roberino

Australian comedian, Steve Hughes, once said: "So what? Be offended! Nothing happens! Be a grown up, deal with it."

roberino

"'I want to live in a democracy, but I never want to be offended again!'. Well you're an idiot!"

Ditto

You can never make everyone happy, why does a breastfeeding mom have more rights than someone who might be offended by it due to, say, his religious beliefs?
I don't think the request was unreasonable, if there was an actual complaint about it.

roberino

You find me one single passage in any religious book that says that it is sinful for a person to witness breastfeeding. People develop their own opinions on things and then tenuously hang them on their religious beliefs and demand "rights" as a result.

In any case, the complainant does have the right to be offended, but not the right to have anyone else care.

irishguy28

That brings to mind those ultra-orthodox Jews who cause delays on (mostly) El-Al flights when they refuse to sit beside a woman!!!

NY-Israel flight delayed by ultra-Orthodox men’s refusal to sit next to women
ultra-Orthodox Jewish pax refuse to sit next to women on El Al flight JFK-Tel Aviv
Passengers Cause Chaos by Refusing to Sit Next to Women on Easyjet Flight

roberino

I thought about that incident too. "Sirs, please take your assigned seats or you and your luggage will be offloaded."

Ditto

And the breastfeeding mom has exactly the same right, yet she chose to create a storm out of it

That's exactly what comes to my mind as well.

roberino

Not quite The breastfeeding mum has the right to breastfeed publicly. She also has the right to be offended but that wasn't the right she was trying to defend.

Let's just say, for argument's sake, that everyone does have the right to have their personal offence taken seriously and acted upon. The vegetarians can now have the ominvores banned from eating meat; the vegans can have the vegetarians banned from eating cheese and egg; Jewish people can now force anyone to cover up their tattoos; the Christians can now have any LGBT offloaded; thin people can now have fat people ordered to a different seat; liberals can tell anyone in a MAGA hat to take it off; and I can have any footballers offloaded because I am a rugby fan and I think they're preening overpaid examples of how too much money and an insular lifestyle turns people into human garbage.

We live in a free world, and if you expect 100% of other people to meet 100% of your principles and standards then you are going to very offended, most of the time.

irishguy28

But those analogies are imperfect, as most analogies usually are.

No-one was "banned" from doing anything. The mother wasn't asked NOT to feed - she was asked to "cover up" while feeding.

So, your analogy should be: "The vegetarians can now have the omnivores required to eat meat under a blanket; the vegans can have the vegetarians required to eat cheese and egg under a blanket" - a bit like the accepted protocol for eating ortolan - an act so shameful and decadent that it must be shielded from the eyes of God

NY Times: Chefs fight for songbird

Ditto

And she was never denied that right, she was asked to cover up (which she didn't anyway) and then chose to get offended by either the request and/or how the FA treated her for the rest of the flight.

roberino

OK, so blankets all round! You'll get the same response.

[I'm having a good chuckle about this now, BTW]

JamesKidd

The only one who could be "offended" by it would be someone sitting right next to her. Everyone sitting in front would have to turn their heads around to be "offended". Everyone sitting behind her would also have to make an effort to be "offended". Also, people on the same row as her would have to turn their heads towards her to be "offended". So that's quite an effort to be "offended". If someone did complain to the FA and wasn't sitting right next to her, the FA could have explained to the passenger the amount of effort it would take them to be "offended".

irishguy28

Rather than anyone taking offence at the breastfeeding, I'd be far more concerned about a seatmate taking an unwarranted interest in the mom's partial disrobement during feeding.

LondonElite

Yawn. Another single-data-point rant. I think every airline has had this book thrown at them at least once. Is there anyone left to fly?

Concerto

Given that is seems KLM is trying to discourage people from flying at the moment, by making conference calls or taking the train, maybe this is part of their strategy? Or maybe the absence of babies on board will cause an avalanche of bookings from people wanting to avoid babies!