Nanny Knows Best

Nanny Knows Best
Dedicated to exposing, and resisting, the all pervasive nanny state that is corroding the way of life and the freedom of the people of Britain.

Tuesday, August 07, 2007

Nanny Bans Formula

Nanny Bans FormulaOnce Nanny had succeeded in banning smoking, I knew that it would not be very long before she turned her attention to banning something else (eg fat, booze). Sure enough, she has fixated on something else that she feels should be banned.

However, I never thought that it would be baby milk formula.

A coalition of Nanny type charities is demanding (note; "demanding" was the word used by the BBC, so it must be true) baby milk be treated like tobacco and subjected to a total advertising ban.

Whenever I hear the word "demand" in a statement from Nanny or her acolytes, I instinctively reach for my sick bag.

How farking arrogant and simple minded of these people!

Who do they think they are to "demand" anything???

I have to say, what society or planet do they inhabit?

Does it not occur to them that we actually live in a "democracy" and free market economy. Unless a product/service is actually illegal (eg heroin) it is perfectly within the remit of the law and society's mores for companies to advertise a product/service in order to create a demand for that product/service.

It's called the free farking market, get used to it Nanny!

Anyhoo, Nanny's chums in The National Childbirth Trust (NCT), Save The Children and Unicef are blaming adverts (how convenient) for many mothers abandoning breast feeding before the recommended six months.

These charities, who reside in Lah Lah Land, want Nanny to extend a ban on infant milk adverts to include "follow-on" milks for older babies.

Companies are currently not allowed to advertise formula milk for babies under six months.

Needless to say this little outburst by these people will do nothing for the self esteem of mothers who move on to feeding their sprogs with a bottle. Many mothers already feel an immense sense of guilt and failure when they move on to the bottle. This is standard Nanny tactics, make people feel worthless and guilty about their lives; that way they are easier to manipulate and can be made to depend on Nanny.

The charities are trying to compare milk companies to fag companies; note the subtle Nazi style word association/word dropping that they use, "tobacco companies" "loopholes" "cigarette" "exploit" "aggressively", so that people subconsciously start to feel a sense of revulsion over milk formula companies.

Here is Belinda Phipps, of the NCT, doing her bit for the propaganda machine:

"In similar ways to how tobacco companies found

their way through loopholes in legislation

restricting the advertising of cigarette promotion,

formula milk companies are finding ways to

exploit ambiguity in the law and to continue

aggressively marketing their products to parents
."

Dr Ellie Lee of the University of Kent, who has actually bothered to do some research, said the impact of advertising on the decision to switch from breast to bottle was "negligible".

Dr Lee found that the decision to bottle feed was a "pragmatic decision based on personal circumstances".

"Some do it because of the pain

of feeding or so they can feed their

child at more regular intervals,

some so they can share responsibility for

feeding the baby, others because they are

thinking of going back to work.

Many mothers feel an immense sense of guilt

and failure when they move on to the bottle,

and this latest debate about advertising

is likely to make them feel even worse
."

In other words, it is a decision that is best left to the individual to make based on her own personal circumstances. The trouble is that "individual decision making", whereby people think and decide for themselves, is an anathema to Nanny.

5 comments:

  1. Anonymous12:00 AM

    I live in the US and am a nurse. I used to work on a post-partum floor that employed"lactation consultants". We used to call the "nipple nazi's" because of their guilt tactics in trying to get everyone to breastfeed.

    Debbie

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  2. Anonymous8:34 AM

    As usual, Spiked Online gets it right: http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/article/3705/

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  3. Can I 'demand' that these 'charities' are banned as well ? It was people like them that almost caused the loss of my daughter by making my wife(*) continue to attempt breast feeding instead of using formula. It turned out that she was not producing enough milk and if she had not switched to formula then my daughter would have become malnourished (no doubt causing a visit by social services and a claim of neglect). As it happened my wife told them where to go, ignored their tactics to make her feel guilty and as a result we now have a happy and healthy five year old.

    (*) Can I say 'wife' or is that now a proscribed word to be replaced with a non-gender specific alternative ?

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  4. Anonymous4:15 PM

    It seems they are now pushing the publicity by associating their unpleasant beliefs with Katie Price, who appears to be identifiable as someone in the public eye.

    How unpleasant these people are. I have come to the conclusion that out charities, under the guiding hand of the current government mainly, have become overtly political bodies many of which simply should not exist at all, certainly not as charities. But they are convenient vehicles into which quango seekers on a mission can be placed.

    I am very selective about those to whom I give any spare cash these days, or indeed clothes for the many bags that seem to be pushed through our letterbox each week.

    Many of the louder organisations must be stooges of the political 'elite'.

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  5. Anonymous1:31 PM

    These "breast is best" campaigners make my blood boil!

    Like Kaptain_Von's wife, I found that I wasn't producing enough milk to feed my first baby. This was at the height of the "anyone can breast-feed" campaign of the 80s, and being faced with that slogan at every post-natal clinic made me feel that if "anyone" could breast feed, and I couldn't, then I obviously was somehow sub-human. (Not, I think, the best frame of mind to be in when you're trying to cope with all the demands of raising a new baby!) I was too demoralised to even attempt breast-feeding my subsequent children.

    My daughter had to abandon breast-feeding when her nipples (despite the use of all the protective products available) became so cracked that her baby was drinking more blood than milk!

    One thing I've always wondered about: if breast milk is the "perfect" food for a baby, why did the NHS give every breast-fed baby (but not bottle-fed babies) a prescription for vitamin drops?

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