The Skeptical OB

Do the purported benefits of breastfeeding really exist or are they merely artifacts of wealth, health and privilege. A new paper dramatically demonstrates what happens to the benefits of breastfeeding when you take confounding variables into account. The paper is To what extent does confounding explain the association between breastfeeding duration and cognitive development up […]

The organizing principle of contemporary mothering ideology (aka attachment parenting) is NOT nature as its proponents like to pretend. It’s not intuition as its most stalwart ideologues insist. And it’s certainly not science. The organizing principle of contemporary mothering ideology is FEAR. Every aspect, from natural childbirth to breastfeeding to baby wearing, is designed to […]

One of the greatest ironies of radical feminism is that it is both disrespectful to women and harmful to the feminist project. Consider this comment left on my Facebook page by a radical feminist: [H]ow does anyone, not only women, make decisions in a patriarchal society that aren’t limited by patriarchal structures? Have you developed […]

Over the past week or so I’ve engaged with a number of radical feminists who have a remarkably dismissive view of women. They appear to believe that — against the background of historical and ongoing patriarchal oppression — women are incapable of making authentic choices about their own lives. Any decisions they make about makeup, […]

Yesterday I critiqued Kate Cohen’s recent piece in The Washington Post, Sorry, but these choices aren’t ‘feminist.’ They’re sexist. on substantive grounds. It isn’t specific choices that make women feminists; it is the conviction that choices should be made BY them, not FOR them. It’s anti-feminist for women to knuckle under to specific choices prescribed […]

Another day, another misguided feminist who mistakenly believes she has the right to define feminism. Writing in The Washington Post, Kate Cohen feels it necessary to tell us what she thinks about other women’s personal choices, in this case women like Jennifer Lopez who change their surname after marriage: … some claim that changing their […]

Anti-choice advocates say they oppose abortion because it stops a beating heart. They say it makes no sense to have a rape or incest exception because it’s not the fault of the beating heart that it was conceived through violence. That’s rather difficult to believe when the exact same people also say that capital punishment […]

‘Breast is Best’ or ‘Fed is Best’? A Study of Concessive Relations in the Debate on Methods of Infant Feeding is a fascinating new paper about the rival claims of the Breast Is Best vs. Fed Is Best movements. The paper was written by linguistics professor, Giorgia Riboni. As a linguist, she analyzes the claims […]

One of the most contentious aspects of the currently roiling debate about the rights of transgender persons is that both sides imagine that they are defending the principle of justice. Trans advocates are absolutely, positively, unalterably convinced that justice REQUIRES not merely acceptance of transgender individuals, but capitulation to all their demands. Anyone who doesn’t […]

The American Academy of Pediatrics recently released guidelines promoting breastfeeding each child for two years — despite the fact that there is NO scientific evidence for the recommendation. How did that happen? When you let lactivist zealots make breastfeeding policy, you end up with breastfeeding policies that ignore scientific evidence in favor of lactivists’ cherished […]