Julie Bowen of Modern Family recently shared a picture with George Lopez of her breastfeeding her twins in a move called the “double football hold.” Unsurprisingly, that photo, seen below, created a public outcry and claimed that the picture was offensive and shocking.

The squeamish response is unsurprising given previous outcries in recent years. In 2006, Babytalk, a free parenting magazine consumed mostly by mothers, received a backlash from offended parties when they featured a cover of a nursing baby in profile. The magazine received over 700 letters, comments included:

I was SHOCKED to see a giant breast on the cover of your magazine,” one person wrote. “I immediately turned the magazine face down,” wrote another. “Gross,” said a third.

One mother who didn’t like the cover explains she was concerned about her 13-year-old son seeing it.

“I shredded it,” said Gayle Ash, of Belton, Texas, in a telephone interview. “A breast is a breast, it’s a sexual thing. He didn’t need to see that.”

“Gross, I am sick of seeing a baby attached to a boob,” wrote Lauren, a mother of a 4-month-old.

Here is the “controversial” cover:

Angelina Jolie created a similar uproar in November, 2008 when she appeared on the cover of W Magazine nursing one of her newborn twins. Along with general discomfort, people responded to the breastfeeding image as something inherently sexual and claimed that the cover photo “sexualized” the act of nursing.

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…doing nothing.

Right.  That’s realistic.

Rebecca Romijn was photographed and applauded for being back in shape mere weeks after her pregnancy and giving birth to twins. In a recent interview, she told Extra! that she lost 35 pounds in about 3 weeks by breastfeeding.

Romijn’s close to losing the 60 pounds she gained during her pregnancy and get this…She’s done it without a workout plan. “I think within the first three weeks, I took off like 35 pounds without doing anything!” Okay, almost anything. “I haven’t been able to work out that much because I have twins. It’s impossible to get back into a regular schedule.” So, what is her secret to dropping the pounds? “Breastfeeding is the very best diet I’ve been on. It’s amazing. It’s like you have to eat 5,000 extra calories a day or you can’t produce enough food for them.

Breastfeeding burns approximately 500 calories/day and women lose approximately 1-2 pounds/week. Salma Hayek is the only celebrity that I’ve heard speak honestly about pregnancy, baby, weight gain, weight loss and breastfeeding.

I wrote a similar piece in October when the tabloids were printing pictures of Angelina Jolie 11 weeks after twins.

In this week’s Us Magazine, we have yet ANOTHER story of success: a new mother of twins sheds all her baby weight after a mere 11 weeks.  How did she do it, you ask?  Oh, ya know, it’s just an illusion created by a “good dress.” Oh, and by receiving deliveries of assorted Asian fruit and vegetables, mussels, crabs and prawns.  No exercise, though.  Nope.  Just good genes and the usual claim: breast feeding! Salma Hayek spoke out against this myth. As she said to Oprah, “The only way women lose weight this way is by not eating AND breast feeding…and this is bad for the baby.”  Amen, sister.

The emphasis on unhealthy, often deadly, thinness is bad enough but to add that same pressure on pregnant women and new mothers moments after delivery is ludicrous! This signals an unhealthy and potentially dangerous trend by creating unrealistic expectations for ordinary women that don’t have the time of the means to devote their all of their energy to weight loss. Not to mention, even with the time and money, baby weight gain is not designed to fall off immediately.  No matter who you are (Nicole, Angelina, Jessica, Katie).

Bump watch has taken over the tabloids in a furious and obsessive way over the last few years and includes the intense scrutiny and public commentary on how much weight pregnant celebrities gained and how much they lost soon after birth.  Salma Hayek was absolutely chastised for not losing her pregnancy weight immediately after her daughter was born. which is one of the reasons she chose to publically address this craze on national television.