversation going -- don't act like we've suddenly become invisible.

3. Nope, we don't need any help. But you might offer to fetch us some water or a snack.

4. Personally, I could care less if you watch or not.

5. I could also care less whether or not it excites you, nor do I think you should feel bad if it does. This reaction will fade as nursing in public becomes more normal."

"Don't worry what others are thinking," Kimbro sums up. "Your baby is hungry."

For boob-minded nincompoops who still don't get it and cannot handle the breast intentions of mothers, I offer a two-word footnote:

Look away.