The space race no one asked for – why Katy Perry’s flight misses the mark

Once upon a time, there was a pop Princess called Katy. She had kissed a girl and liked it, lived like a teenage dream and at times, was hot and cold. She was brave and daring and traversed the world sharing her musical talents. Along the way there were frogs she kissed until she finally found her Prince in full bloom.

While the production lines of perfect pop hits had halted, in the land of daisies, she would remain a bona fide musical legend. The people she reigned over didn’t want for much. A few catchy tunes here and there would have sufficed. They had no need or desire for acts of an elaborate nature. The world was burning, and in America, they couldn’t afford eggs, so the want was for the Princess to keep it light and airy. Stay in your lane, please, miss.

As the world order continued to be dismantled by an evil wizard who rolled around in orange paint and plotted trade wars in a big white house everyday, the public wasn’t exactly clamoring for a second wave of girlboss feminism, and they certainly didn’t need a troupe of ultra-privileged women blasting off into space for approximately 11 minutes. But that’s exactly what happened, and the Princess took flight. As she descended back to Earth, questions swirled: had she returned the same woman, or been quietly replaced by an acid-loving alien with a penchant for long-winded sermons one would only hear at midnight in the dark corner of a smoking area?

“I feel super connected to love,” she professed. “I think this experience has shown me you never know how much love is inside of you, like how much love you have to give, and how loved you are until the day you launch.”

Her people were bewildered – had she taken shrooms? Was she pulling our leg in the hopes of getting a comedic reaction? It seems the Princess was genuine in her oratory. Not only did she believe her capacity for tenderness had expanded as she gazed down at an Earth writhing in suffering, she also believed that this particular group of women would, in her words, “put the ass in astronaut.”

This story sounds like a fairytale noir or a satirical Black Mirror episode, but it’s not. This is real life. This happening. This is the world we inhabit. This is us.

Along with five other women, including Oprah’s best friend Gayle King and Lauren Sánchez, the fiancée of Jeff Bezos, Katy Perry went into space for no apparent reason. It’s a bit like deciding to drive to a McDonald’s drive-thru at 3 am just because you suddenly realised you’re an adult and have free will. This nonchalant trip into the atmosphere wasn’t to aid mankind or extricate life-saving information that will save us all from the apocalyptic prophecy of our own making. No, this was a girls’ trip disguised as a marketing stunt for Jeff Bezos’s space tourism side hustle – an intergalactic influencer brand trip, if you will.

Even more bizarrely, the women involved tried to gaslight the world into believing this was feminism’s next frontier. “Take up space,” they shouted while wearing Power Ranger-esque jumpsuits. They encouraged young girls to never give up on their goals and strive for more. Khloe Kardashian, who watched the launch from land, said she became emotional and encouraged us to “dream big, wish for the stars, and one day, you could maybe be amongst them.”

 

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Just when you think celebrities and billionaires can’t get any more out of touch, all of their senses disintegrate. Firstly, women would much rather take up space in arenas where it matters. We’d much prefer to not be fighting for basic bodily autonomy – or quite possibly not being raped and murdered by men – while rich people play astronaut. Unless you’re a five-year-old with a Buzz Lightyear toy or an adult with a severe surplus of wealth and boredom, nobody really wants to go to space. We have all but butchered this planet, please don’t let us near another – we’ll end up killing that one as well.

Instead, people on Earth want to be able to pay for their groceries without checking their bank balance mid-aisle. They want affordable housing, functioning healthcare, childcare that doesn’t cost more than a mortgage, knowing that their kids will grow up in a world not constantly ravaged by fire or deluged by floods. We don’t want to nip to the stratosphere for a pint of milk. We don’t want a selfie taken in zero gravity. We just want to live a life that is fair and just.

This trip highlights the ever-growing chasm between the ultra-rich and the rest of us. This world is prejudiced and inequitable. The majority of individuals will wrestle to survive, clinging to the scraps of light we find. All the while, the big men with their stupid toys make reckless decisions that enrich our ruination and augment their bank balances. Children are dying from hunger, while a celebrity singer drifts in a spacecraft, casually unveiling the setlist for her next concert and acting like she uncovered the gospel truth of existence. The truth is, we’re living in a dystopian nightmare. This was never a fairytale.

So, what happened to the pop princess in the end?

Well, she returned from space, her feet finally touching the ground.

But the people thought she should’ve just stuck to the music.