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You quoted me in this article, which is fine, but you took my statements completely out of context. You also failed to use your connection to someone who has been intimately involved in Forest Park politics–and the person who sent you the original ordinance– to ensure that you got your facts straight. Frankly, I feel rather betrayed given that this blog post is not at all reflective of the conversations you and I had when I was informing you about what was going on in Forest Park. Everyone who writes knows that you don’t burn sources and you let them see what you’re writing about and know their perspective, but I’d rather just address some of the erroneous contentions in your article:

1. You are correct that the ordinance is not solely targeted to breastfeeding. However, I’m a bit surprised that someone with a law degree would see this as relevant. Single lines, single sentences and even single words in ordinances are frequently and regularly used to infringe upon people’s rights. Further, as far as the law and the courts are concerned, it doesn’t matter whether a law devotes on sentence to banning some forms of public breastfeeding or devotes a hundred pages to doing so. The effect is the same, the enforcement is the same, and the fact that the ordinance is violative of Georgia law is the same. Further,the fact that the law associates breastfeeding with public nudity and general lewdness should be disconcerting to those who support public breastfeeding, not a consolation.

2. It is incorrect that breastfeeding acttivists immediately staged a protest without exploring other options. Numerous people called the city council, which is precisely what one is supposed to do in a democracy. The city council, and specifically the city manager, were unresponsive to the point of laughing at breastfeeding women and had no intentions of changing the law until the nurse-in occurred. One could easily interpret your post as a screed against any form of activism and citizen engagement. I am unclear what you would have citizens do when their government is unresponsive if you are opposed to petitions, calling the government and protests.

3. you argue that we should look critically at whether the stretegies employed by the breastfeeding community are effective. It seems, indeed, that they were. Immediately after the protest, the city announced its plans to change the law, and did so at the next city council meeting. They had no intention of doing so until the protest occurred, and made public statements to that effect–public statements of which you were aware when you wrote this blog post.

4. You argue that militance and failing to celebrate small victories harms the cause of breastfeeding. What, specifically, is the small victory breastfeeding women should have been celebrating when this law was passed? What, specifically, is militant about lobbying one’s government?

5. Women are far more likely to decide not to nurse when threatened with imprisonment for doing so than when faced with hundreds of women publicly supporting nursing. What evidence do you have to cite your contention that lobbying a government to change its laws is more harmful than arresting women for breastfeeding?

6. You allude to an angry mob. Please point specifically to the angry mob that descended on Forest Park. In your post, you yourself state that the protests were not only effective, but also peaceful.