Booby Protest!

Apparently, a breast-feeding mother was offended recently at the Galleria when security personnel asked her to put her tit away, and is making a big damn deal about it:

It was a laid-back day at the mall for Julie Doyle and her son. Like other Galleria shoppers on a Sunday afternoon, four-month old Will got hungry.

So Doyle fed him, sitting on a mall bench.

Julie Doyle was nursing her son, Will, when a Galleria security guard confronted her.

“A security guard came up and said, very confrontationally, ‘excuse me, can you please cover yourself?'”said Doyle.

She says she asked security for any written policy on nursing. She was told that it was not forbidden, but the preference was to breast-feed in a less-populated place.

“It bothers me that they were very aggressive and confrontational for something that I have the legal right to do,” she said.

Doyle told her friends, who in turn told others, and soon a civil rights-style sit-in, or in this case, “nurse-in” was organized.

Organizers are encouraging moms from all over to breast-feed on Thursday at noon.

Amy Hartley plans to be there in support of Doyle, other nursing moms and the law.

Cool.

So, since I work across the street from the Galleria, I have a plan as well.

I think I’m going to go across to the Galleria tomorrow and document the Titty Solidarity Protest!

If they’re so damn excited about baring their boobs in public, then surely they won’t mind my giving the mini-camera in the new Sony Ericsson T-610 a good workout during their public display. Maybe we’ll have a breast-feeding boobie-thon on PubliusTX.net tomorrow.

We want to support the cause, after all.

(07-01-2004 Update) After having wonderful bbq at Harlon’s in the Galleria, Callie and I wandered to the food court for the Titty Solidarity Protest. It wasn’t much of a protest. Something like a dozen mothers gathered, and stood around till about five past noon.

Then, apparently one mother went and sat in a seat in the food court, and very discretely nursed her child, with shawl covering the whole affair and the other mothers surrounding her and looking very excited.

Then they all went on their merry way, save for a couple of mothers who continued to talk to an ABC-13 reporter (Deborah Wrigley I believe, but not positive on that).

What a great day for Mothers’ Rights!

These ladies dragged their little ones out to a crowded, noisy, germy mall at lunchtime to protest for a right that had not been denied to them, and then five minutes later, went on their merry way.

Let freedom ring.

Incidentally, the T-610 is kind of neat as a novelty, but obviously the photo quality (as above) is pretty poor. Still, in a pinch, it’s kind of a cool to have an unobtrusive camera. Several people were taking photos, but as it turns out, promises of a Boobiethon were overblown.

Much was overblown, to be honest.

(07-02-2004 Update) The Comical reports that the mothers moved from the food court upstairs to the Baby Gap for the booby exposure part of their effort. The Chronicle also reports that numbers swelled to 50 up there (from the dozen that were at the Food Court). What a bunch of nitwits.

(07-02-2004 Update 2) Callie notes that I left out the fact that Deborah Wrigley seemed to be instructing the activist mothers on the best way to engage in their titty protest activities. That’s just great, huh? The local media helping drive a story instead of just reporting on it. Not surprising at all, really, and just another indicator of the level of nitwittery involved all the way around here.