Brangelina's Most Welcome "Controversy"

F THERE WAS A CARD FOR LA LECHE LEAGUE MEMBERS, I WOULD TOTE IT. So it should come as no surprise that I am awestruck by the beauty of W magazine’s cover of Angelina Jolie nursing one of her twins.

In the picture, said to be taken by Brad Pitt himself, Angelina has one side of her night gown pulled down as though an infant is suckling just out of sight.

This latest publicity campaign is a continuation of Angelina’s boobie bravado, first seen when she revealed her nursing bra under a tank top in a photo with a wee Shiloh in People.

For me, though, this latest photo is salve to the provocative photographs that W published in 2005 of Brad and Angelina. Posing as a large and lustful family, the pictures came out when “Brangelina” was still a new – and unwelcome -- public concept. The latest snaps of Angelina as the actual mother to Brad’s children comes off as a satisfied “I told you so” to the people who doubted their relationship in the beginning.

I also find it daring of the Jolie-Pitts, since breastfeeding seems perpetually controversial. While Angelina looks like the Madonna herself on her newest cover, Jamie Lynn Spear’s stolen breastfeeding pictures are considered pornography because she’s a minor. What is wrong with Americans’ view of women when Hollywood careers are built by women baring breasts, but a young mother can’t safely be photographed feeding her infant? As a spokesperson for La Leche League told the AP, there’s more skin shown on the red carpet than on Ang's W cover, as well as by ordinary mothers when breastfeeding .

Will Angelina and Jamie Lynn help boost the breastfeeding cause? Already, nursing is reaching record numbers in the United States. That number would go higher if PETA had its way; the animal rights group recently suggested that mothers “donate” their breast milk to Ben and Jerry’s for ice cream.

So now we have the dueling messages that it’s pornographic for a 16-year-old to be photographed nursing her baby -- but that the succor that supports life also makes great shakes? PETA’s psychosis only further feeds the misunderstanding of women’s bodies in our country.

Breasts are made to feed babies. Whether flashed on the red carpet, used as weapons of exaggerated activism, or to nurse the newborns of unwed startlets, that is their one, true purpose. The peace in Angelina’s W magazine cover attests to that.

MzEll is a stay-at-home mom who writes, reads, knits, and tries to maintain sanity on a regular basis. You can read her blog at Cookiemonks.

Posted October 14, 2008