Well, Time magazine succeeded in getting its name out at the forefront of peoples’ minds again – after noticing a continuing downward trend in sales the last few years. They accomplished this by publishing a magazine with a cover picture of what would easily be considered child porn if it weren’t camouflaged under the category of “breastfeeding” – Actually challenging under the title of “Are You Mom Enough?”
Now, as predicted, comes all the debate back and forth – we have breastfeeding mums promoting the beauty of breastfeeding, the culture warriors blaming the “media” for their ability to sexualize breastfeeding, the contingency that is in favor of “freedom of expression” hailing the move by Time magazine and those in favor of the promotion of porn in all its glory, running in to get their copy.
In analyzing the cover, I noticed that the “mother” is posing quite provocatively and staring directly into the camera – no look of nurturing to be found anywhere. I would say the stance is rather defiant. The supposed “three” year old is also looking directly at the camera and his stance is nowhere near that of a breastfeeding child. His arms are straight down in front of him and it actually looks like he is being pushed toward the breast by the mother – one of the reasons it screams “child porn”. Time magazine has the audacity to suggest by the caption that if you’re not breastfeeding a “three” year old – (in this provocative manner), you’re possibly not up to the task – yes – you’re NOT MOM ENOUGH!
For all of us that are “outraged” at the capacity of Time magazine to turn the life giving act of breastfeeding into a sexually provocative act, I don’t think we can really be surprised if we’re honest. Of course every day we witness new lows to which we find ourselves exposed and while initially we may react with outrage, we gradually accept the new norms as our status quo.
Take for example the fact that not so long ago, people didn’t want anyone to know if they were “indulging” in premarital sex. These days if you’re NOT indulging – something must be WRONG with you! No one discussed bedroom matters openly – these were private and even sacred as in the “marital act”. Now, we have shows and movies based purely on the sexual escapades of people and we are even sectioning society based on their sexual “preferences”. No topic is taboo any more. At one time we protected and defended life by banning abortion. Today, we have women (and men) touting “freedom” of choice to end one life in order to make another life more comfortable. Oh, by the way, rape and incest features in the choice only about 0.5% (that’s half of one percent) of the time. Google this and you’ll have plenty of studies and data proving this statement. Out of the over fifty million babies that were massacred since Roe V Wade, almost all were because of the “inconvenience” factor.
I was in tenth grade when I decided to be “cool” like some of my friends and incorporated some words like “damn” and “bloody” into my everyday vocabulary, much to the dismay (to say the least) of my family. Those words actually sound nice compared to all that is part of the course today. If everyone’s saying it, it’s got to be fine – right? Accountability is overtly discouraged and we often focus the discussion more on what we can get away with. We talk about what might not be “moral” but might not actually be illegal. Take for example the woman (no, not a lady!) who won several million dollars in a lottery but was still claiming unemployment because she now had two homes! While it was being discussed in the media, they opined that while it didn’t sit well “morally” she hadn’t broken any laws – encouraging some congressmen to create laws specifically for situations like these. Seriously – we actually need specific laws to say that we cannot rip the government or others off? Wow!
We have become a society that is intent on exploring not how high can we go but how low can we sink and still get away with it. Why should the Time magazine cover outrage us? They are just doing what they know will generate a ton of revenue. I say “Good for them” – until we as a society can prove the contrary.
To those of us who really want to change the status quo, I say it’s “Time” to take up the magazine’s challenge to be MOTHERS and FATHERS ENOUGH to get involved – to condemn the crime toward our kids by having them (and all of us) exposed to this cover in our local grocery stores; exposed to the culture of relativism which includes child porn. Let’s take a stand against Time magazine – educating them on the fact that it is covers like theirs that cause teens and adults to think along the lines of child pornography and then act out this perversion toward our innocent kids. Of course in that case, the media will decry the atrocity and talk ad nauseum about how to identify and ostracize a “child abuser” – when all the time, the media helped create the monster!
Here is Time Magazine’s contact info: http://www.timeinc.com/contactus/
