I Find Myself Dumbstruck
Redefining 'Space Cadets'
Every once in awhile I encounter things that make me wonder. They appear to be unexplainable or at least baffling. At 74 there aren't too many things that are totally foreign to me. I'm not a world traveler or an academic know-it-all. Just someone who is well read, a newshound and always curious.
But increasingly I find myself dumbstruck: Blindsided by stories of inventions, of experiences, of incidents that just don't…well, make sense. They don't add up. They appear to contradict what we know is commonly understood to be real.
For instance, last month some female celebrities (that is how they describe themselves) decided it would be a good idea to go into space. One of those six women is married to Jeff Bezos, one of the world’s richest men.
The idea was to give young women something to aspire to. To empower all women to dream big, to expand their visions of who they are and what they can accomplish (other than marrying the richest man in the world, of course).
What could be more inspirational than seeing five attractive, well known females, experience the wonders of space?
So they scheduled a space shuttle flight into low orbit with Blue Origin, and embarked on a training program to prepare themselves for a few hours in space and the somewhat risky reentry into the atmosphere. Billed as an historic mission for women, the crew included Lauren Sánchez, Gayle King, Aisha Bowe, Amanda Nguyen, Katy Perry and Kerianne Flynn. The flight lasted only 11 minutes but it did send them 60 miles above earth into lower orbit, before they landed in the desert after parachuting their capsule to the ground.
What was shocking was the video coverage of their landing. If it was that easy to just float down, settle softly into the sand and then for the girls to step out in their fancy cadet-blue skin tight "space" suits, hair brushed, lipstick in place, high-fiving their ground crew. If it was that simple how come NASA has lost several astronauts when they burned up when reentering the Earth's atmosphere at 1200 MPH? How come they have to parachute into the ocean where they are jostled around while scores of coast guard rescue teams rush in to pluck them out before the capsule sinks?
OK, I understand that Mr. Bezos is using his fiance (Lauren Sanchez) and her celebrity girlfriends to promote future commercial space adventures. I know in the near future very wealthy people will be able to schedule their own Space Roller Coaster Ride and this was a great PR campaign to raise awareness while simultaneously culturally appropriating GirlPower!
But I can't help but feel like the whole narrative of going without any serious astronaut equipment (oxygen masks, pressurized helmets, etc.)while claiming the girls are all Real Astronauts is duplicitous and arrogant. It is like stealing valor, it misrepresents the serious difficulties and life threatening reality of space travel.
The exhibition was nothing more than a modern day amusement ride. Walt Disney would be proud.
Even more annoying is the wide ranging media circus that never bothered to ask any serious questions about the capsule and how it weathered reentry with no signs of heat fatigue or wear and tear. How the door that should have been sealed shut opened 'by accident' from the inside of the capsule? That is not supposed to happen but no major news organization 'noticed'. It was caught on tape and went viral, but even then the news media pretended it was just insignificant.
It was a dead giveaway that the whole thing was oversold, that it either didn't happen as they said it did, or at least the landing was rehearsed, staged or reenacted.
I wonder just when will citizens see how much information they are being denied. It is not always how the news is manipulated, and it is, but the problem is what is ignored that affects what people think. That is why judges in courtrooms have to monitor what the jury is allowed to see. Too much information may 'influence' people in the wrong way…
And we can't have people thinking the wrong way.