Right Entertainment

Following on the heels of Time Magazine’s breastfeeding photo controversy, now we have the making of a new red hot debate on the appropriateness of nursing babies in public, particularly by women in uniform. Terran Echegoyen-McCabe is an Air Force service member stationed in Fairchild Air Force Base in Washington state. She, along with her friend and fellow service member Christina Luna posed for breastfeeding pictures that have once again ignited a national debate.

Terran Echegoyen-McCabe is the mom on the left in the picture with the lighter colored hair. On the right is Christina Luna. The image is surreal to me in that they picture both women with huge smiles on their faces, which artistically associates what they are doing with enjoyment. It is no different than other product marketing campaigns that want consumers to purchase products like soap or automobiles. But in this case they are selling an idea, which is that breastfeeding in public is okay even for the military.

The pics are part of a activist campaign to promote the rights of women to breastfeed babies in public. They were shot by an excellent photographer named Brynja Sigurdardottir for a Facebook group called “Mom2Mom” set up to promote the issue. You can find the Facebook page right here and see 17 of the photos for yourself.

The purpose of the advocacy group is best described in the own words of these Air Force women: “We cannot begin to describe our feelings on this right now. We are so thankful, excited and so happy that this has spread to everyone! We hope that women will get our message and help spread the word. We are creating slogans for the images and making them into posters to be distributed everywhere we can. We appreciate and accept all help if anyone is interested!”

Although Terran Echegoyen-McCabe is in the Air Force reserves, she views her occupation as a full-time mother to her children in Spokane, Washington, where she lives with her awesome hubby. She graduated from Washington State University in 2011, the same year that her cute twin babies Fredi and Devon were born, one boy and one girl who are both cute as a button. She has an earlier degree in psychology from the University of Wollongong which is located in New South Wales, New Zealand. You can learn more about Terran on her Facebook page here. As for twins, that’s why God gave women two breasts and it is great that Brynja Sigurdardottir made room for both of them in the picture.

By the way, the women are aware that the photo of breastfeeding women in uniform is controversial.

We NEVER thought this photo would have been shared around the world and back twice over, This was going to be for the local airmen at Fairchild. However, We want everyone to realize that we never meant to cause commotion, disrespect or attention. These are just two beautiful women, who are in the military, breastfeeding their babies. We do not regret what we have done, we just hope the military and everyone else sees, that just because you are in uniform or not, you can breastfeed your baby without shame. We have done nothing wrong and we hope this will make changes to protect ALL women to breastfeed in public, in uniform or out.

Christina Luna, the other Air Force member in uniform on the right side of the frame has a Facebook page here that is not very well developed. She is a 27-year old dental technician who was stationed before at Ramstein AB. She likes the New York Giants football team so she is probably originally from there. She has an old MySpace page over there. Christina’s sweetie pie baby girl was born in April 2009.

As for the photographer herself, Brynja’s Facebook page is located here where you can see all 24 breastfeeding pictures from the awareness project plus some very sensual photoshoots of women models. She was born and raised in Iceland, and describes her artistic style this way: “Using natural light and creativeness. Focusing on originality, embodiment of human interaction and beauty! I capture moments, and real emotion.” She also has a dedicated website to her work and services which we will link to when it is back online. The public interest in her breastfeeding pics seems to have crashed the site. Her original website she used until 2011 is located here.

So is the photo of Terran Echegoyen-McCabe breastfeeding with Christina Luna in uniform appropriate or not? And on a more general level, how do our readers feel about Brynja Sigurdardottir’s project raising awareness to this issue?