Why is breastfeeding in public controversial?

There is nothing sweeter than a little baby, is there? If you are the mom of a little one, you'll no doubt have noticed that they attract a lot of attention, coos, and tender looks. Unless, of course, you are breastfeeding them at the time. Formula-feeding mothers tell me that most restaurants are happy to warm up bottles for them, and as far as I can tell, nobody has ever negatively reacted to seeing a baby drink a bottle.

So why is breastfeeding in public so controversial? Breasts, these days, are everywhere. It's difficult to find a billboard without a half-naked woman on it, no matter if it's marketing bras or a car. That one time a waiter in a posh restaurant told me to breastfeed my newborn daughter in their office, so other people would not have to look at it, it never occurred to him to ask the ladies sitting at the table next to mine to cover up their cleavage. Breasts are everywhere, and they are seen as a sex object. Let's not lose sight of the fact that the primary purpose of a woman's breasts is feeding babies. Perhaps breasts are attractive, and perhaps they are sexual in some context but at the end of the day... we've got them to sustain our babies.

If you can bottle feed somewhere, you should be able to breastfeed there as well. Breast milk is, after all, the best and most natural food for babies. Of course, not every mother is comfortable breastfeeding her child in public. And if you are one of them, there is nothing wrong with that. Some babies also prefer nursing someplace quiet and without distractions. There are mothers who prefer to cover themselves with a nursing cover or t-shirt to breastfeed in public, and there are those who prefer not to. All of these things are just fine. But perhaps, if more women would breastfeed any time their baby wanted to wherever that happened to be breastfeeding in public would stop being so controversial.