A man verbally attacked a mother for publicly breastfeeding her baby inside a Connecticut Target store, and video of the encounter went viral, Fox-61 reported Tuesday.
Video of the Monday outburst was posted online by Jessie Maher, who was sitting in the café section of the Torrington, Conn. store, feeding her young child around 11:30 a.m.
Before she began filming, a man stared at Maher and called the public breastfeeding “[expletive] disgusting,” Maher wrote on Facebook.
“Can’t you do that somewhere else?” the unidentified man angrily asked Maher, she wrote.
Maher, of Canton, Conn., said she told the man she had the right to breastfeed her child and that he should walk away.
In the video, the man asks a Target employee for a refund after witnessing Maher’s breastfeeding, later accusing the mother of being disrespectful.
“Because I’m feeding my baby, this man is going crazy—and I’m shaking,” Maher can be heard saying quietly.
Another customer soon comes to Maher’s aid, telling her that feeding her baby is a “beautiful moment.”
A line of Target employees later separate Maher from the man. One employee gestures toward the man, apparently asking him to leave.
Connecticut law protects women who choose to breastfeed in public. Target corporate policy also allows for breastfeeding in their stores.
The video recorded 2.5 million hits as of Tuesday morning.
Torrington is located 30 miles west of Hartford.
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