Petition calls for new law to protect mothers who breastfeed in public in France

A petition calling for a new law to protect breastfeeding mothers from harassment in public has gathered some 22,400 signatures, as campaigners say hostile stares, comments and even physical incidents remain common across France.

Nothing in French law currently prohibits breastfeeding in public, with the Code du Travail explicitly protecting breastfeeding mothers, giving employees the right to one hour a day for breastfeeding during working hours, for a year from the birth of their child. 

Campaigners say this leaves a gap: there is no specific legal protection against public harassment of breastfeeding mothers, and a 2021 bill on the issue, brought by then-MP Fiona Lazaar, was never voted on.

Real life experience: 'People tell me I should hide'

Mylène, a mother of three boys from Seine-et-Marne (Ile-de-France) who is expecting a daughter, has breastfed each of her children and says she regularly faces disapproving comments from strangers as a result.

She says she has been told she ‘should hide’ or asked whether she ‘couldn't do it somewhere else.’ 

Because she has chosen to breastfeed her children until the age of two, she says she is frequently on the receiving end of disapproving looks, or told to ‘find another spot’ with some people telling her outright that breastfeeding in public ‘wasn't appropriate.’

Mylène has since made the right to breastfeed in public one of the causes she champions on social media, where she says hostility towards breastfeeding mothers is often at its worst: people hiding behind anonymity to make comments about a personal choice, she says.

Other accounts reported by AFP go further still, including one woman who says she was spat at by an older woman while breastfeeding her baby at a cafe terrace.

The petition

The petition was launched on Change.org in early July by the collective "J'ai faim, je mange" I'm hungry, I eat). 

Its creator, Anastasia Cailly, says that while breastfeeding is a legal right in France, mothers regularly face obstacles to exercising it - from disapproving looks and remarks to venues open to the public refusing to let mothers breastfeed on the premises.

Ms Cailly says that changing attitudes is the priority. She says the female body and breasts are constantly sexualised, and that it is time to recognise their natural function is to feed a child, not to arouse men - breastfeeding in public is not exhibitionism but a response to a child's needs.

The petition calls for the creation of a specific criminal offence covering "hindering, intimidating, discriminating against or humiliating" a person breastfeeding in a place where they are legally entitled to be.

The petition is also calling for a national campaign to reinforce the message that breastfeeding is a right, and not a nuisance, an obscenity or an act of incivility, alongside better training for staff in public-facing businesses so such incidents don't arise in the first place, and a coherent public policy of support for mothers in line with health authorities' recommendations. 

Ms Cailly adds that supporters would also like to see more spaces set aside for breastfeeding or bottle-feeding, stressing that the aim of any campaign is not to single out breastfeeding mothers, but to make clear that every mother is free to feed her child however she chooses, and that all approaches have their place in public life.

There are plans to hold photo sessions across France on September 27 in support of "the right to feed your child in public."

In 2024, The Connexion reported parents in France are breastfeeding their babies for longer now than they were 10 years ago but the country still has some way to go to catch up with other countries.