I do hope our friend who came over last night to berate you comes over again to read all the responses.

I NIP'd many, many times, including at a baseball game with thousands of attendees, and I don't think I ever had someone complain.

People need to get over the fact that infants and toddlers need to eat.

What is the brouhaha about breastfeeding?  OMG.  As you point out, all one needs to do is NOT LOOK.  As for me, I think breastfeeding is beautiful.  I formed an opinion only after I became a mom and had children -- I didn't even think of it before that time in my life and couldn't have cared less about moms choosing to breastfeed in public.  It seems the MOST natural thing in the world.

WHY DO PEOPLE CARE?  In this country we seem so upside down about the human body and its natural functions.

This seems to be such an issue of CONTROLLING others at the whim of whomever.

One of the commenters at kos was making fun of the fact that maybe this was somehow related to a terrorist booby.... i thought the only terrorist booby we have is in the white house --

quick cover him up!

My first child went into childcare at 8 weeks, and we kept on nursing a couple of times a day for about 6-8 months, but gradually she chose to do other things, and liked the bottle.

My second....well, I was an at-home mom first of all, so I could nurse on demand.  He was (is) a super cuddler, and REFUSED a bottle (except sometimes his big sister could coax him to drink a little).  Nursing just seemed easier, more convenient, etc.

I nursed in all sorts of places, and kept a mental list of "places S and I nursed".  To this day, I can't go to the Metroplitan Museum's Scupture Court without smiling!

But seriously, I nursed in public countless times, at Starbucks, in parks, on busses, at the Savoy when Jess was 5 months and I got invited to a poshy high tea. The tea at the Savoy was actually funny, because I was invited by a  contact and she brought a colleague. The professional contact had a big story about how disgusted she was to have to sit next to a BF woman on a recent flight in business class. I was just nodding along, but the colleague turned to me and we then proceeded to have about a 10-minute conversation about breastfeeding, as she had a 10-month old son and was bf him and had bf her two older children as well. We went over the fine points of expressing (manual v electric pump), lactating on the road (pump and dump, or take a cooler?), the pros and cons of extended bf, etc., etc. All very, very seeeriously. The first woman just didn't know what to say and ended up necking a few extra cups of tea! I guess you could say it was a verbal bf protest!

I was always comfortable with breast feeding, as my mom bf me and my younger sister (not that I'd remember my experience, of course!). As a result, I've always had a very warm feeling seeing women bf their children.

I guess we do not know the entire story, perhaps the flight attendant asked nicely the mom escalated and it all turned ugly, who knows, but the point is that the attendant should not have even asked.  I guess the only possible defense I can muster for the flight attendant is that the kid was almost 2 and technically did not need to nurse, since milk was not its only form of sustenance.  But what, she should mind her own business.

My only exposure to NIP which could be misconstrued as "offensive" was on the bus.  Kid of about 3 or 4 would hike up mom's shirt and latch on.  The rest of us passengers just looked away.  I am very much pro breastfeeding, but I think past 2 or so, it is more of a binky/blankie type thing for the child vs. nourishment.

At the end of that drive, we reached my aunt's house for a family occassion -- maybe 30 people, with 10 kids under the age of 12, most of whom had been breastfed.  My mother, however, was appalled at the thought (she thought I should have weaned him at six weeks, at this time he was 5 months old and I had 8 more months of harrassment from my mother to go!)  Anyway, my mother informed me that I should not nurse my baby in front of people, that my aunt would be offended.  So I took him up to the master bedroom, and sat in my aunts rocker for 20 minutes.  No problem.  Except my aunt was more offended that we had disappeard.  The next time he nursed, we sat in the living room, with people filtering by, and noone (except my mother who turned her back and scowled) noticed.  

Recently we had an incident near here, again with a teenage male, where he was the lifeguard at the public pool and asked a mother to leave the pool area. He got pretty thoroughly slammed too. But when you consider what a granola/free spirit area this is (north coast California), it's kind of surprising that things like that would still happen here.

Also, Mothering Magazine recently did an interview with Emily Gilette.

I've breastfed babies on planes...again, no problem.  In fact, most literature suggests doing so as it eases the pressure in the ears.