KLM’s breastfeeding policy wants the mother to cover up and people are absolutely not having it

We have an airline update for you on this fine Thursday morning! No, it’s not about your delay or a canceled flight. Nor is it about traffic backing up at Schiphol. This airline update is about KLM’s official policy about women breastfeeding their child. Did you know that the Dutch airline requires the mother to cover herself when she is breastfeeding so as to not offend anybody? 

Yep, it’s true! You can see for yourself here!

This whole conversation was started over last weekend when Shelby Angel posted a warning on Facebook, telling mothers who are still breastfeeding their child to be weary with the airline after her experience with them. Long story short, she wanted to breastfeed her one-year-old child because it would help calm her down for the long flight from Amsterdam to San Francisco. It was then that a flight attendant approached her and told her “if you want to continue doing the breastfeeding, you need to cover yourself.” She left her with a warning of having to deal with the “issue” if someone complains. No one around her complained.

KLM’s reaction to this led to wide-spread controversy because people were not having it. Of course, their tweet does not mention anything about the person who might be offended at the sight of a mother feeding her child, because let’s make those people feel a whole lot more comfortable! Honestly KLM…
Personally, I would not have any problem if a woman is breastfeeding her child and obviously, a lot of people agree with me. The woman should be able to take a call about whether she and her child are more comfortable being covered or not. KLM, or anybody else, does not get to have a say in that. People are rejecting this archaic policy that KLM has and took to Twitter to express their anger.

It’s like this Dutch company is going backward in time!

It would be a welcome change to look at company policies, laws, opinions, and everything out there not worrying so much about controlling everything a woman is doing with her own body, and start focussing on the people who are trying to control it. People are even asking each other about other airlines they could use instead!

What has your experience been with breastfeeding during a flight, or in any public space in general? Let us know in the comments below!

Image by seeseehundhund from Pixabay
Kavana Desai
Kavana Desaihttps://medium.com/@kavanadesai
Coping with the aftermath of her 3-year stint in the Netherlands, Kavana is a writer, content creator and editor for DutchReview. Hailing from India, she frequently blogs about the Netherlands, being Indian in the Netherlands, and everything in between. She envisions herself to one day be the youngest person to win that Nobel Prize for Literature (she is also not very humble but welcomes only constructive criticism). In the meantime, she fills her days with writing for DutchReview, writing her master's thesis on art theft, and writing fiction that will hopefully see the light of day soon.

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