The Celeb stars behind the Blue Origin mission, led by angry Gayle King and Lauren Sanchez, have made a quick move to defend their journey.
It’s been just four days since the New Shepard NS-31 mission on April 14, and the lucky celebrity astronauts are already well aware of criticism aimed against them. The spacegoers hosted a press conference after the flight – and in many cases only made critics angrier with their righteous justification of the trip.
In the special invite-only mission – hosted by Jeff Bezos’ aerospace company Blue Origin – the all-female crew took a rocket to space in a journey lasting only 11 minutes, but thought to have cost millions. Bezos’ partner Lauren Sanchez was the person to fill the limited seats, and opted to bring pop star Katy Perry, CBS News journalist Gayle King, aerospace engineer Aisha Bowe, film producer Kerianne Flynn, and civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen for her intergalactic tour.
The highly-publicised celeb trip to the stars naturally incited plenty of criticism, with many people pointing out how the money could be used to help those suffering on solid ground. Speaking after the flight, the celebs blasted any idea that their trip was morally wrong – and said that no one had a right to criticise them unless they’d been to space themselves.
Gayle King – who previously called critics of the journey ‘sexist’ – offered one of the most controversial comments in defence of the trip, asking critics during an interview with Extra: “Have y’all been to space? Have you been to space?
Go to space, or go to Blue Origin, and observe how they behave before returning and saying, “This is a terrible thing. Costs it? Yes. However, one of the things they’re trying to do is that it shouldn’t be that expensive if there are enough people interested.
King reacted in a second blatantly titled, “This is what bothers me, because I’ve certainly read some of the things online – coming from people I know, I like, and I consider friends!”
She later stated, “Your space activities are attempting to improve things here on Earth.” The goal of Blue Origin is to find a way to make our planet cleaner by placing the waste there.
King responded to the official press conference with a similarly passionate defense of the star-studded journey by saying, “I feel anyone that’s criticizing doesn’t really understand what’s happening here.
Sanchez quickly accepted the microphone, who re-entered Bezos’ website despite the cost and exclusivity of doing so. She says, “I get really excited about this because I would love to have them visit Blue Origin.”
“See the thousands of employees who put their heart and soul into this vehicle instead of just working here.” Rocket scientists, engineers, and anyone else involved. They are passionate about both their work and their mission. And since it’s such a big deal for them, I simply say, “Truth me, come with me, and I’ll show you what it’s about” whenever I hear comments like that. And it’s incredibly eye-opening.”
While King and Sanchez’s solution to the backlash seems to be getting us all spending millions on going to space despite the current economic crisis, Katy Perry is said to be having some regrets behind the scenes. A source said: “Katy doesn’t regret going to space . It was life changing. What she does regret is making a public spectacle out of it.”
The star led the charge in making media-friendly moments out of the trip, including talking off her plans to make space “glam” and “put the ‘a**’ in astronaut,” alongside stealing the show by singing at zero gravity and linking her upcoming tour to the trip, but now wishes she’d kept her head down a little bit more.
On X, formerly known as Twitter, fans made it clear that the celeb crew had missed the mark with their statements after the journey. “Have you been? To space? Lady people can’t afford homes ON EARTH!” one person summarised.
Source: Mirror
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