COLUMBIA - In a Victoria's Secret store, surrounded by frilly bras and blown-up images of barely covered models, Lori Rueger says she was told to find somewhere else to breast feed.

Rueger's testimony in support of a bill to ensure breast feeding is allowed in public places so angered a state lawmaker that he's urging women to form a national Mothers Against Victoria's Secret movement.

"Why can't you teach Victoria's Secret a lesson," Rep. Walt McLeod, D-Little Mountain, said Wednesday as a committee took up the measure. "It's really kind of subhuman behavior. And subhuman behavior warrants some kind of strong response other than just a little law that we pass in South Carolina."

Rueger was one of more than a couple of dozen mothers, doctors, lawyers and other advocates of breast-feeding who were on hand to urge passage of the bill.

The 29-year-old Charleston mother testified that she was in a Victoria's Secret store in suburban Mount Pleasant and was told by an employee that she could not breast feed her baby in a dressing room and was encouraged to use a restroom in a nearby store instead.

"I can't really comprehend the human being who told you that," McLeod said

Tavish Brinton, a midwife from Lexington County, told the committee that it needs to send a strong message: "We need help the people of our state begin to learn: Breasts are not just marketing devices for everything from A to Z."

A Victoria's Secret spokesman described what happened with Rueger as a misunderstanding and said it has actually had a positive effect by reopening a dialogue on the issue.

Victoria's Secret has a "long-standing policy to allow nursing in our stores. We are still for and about women," said Anthony Hebron, spokesman for the chain's parent, Limited Brands.

With or without that retailer's support, the breast-feeding bill might face a tough time in the House Judiciary Committee next week from Rep. John Graham Altman, R-Charleston, who says he supports the concept but not the mandate on businesses.

"I can't imagine the fascist sort of government we Republicans are running up here," he said.

"We're supposed to be helping businesses."