Space Travel Is Patriarchy And Therefore Bad

Or put another way,

The patriarchal race to colonise Mars is just another example of male entitlement. The presumed right to use and abuse something and then walk away to conquer something new is a hallmark of colonialism.

No, really. It says so here. The author, Marcie Bianco, is quite adamant on this point. One might almost say feverish:  

The desire to colonise [space] — to have unquestioned, unchallenged and automatic access to something, to any type of body, and to use it at will — is a patriarchal one… It is the same instinctual and cultural force that teaches men that everything — and everyone — in their line of vision is theirs for the taking. You know, just like walking up to a woman and grabbing her by the pussy.

Apparently, and for reasons that aren’t shared, exploring space is not about ambition, curiosity or survival, or even a hope of distant profit; it’s all about “gendered power structures” and “men giving up on the planet they have all but destroyed.”

Naturally, Ms Bianco has a degree in Women’s Studies and has taught “social justice courses” at Rutgers University and John Jay College.

Update, via the comments:

It’s odd how articles of this kind, by self-declared feminists, seem determined to, as it were, erase and marginalise the choices and agency of other, more accomplished women. Are we to believe that Gwynne Shotwell, the President of SpaceX, is a mere dupe of The Patriarchy? According to Ms Bianco, our “queer public intellectual,” yes. 

And what about these ladies here? Are their minds not their own? And has anyone told them this, to their faces? I wonder how that would go down. But this is a standard pattern for dogmatic feminism. Just as Ms Bianco acknowledges only “the menz” who complain about her writing and its laughable conceits, while ignoring the numerous women who also find her article insulting, incoherent and absurd.

And so a question comes to mind. If you were a young woman in search of role models, who might be more likely to inspire? Carolyn Porco, a planetary scientist who worked on the ground-breaking Voyager missions and was Head of Imaging Science for Cassini, and who speaks enthusiastically about exploring – and colonising – other planets? Or Marcie Bianco, a third-rate scold with a Women’s Studies degree?

Answers on a postcard, please.

Comments

[Alice]

Funny how this feminist with a degree in Women's Studies didn't bother to ask any female astronomers, engineers, etc at NASA or Space X.

[David]

Funny how this feminist with a degree in Women’s Studies didn’t bother to ask any female astronomers, engineers, etc at NASA or Space X.

Well, quite. It’s almost as if Ms Bianco was much too busy airing her own, rather strange, personal baggage.

[WTP]

So the way I read it, these women are finally running out of things to bitch about on this planet and they're moving on to the next one.

[David]

Deploy the mighty space phallus.

Mwah-hah-hahh!

[David]

Previously, in the Guardian.

[ComputerLab Rat]

My gut reaction was that it's silly, disturbed women like this one that give those of us who are in engineering and serious science a bad name. But no, the stupid diversity and affirmative action policies these silly women have advocated for and gotten implemented are probably doing more damage.

Just reading the excerpts has made my head hurt. What ever happened to logic and rational thought? Ye gods I am tired of all the feelz all the time.

[David]

My gut reaction was that it’s silly, disturbed women like this one that give those of us who are in engineering and serious science a bad name.

Based on their behaviour and what falls from their mouths, one could easily get the impression that Women’s Studies graduates are on a mission to make womankind seem absurd. Indeed, bewildering.

[Fred the Fourth]

Well, my first instinct was to note that Ms. Bianco, formerly of Rutgers and John Jay, now at Stanford, no doubt never wonders where those institutions came from. But then I decided not to just snark, but to RTWT, perhaps to Fisk.
Sigh. What a waste of 3 minutes.
A perfect example of a pre-written article, needing only the pre-pending of a few remarks about the current Hot Topic (Starman) before hitting the "publish" button.

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

Deploy the mighty space phallus.

Meh, it is no match for The Devil Girl From Mars.

[sH2]

The president of Space X.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwynne_Shotwell

[David]

The Devil Girl From Mars.

I was somehow, shamefully, unaware of that one.

[jabrwok]

I look forward to the day when we can mass-produce large scale space habitats (~500km diameter) and give all the grievance-mongers their own little worlds where they can implement their True Ideologies without bothering the rest of us. Watching them starve while blaming the Patriarchy from which they've seceded will be amusing.

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

The president of Space X.

Gwynne Shotwell (née Gurevich).

Right, just trot out another Russian bot like that disproves Miss Bianco's theory.

[Fred the Fourth]

Please please tell me Gwynne Gurevich Shotwell is related to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Gurevich_(aircraft_designer)

[Joan]

exploring space is... all about “gendered power structures” and “men giving up on the planet they have all but destroyed.”

Feminism is now just basically a conspiracy theory.

[ComputerLab Rat]

Deploy the mighty space phallus.

Ahahahahaha!! That's awesome! Is that from Spaceballs?

The Devil Girl From Mars.

I must find this movie! It looks hilariously bad.

[David]

Feminism is now just basically a conspiracy theory.

In the developed world, pretty much.

[David]

That’s awesome! Is that from Spaceballs?

Flesh Gordon, 1974.

[WTP]

The Devil Girl From Mars.

Ah. The Patricia Laffan, Hugh McDermott, Adrienne Corri classic...

On Nyah's world, the emancipation of the women eventually led to open warfare between the sexes. The females won, usurping the political power of the men. This eventually lead to the sexual impotence of the planet's entire male population; a rapid decline in the birthrate soon followed.

Wonder what ever gave them that idea...

[Fred the Fourth]

Every time I read David's blog I thank god that most of the women I know and meet are so utterly different they might as well be members of a separate species.
- The woman (OMG, another Russian ex-pat!) who founded a company making surgical bone-screw technology
- The woman (chinese immigrant) who founded a company with products to improve post-hospitalization health results
- The woman who founded a company working on video-streaming tech
- The woman who leads a bunch of local university folk in promoting and investing in bleeding-edge tech
- The woman who founded a local investor group and teaches entrepreneurship at a major university
- The woman who owns and runs a local bike shop
- The woman who led the care team when my father-in-law was in surgical rehab
- The young women I met at Cal's Sutardja Center for Entrepreneurship and Technology.
- The woman who led the SR-71 Blackbird Flight Quality Engineering team at NASA Dryden

Women and men like Ms. Bianco need to be actively opposed, so that women and men like the above have a civilization to live and work in.

Man, am I in a crotchety mood this morning...

[R. Sherman]

So, then, what is the alternative? What is her proposal? Or is she just sitting in her jammies at her computer, enjoying a Kuerig coffee while the climate control at her home keeps her nice and comfortable enjoying a session of "Gender Studies" onanism while making the rest of us watch?

[Sam Duncan]

Patriarchy... is there anything it can't do?

“Feminism is now just basically a conspiracy theory.”

Yes. I wish I'd thought of that. But it's absolutely right: just like any conspiracy theorist, they're contorting reality to fit their theories, rather than adapting the theory to match observations (such as the inconvenient existence of Mrs. Shotwell).

[Adam]

I knew that space has Uranus, but I didn't know about the pussy. Can I get a ride up there?.

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

I must find this movie!

See the link I posted - whole thing on Vimeo.

[Adam]

"...taught social justice courses..." Is she hoping for a gig at Lawrence Livermore labs?

[Lisboeta]

the inconvenient existence of Mrs. Shotwell

I think it likely that they're quite oblivious to the existence of Mrs. Shotwell (and the others of her ilk). Why spoil a cliché theory with actual research/knowledge?

[PiperPaul]

"Climate denial and misogyny seem to go together sadly."

- Catherine McKenna, Twitter, 17 February 2018
Canadian Minister of Environment and Climate Change

I bet if you disagree with her you'll get called a racist, too.

[Governor Squid]

This 21st century form of imperialism is the direct result of men giving up on the planet they have all but destroyed.

She's typing this drivel, mind you, from a comfortable, air-conditioned office in Stanford. We men have so fully given up on Planet Earth that we've provided her with a comfortable place to work, plentiful fresh water and electricity, a comfortable home, and a vehicle that can carry her a thousand miles a day in safety and comfort.

She enjoys access to a variety of fresh foods the likes of which were unimaginable by tycoons and royalty less than a hundred years ago. Her bathroom is filled with perfumed soaps and cosmetics that the most favored courtiers of the Sun King would kill each other over.

All of these things and more are in her hands because she is paid a comfortable sinecure to write terrible things about the men who produce the surplus that makes her position possible. And these men do not punish her for her insolence; she is in no danger of abuse, harassment, or assault. No, these horrible men just keep plugging away, doing whatever unpleasantness is required to take care of their families, and making life easy for her and her Sisterhood of the Unrelenting Moan in the process.

But, to paraphrase the Dandy Warhols: gratitude is so passé.

[PiperPaul]

"I look forward to the day when we can mass-produce large scale space habitats"

It could look like this with a pod for each SJW subgroup:

We could call it the B Ark or something.

[Governor Squid]

I do take some consolation in seeing that the silly vote-meter at the end of her article is running 87% in favor of space colonization to 7% against. Looks like poor Marcie has a lot more "educating" to do.

[David]

The president of Space X.

Like so many feminists, Ms Bianco, our self-described “queer public intellectual,” seems determined to pretend that we live in the 1950s.

[Governor Squid]

And another thing, as long as I'm ranting:

It is the same instinctual and cultural force that teaches men that everything — and everyone — in their line of vision is theirs for the taking.

She's half-right, which is surprising. We humans are hunters, and so we look at everything with an eye toward whether it might be considered as prey. Your average toddler is a tyrant and a monster, who feels entitled to everything in sight, and who throws an absolute fit if anything is denied to him. It takes a decade of constant, dedicated effort to teach these little monsters to share, to cooperate, to delay gratification, to respect others, to keep their promises, and all the other values and discipline needed for civilization to continue.

Look at any community struggling with violence and poverty and lawlessness, and you'll find the root cause is almost always the absence of civilizing efforts on the part of adults toward the children in those communities. You can make a lot of noise about skin color or historical oppression or unequal opportunities, but any in-depth look at the data shows you that a poor black kid growing up in a stable household with a mom and a dad has a very good shot at growing up into a skilled tradesman or a professional. (His less-fortunate peers will accuse him of "acting white" every time they seem him exhibiting the behaviors that will make him successful; irony is lost on these souls.) And if he marries well and raises his kids in a stable household, they'll go on to be even more successful, provided that they don't buy into the wisdom of their teachers and decide to be professional grievance mongers.

The reason this winds me up so is that if this dizzy PhD really wanted to end violence and abuse against women, she'd work tirelessly to educate the public about the importance of civilizing their children. She'd encourage two-parent homes, and Sunday School, and Scouting. But of course she'll never do any of these things, because they'd make her look like a square, and posturing and pretending at rebellion is much more important to her than making actual progress toward her proclaimed goals will ever be.

And she wonders why successful grownups never show her any respect.

[David]

Feminism is now just basically a conspiracy theory.

Ms Bianco doesn’t strike me as inclined to reflect on criticism of her writing:

Apparently, Space X’s female president and all the other women engaged in exploration and space-related industries, often in positions of great importance, are merely proof of the patriarchy.

[jabrwok]

the absence of civilizing efforts on the part of adults

Mothers. Such adults, and I use that word loosely, as are present in these children's lives, are rarely fathers. As you touch upon further down, two-parent (mother and father) households are qualitatively better for children than any other arrangement thus far attempted.

Noting which makes me a sexist, blah-blah-blah. Guilty as charged and proud of it.

[lotocoti]

I notice the well worn women and children hardest hit has been trimmed to exclude the progeny of the patriarchy.

[Jen]

Apparently, Space X’s female president and all the other women engaged in exploration and space-related industries, often in positions of great importance, are merely proof of the patriarchy.

You can't argue with a conspiracy nut.

[David]

You can’t argue with a conspiracy nut.

Based on Ms Bianco’s article and Twitter feed, it’s hard to see how one could have a realistic and productive discussion with her. She even seems quite pleased to be giving that impression. As if it were a credential, sneering at “the menz.”

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

This 21st century form of imperialism is the direct result of men giving up on the planet they have all but destroyed.

She's typing this drivel, mind you, from a comfortable, air-conditioned office in Stanford.

Which gets to my favorite rant about how provincial these types are that they think the entire planet looks as paved as San Fransisco, Manhattan, Boston, or London. She is just another of the type that could fly from coast to coast and never once look out the window to see either the vast amounts of nothing, or to marvel at what was wasteland turned into farmland. I'd bet that though she went to Rutgers, she never once set foot in the New Jersey pine barrens, and from Stanford, has never been east of I-5 in California.

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

Based on Ms Bianco’s article and Twitter feed, it’s hard to see how one could have a realistic and productive discussion with her...As if it were a credential, sneering at “the menz.”

The entire last paragraph of her Clayman Institute bio:

Marcie Bianco is a feminist.

QED.

[lotocoti]

and Twitter feed
Should I sully my browser history and search "Purveyor of Fine Italian Lesbian Meats"?

[Adam]

"..as paved as San Francisco..." with feces covered streets?

Would that be reclaiming the environment, or giving up on it?

[I_luv_alburta]

Space Pussy!

[Monty James]

For some more clues about what put the bees in her pantyhose, Marcie Bianco on Medium.

"The Friday before SpaceX’s launch, legendary astronaut Buzz Aldrin reiterated to me over lunch that it is imperative that we talk about space exploration in terms of “migration,” rather than using words like “colonize” or “settle” when talking about going to Mars.

Through a feminist lens, Aldrin’s deliberate word choice revealed an important reality of the space race: This 21st century form of imperialism is the direct result of men giving up on the planet they have all but destroyed.

As if history hasn’t proven that men go from one land to the next, drunk on megalomania and the privilege of indifference."

That's what this jealous cow took away from lunch with Buzz effing Aldrin, who walked on the moon.

[Monty James]

Akismet, I think, doesn't like me.

[Bad News Quillan]

Copied from Small Dead Animals:

Deploy The Enormous Space Phallus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GiWQZhUmmRw

--Bad News

[pst314]

The patriarchal race to colonise Mars is just another example of male entitlement.

"No feminists in space" would be fine by me.

[WTP]

“All feminists in space” seems like a much better idea to me.

[pst314]

“All feminists in space” seems like a much better idea to me.
Do you mean "on the Golgafrincham B Ark"?

[Spiny Norman]

...she is paid a comfortable sinecure to write terrible things about the men who produce the surplus that makes her position possible. And these men do not punish her for her insolence; she is in no danger of abuse, harassment, or assault. No, these horrible men just keep plugging away, doing whatever unpleasantness is required to take care of their families, and making life easy for her and her Sisterhood of the Unrelenting Moan in the process.

[Spiny Norman]

lotocoti,

Should I sully my browser history and search "Purveyor of Fine Italian Lesbian Meats"?

I don't think it matters at this point. Google already knows what you posted there.

[WTP]

Do you mean "on the Golgafrincham B Ark"?

In an ark or not in an ark. All the same to me. One of these days, Alice...one of these days...

[MC]

CORRECTION (Feb. 21, 2018, 12:00 p.m. ET): An earlier version of this article misstated the name of a mannequin recently launched into space by SpaceX. The mannequin is called Starman, not Spaceman.

She was too stupid and slapdash to get the name of the thing she was moaning about correct. This basic error makes me question her academic credibility.

[Spiny Norman]

This basic error makes me question her academic credibility.

As if the Women's Studies degree didn't already.

[Artie O'Dactyl]

"If civilization had been left in female hands we would still be living in grass huts."

-- Camille Paglia

[David]

That’s what this jealous cow took away from lunch with Buzz effing Aldrin, who walked on the moon.

It’s odd how articles of this kind, by self-declared feminists, seem determined to, as it were, erase and marginalise the choices and agency of other, more accomplished women. According to Ms Bianco, our self-declared “public intellectual,” SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell is a mere dupe of the patriarchy. As, presumably, are all the other female astronauts, astronomers and engineers linked in this thread. Apparently, their minds are not their own. (I wonder if anyone has told them this, to their faces. I wonder how that would go down.)

But this is a standard pattern for dogmatic feminism. Just as Ms Bianco acknowledges only “the menz” who complain about her writing and its laughable conceits, while ignoring the numerous women who also find her article insulting, incoherent and absurd.

It’s the feminist way.

[[+]]

According to Ms Bianco, our self-declared “public intellectual,” SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell is a mere dupe of the patriarchy. As, presumably, are all the other female astronauts, astronomers and engineers linked in this thread. Apparently, their minds are not their own. (I wonder if anyone has told them this, to their faces. I wonder how that would go down.)

That.

[David]

That’s what this jealous cow took away from lunch with Buzz effing Aldrin, who walked on the moon.

A question comes to mind. If you were a young woman in search of role models, who might be more likely to inspire? Carolyn Porco, a planetary scientist who worked on the ground-breaking Voyager missions and was Head of Imaging Science for Cassini, and who speaks enthusiastically about exploring – and colonising – other planets? Or Marcie Bianco, a third-rate scold with a Women’s Studies degree?

[Karen M]

And so a question comes to mind. If you were a young woman in search of role models, who might be more likely to inspire? Carolyn Porco, a planetary scientist who worked on the ground-breaking Voyager missions and was Head of Imaging Science for Cassini, and who speaks enthusiastically about exploring – and colonising – other planets? Or Marcie Bianco, a third-rate scold with a Women’s Studies degree?

LOL. Burn.

[Hector Drummond, Vile Novelist]

>>The Devil Girl From Mars.
>
>I must find this movie! It looks hilariously bad.

Hilariously good, you surely mean?

[David]

Hilariously good, you surely mean?

She’s rocking that cape. I’m a little envious.

[Farnsworth M Muldoon]

...while ignoring the numerous women who also find her article insulting, incoherent and absurd.

Not so fast there, you overlooked this Deep Thought™ of hers:

Patriarchy knows no gender.

...who might be more likely to inspire? Carolyn Porco, a planetary scientist...Or Marcie Bianco, a third-rate scold with a Women’s Studies degree?

Alas, given the relative numbers, it appears to be the latter.

[Jonathan]

It seems to me to be a general rule that racism/ sexism activists are motivated by their feelings of inadequacy when faced with the acheivements of men in general, and white men in particular. Science and Engineering are hard and you won't find many women or non-white people who genuinely work in the technical side of those fields, rather than just management or HR, who complain about racism or sexism.
To be honest, this is just another attempt by the mediocrities who inhabit the racism/ sexism industries to guilt others into giving them money or well paid non-jobs in the 'equality and diversity' departments of major organisations.

p.s I'm prepared to chip in a tenner to the feminist space expedition to the surface of the Sun.

[Nelvinator]

Everything is about "power structures" with these people. There is not a single institution in Western society that is there to serve its stated role, apparently, rather than the cynical exercise of power for its own sake. And they wonder why they get called "cultural Marxists"...

[Pst314]

Shotwell is a wonderful name for someone who launches rockets.

[R. Sherman]

There is not a single institution in Western society that is there to serve its stated role, apparently, rather than the cynical exercise of power for its own sake.

Which leads, again, to the question, "What is the proper, righteously feminine course of action?" As with virtually all of these people, Ms. Bianco--a perfect name for a closet white supremacist, BTW--is long on denunciation and short of proposed solutions to the "problem" she identifies. It's as if there is a but a single essay ranting against "The Patriarchy" floating about which contains blanks into which these harridans place random subjects, like "space exploration" or "British Leyland" or "baseball" or "bratwurst" or "belly-button lint" and wait for the applause of Gender Studies majors world-wide.

[Burnsie]

The reward system in Women's Studies is predicated entirely on finding sexism and patriarchal oppression in everything. The more obscure the connection, the louder the applause. Being the first to denounce the sexism in something makes you a rock star.

Here's a fun game for a minute or two:

Do a google search for, "_______ is sexist."

Any noun or verb will do. It's amazing what pops up. Some feminist has already blown the whistle on it. Some violation has already occurred.

Almost everything known to the human race has somehow been tainted by men.

[GregMan]

I'm prepared to chip in a tenner to the feminist space expedition to the surface of the Sun.

Hey, if they go at night, they should have no problem, right? At least that's what an old Blonde joke says.

[WTP]

p.s I'm prepared to chip in a tenner to the feminist space expedition to the surface of the Sun.

Oh hell, I'll do better than that. I'll pay to fly any one of these American (sorry other westerners, it gets complicated otherwise) feminist or race-baiting a55holes to whatever country they think does life better, but they must relinquish/renounce their citizenship, have their names put on a State Department watch/no re-entry list, and make an open promise never to return. Hell, I'll even fly in another POC or woman so long as I get to pick which one.

[Sporkatus]

There's a starpyrsyn waiting for us in the sky. Xe says xe'd like to meet us, but... we're all patriarchal and insufficiently queer. Xe thinks xe'd be triggered by our minds.

[Sporkatus]

I would observe that this particular hysteria dovetails near- perfectly with the "first woman to be raped in space has already been born" hysteria from a while back. A matched set of final frontier phobias.

[Mike]

The desire to colonise [space]… is… just like walking up to a woman and grabbing her by the pussy.

We used to only let the bright one teach our kids.

[Mike]

bright ones

aarrgh

[Fruitbat44]

Why is it the best advertisements for feminism are women who aren't feminists, and the worst advertisement for feminism are feminists?

[Governor Squid]

Same reason as nude beaches, I reckon...

[ACTOldFart]

Incidentally, Carolyn Porco is a fine-looking woman:

https://www.egconf.com/sites/the-eg/files/styles/photo/public/Carolyn-Porco-eg4_0.jpg?itok=jFgMz2hI

I watch space science documentaries just in the hope that she might appear. Just like I have learned a hell of a lot about archaeology as a side efeect of hunting out documentaries featuring Bettany Hughes

And no David, this is not an opportunity to torture us with a picture of Ms Bianco. I can just imagine ...

[David]

Incidentally, Carolyn Porco is a fine-looking woman

I think I first noticed her while watching the BBC’s excellent 1999 mini-series, The Planets. Though I suspect we may have been impressed by her for slightly different reasons.

[WTP]

This showed up at Ace and I showed it to my wife. Discussion ensued. I showed her this:
Bianco has an undergraduate degree in Government from Harvard (cum laude); a MSt in Women's Studies from the University of Oxford (Hertford College); and both a MA and a PhD in English Literature from Rutgers University.

I sense my odds of getting laid tonight have diminished considerably. Funny how that is. Funny ha-ha or funny peculiar depends on one’s perspective. Fortunately I’m old enough and liberal enough to see it both ways.

[Hopp Singg]

Answers on a postcard, please.

How about a postcard from Mars?

[Mags]

The desire to colonise [space]… is… just like walking up to a woman and grabbing her by the pussy.

[David]

Why is it the best advertisements for feminism are women who aren’t feminists, and the worst advertisement for feminism are feminists?

Possibly because feminism tends to attract a high concentration of obnoxious personalities. Much higher, it seems, than chance alone would allow. And if you’re the kind of person who wants to spend your time scolding people, sounding paranoid, and feeling righteous about all that petty resentment you harbour, then feminism is a near-perfect vehicle, as we’ve seen here many times. It’s also quite handy if you need to feel intellectually superior but don’t actually have the appetite or wherewithal for autonomous mental activity. Instead, you can regurgitate jargon, begged questions and preposterous lies, while those around you nod.

In short.

[Jugra]

Mags - Brianna Wu needs feminism because he was born John Walker Flynt.

[duncanm]

Gwynne Shotwell is the daughter of a Brain Surgeon.

Brain Science and Rocket Surgery do exist!

[Sam Duncan]

"Climate denial and misogyny seem to go together sadly."

Also being a big smelly poo-poo-head.

“Any noun or verb will do. It's amazing what pops up. Some feminist has already blown the whistle on it. Some violation has already occurred.”

Rule 34(a): If it exists, someone has denounced it as both sexist and racist. No exceptions.

[Baron Jackfield]

Am I the only one to see the irony of the brain-dead bimbo posting her drivel on a site called "Think"?

[jones]

"That’s awesome! Is that from Spaceballs?

Flesh Gordon, 1974."

Would that happen to be the appallingly sexist film with the Rape-Robots?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=te9SFeFVKo8

Well I never...

PS. Apologies for being so really late to this shindig....

[jones]

Not to mention the disgusting Penisaurus, like I just have...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCe5TlVduvY

Top-flight stop-motion.... Just like the real thing.