Blue Origin’s recent space flight, featuring an all-female crew, has elicited mixed reactions, ranging from admiration for its extravagance to criticism for its perceived superficiality. 12 seconds of ascent Last week’s flight lasted a total of just 11 minutes. It included cultural icons such as CBS anchor Gayle King and pop star Katy Perry. Tickets for this unique journey reportedly ranged from zero to an astonishing $28 million, highlighting the exclusivity of the event.
Lauren Sánchez served as co-host of the mission with Jeff Bezos, founder, and Executive Chairman of Blue Origin. She explained it to us as feeling like a really chill brunch date. She proclaimed, “We’re going to have lash extensions flying in the capsule!” This tongue-in-cheek comparison does a great job of illustrating the glitzy halo surrounding space travel. It depicts the experience as approachable, more than just an academic pursuit.
It was Blue Origin’s own media channel that uniquely captured the gravity of the entire experience. Yet its glowingly laudatory depiction of the mission has earned it the nickname of Pravda. The flight’s aesthetic was focused on glamor and style, with Sánchez maintaining that space travel would be a fashionable, chic experience. Katy Perry struck the same chord, affirming that the universal trek was most definitely going to be glamorous.
By no means though was the flight without its critics. This has led some critics to lament the mission as a step backward for women’s progress. They contend that it erodes the hard-won gains that women have made in science and technology. As one commentator remarked, the whole experience was like a RyanAir flight to Tallinn. They further likened it to watching an arbitrary three-minute song performance on quick time of a song called Space Cowgirl. Since the flight, the term “plastic feminist gesture” has radicalized this conversation. It begs the crucial question of how far it really goes to move the needle on women’s issues.
In a fun surprise addition, to test their space-friendly hair products in microgravity, flight participants were joined by former NASA rocket scientist, Janelle Weldon. This very different kind of demonstration included the goal of testing hair care’s effectiveness in microgravity. It also added a thrilling layer of drama and showmanship to the mission.
As echoed in the criticisms, despite this negative symbolic framing, the flight was structured as an Important Mission, a vital gift from Bezos and Sánchez personally. The unique all-female crew was a milestone for women’s representation in aerospace. Many communities are rightfully cynical about the earnestness of this gesture.
The responses to this space flight are illustrative of a much larger discussion around representation and authenticity in women’s accomplishments. As many celebrate the event as historic, others on the outside wonder what it means for real change in the name of gender equality.
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