On April 14, 2025, a gaggle of rich, privileged woman lumbered into the second richest person in the world’s toy du jour to set the world on fire by making an 11 minute flight to the borders of space. Upon returning to earth, their sentiments were note-worthy — in their inanity. First, Gayle King, “journalist” and more important Oprah Winfrey’s best friend, labeled critics and non-believers “disrespectful” and took refuge in that time-honored tradition of unserious women —bashing men. “You never see a man, a male astronaut, who’s going up in space [disrespected]…”
Next up was pop singer, Katy Perry who in a jaw-dropping minute got on her knees and kissed the ground apparently to indicate her new-found love affair with planet earth. Unfortunately, her gesture didn’t have the desired effect even among those similarly blessed with money and fame —“Like, this is beyond parody. You say that you care about Mother Earth…and you go up in a spaceship that is built and paid for by a company that is single-handedly destroying the planet … [model and actress Emily Ratajkowsk onTikTok]. Sentiments shared by 320,00 people. Not content with that silliness and putting to rest the high-minded sentiments of Blue Origin’s propagandists, Katy boasted —”We are going to put the ‘ass’ in astronaut.” [Katy Perry in Elle]
What a spectacle! Sadly hundreds of thousands tuned in to watch six women cavorting in a space ship, carrying water for a master manipulator. How else to explain the carefully scripted glamour shots of these women in their specially designed “space suits” displaying a hint of cleavage, trying to look both sexy and serious.
Bezos, the ringmaster of this galactic circus, in his benediction to the crew before launch managed to make what seemed like a rich woman’s pleasure jaunt into a travesty: “I am so excited for you. When you get back, I can’t wait to hear how it changed you. See you soon. God speed!” He’s kidding, right?
The combined net worth of these six women is around one-half billion dollars. Some of the rest of us, particularly the 300,000 women who experienced homelessness in 2024, are less concerned with “expanding humanity’s presence in space…” [Blue origin marketing pitch] and more concerned with getting a more equitable deal on earth. Consider how poorly women fare in the U.S. compared to their sisters in other high-income countries. With the highest rate of maternal deaths and the highest healthcare costs, they have the grim choice of not surviving the birth process or finding a way to pay for it. How about the inequity that bedevils the working life of every woman in the U.S.— making 82¢ for every $1.00 men make while doing the same job?
The woman’s rights movement (i.e. woman’s lib) hasn’t always been a playground of rich, entitled women who march to the tune of their fabulously wealthy male overlords. Six decades ago in the 60s and 70s top priority was on expanding women’s rights here on earth. Little things like challenging traditional gender roles, defying social norms that limited women’s access to contraception and abortion and fighting for equal opportunity and equal pay in the workplace.
It was a fluid movement open to all women who dreamed of changing the world. Radical statement-oriented women picketed the 1968 Miss America pageant railing against the traditional metrics for winning particularly breast size. Another cadre conducted “sit-ins” at bars and restaurants which would not serve unescorted women. The most militant sat in at offices of the Ladies Home Journal and Newsweek protesting their clinging to old stereotypical notions about women’s place in the social order.
Not all the women challenging the patriarchy were demonstrators. Some chose a different route focusing on lobbying the centers of power at the federal, state and local level. They campaigned for accessible and affordable day care facilities for working women (which still hasn’t happened), fought for abortion rights and safe shelters for abused women and lobbied local school boards across the country to include women’s studies programs in their curriculum.
It was in this era that their political action helped get federal affirmative action laws passed, “allowing” women to enroll in military colleges (West Point in 1976) and Ivy League schools (Princeton and Yale in 1969}
The highpoint of this activity was the 1977 National Women’s Conference in Houston. It must be admitted that the women attending the conference (over 20,000 from all 50 states) probably wouldn’t have described their experience as “profound” as the woman, a millionaire in her own right soon to be the wife of the second richest man in the world, opined after her flight to outer space. No financial requirements or cleavage size blocked women from joining the movement. By the standards of the six women who imagined they were on a mission whose objective was “to figure out a way to harness the waste here and… to put it in space, to make the planet Earth a better place… “[crew member Gayle King worth $40 million), the demands of these revolutionary women must have seemed mundane. Free daycare, access to contraception and abortions, career opportunities in formerly all-male occupations and so much more to reshape the lives of women and girls here on earth. Come to think of it, many important reforms (like equal pay for equal work, government-provided day care, improvement in the survival rate of women in childbirth) are unmet today, half a century later.
How about another space flight dedicated to the unmet earthly needs of the vast majority of all women on earth?
