Kicked off flight for breastfeeding
With Delta's history of breastfeeding discrimination, it didn't take long for moms to grab their torches and pitchforks and begin a slow march to Delta's virtual front door.
Behold the wrath of Twitter!
We're tired of moms being told to cover up, move or leave the premises when we're doing nothing more than breastfeeding our little ones. It's wrong, it's almost always illegal, and it's misguided. It contributes to the notion that breastfeeding a child is somehow indecent, and nothing moves faster than social media when a mother has been wronged.
However, there is more to the story, as later posts indicated. Yes, she was kicked off the flight, but it didn't seem to be simply because she was nursing her toddler. That was just part of the equation — but it was still a vital part. Their flight was delayed, and she was breastfeeding her little girl when she was told to go ahead and buckle her into her seat. The mother indicated that she would, but it would take a moment to transfer her child from her lap to the seat.
This is totally reasonable. Whether or not you're breastfeeding a kid, it takes a minute to move a sleeping child from point A to point B. Too bad for her, though — that wasn't good enough for the flight attendant who was confronting her.
She expanded on the situation on her Facebook page late last night. She wrote, "She then put her hands on her hips and leaned toward me and loudly said, 'Now.' I asked her why she was being so rude. She told me she would call the captain if I didn't comply immediately."
She was soon escorted off because she didn't buckle her kid into her seat fast enough, and she writes that she feels she was targeted because she was nursing a 2-1/2-year-old toddler. I hope she gets a full apology from Delta ASAP, because this whole situation simply reeks. Would she have been treated the same if her daughter wasn't nursing? That is a good possibility and more likely than not.
I was bummed to read that some people were angry with her for writing a "misleading" Facebook post in the first place. Upset that they had taken her initial, frustrated sentences and ran with them, raining vitriol down upon Delta's social media accounts. I read several people saying we should wait for all the facts to come out before rushing to judgment, like TheBabyGuyNYC wisely advised more than once. But is that the fault of Momma Bean Stalk or of those who acted without knowing all the facts?
Social media is extremely powerful, and it's amazing for bringing both good things and bad to the forefront. This is a good lesson, though, in finding out all the facts before rushing to judgment. Yes, Delta was in the wrong, but everyone should have waited to find out more before going bananas.
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