Post: #1

Quote:The white, male European conquerors of the New World and 19th-century American pioneers of Manifest Destiny still colour the space age, so is it a myth that we’ll turn nice on Mars?

Quote:We’re going to Mars – eventually. The quest to reach the dusty red planet is our version of Manifest Destiny, the 19th-century philosophy that saw Americans spread across their content with the thought and consideration of a chilly lover stealing the duvet in their sleep. There were a lot of different versions of it, but the main themes, as summarised by Wikipedia, should sound quite familiar:

The special virtues of the American people and their institutions;
America’s mission to redeem and remake the west in the image of agrarian America;
An irresistible destiny to accomplish this essential duty.
So 150 years later, Elon Musk (of Tesla and SpaceX) is arguably the most visible example of Manifest Destiny in the space age. He’s the de facto leader of a western “liberal technocratic” consensus that harbours a long-term ambition to put humans on the red planet. Not because they can, but because they feel we must. Phil Plait banged his hammer on this particular nail in a recent article for Slate in which he describes a tour of the SpaceX factory:

“[A] feeling I couldn’t put my finger on before suddenly came into focus. The attitude of the people I saw wasn’t just a general pride, as strong as it was, in doing something cool. It was that they were doing something important. And again, not just important in some vague, general way, but critical and quite specific in its endgame: making humans citizens of more than one world. A multiplanet species.”

Manifest Destiny. But historically, this kind of attitude has come with two big problems.

Firstly, destiny is rarely great for the people already at the destination. When Africans moved north to colonise Europe they obliterated the Neanderthals. When Europeans seized the New World, its cultures were virtually extinguished. Luckily the only population on Mars that we know of is a handful of rovers, but no doubt we’ll start a war anyway, before dragging them into some form of slavery or oppression. It’s just what we do. Second, whose destiny is it anyway? Who gets to go? D N Lee wrote a fascinating deconstruction of this in Scientific American where she makes a number of interesting points. Not least, how little attention this question has been given in the rather white and male race to conquer Mars.

The first objection she raises is to the idea that we’re “stuck” on Earth. “Stuck?! Why would we be stuck on Earth? Stuck implies left behind in a bad situation.” This is one bit I disagree with. As long as we’re on one planet, however good it is, we’re a single freak event away from joining the dinosaurs. Self-sufficient colonies elsewhere make for a good insurance policy. Her next point is critical though:

“I’m nagged by frames or narratives that are presented as universally attractive and necessary and heroic where the protagonists seem to mostly reflect Hollywood action movie casts and plots. *eye rolls*

“I began to question, first in my mind then out loud – whose version of humanity is being targeted for saving?”

To paraphrase Douglas Adams: “Space is white. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly white it is.” It’s also very male and European. Women in space-colony fiction have generally been presented as sexy walking vaginas, whose main purpose is to provide the male astronauts with a place to dock their penis at night. This being necessary in order to “ensure the survival of the species”.

If you think that attitude doesn’t exist in the real world, it’s worth recalling the comments of Prof Anatoly Grigoryev, a doctor and key figure in the Russian space programme. “Women are fragile and delicate creatures; that is why men should lead the way to distant planets and carry women there in their strong hands.”

No wonder Lee says, “I see only a very narrow invitation to this lifeboat.”
The problem with Lee’s argument is that she’s fighting against possibly the most pernicious space myth in existence, a myth far worse than moon landing conspiracy theories. It’s a myth almost universally believed, that sits at the core of liberal technocratic thought, and has been embedded in practically every other work of speculative fiction for the last half century.

In fact we’ve already seen this in a Mars mission simulation that took place in 1999 and ended in chaos, as summarised by Helen Lewis in New Statesman:

“…the Russian captain forcibly kissed the only female crew member, a 32-year-old Canadian health specialist called Judith Lapierre. “We should try kissing, I haven’t been smoking for six months,” he reportedly told her. “Then we can kiss after the mission and compare it. Let’s do the experiment now.” Two of her Russian crew mates then had a fight so violent that it left blood splattered on the walls, prompting another member of the team, a Japanese man, to quit. Lapierre stayed only after the astronauts were allowed to put locks on their bedroom doors.”

The first woman to be raped in space has probably already been born. And if that last sentence makes you howl with protest or insist that such a thing just wouldn’t happen, then I’d stop a second and ask yourself why.

I’m a fan of SpaceX, after some initial scepticism. I think it’s usually better to do something, however imperfect, than nothing, and I admire people like Elon Musk who take on the hard challenges, and make progress in spite of naysayers. I think Lee is absolutely right though when she says:

“When we look around and see a homogenous group of individuals discussing these issues – issues that command insane budgets, we should pause. Why aren’t other voices and perspectives at the table? How much is this conversation being controlled (framed, initiated, directed, routed) by capitalist and political interests of the (few) people at the table?”

It’s early days, but if we really want to create a progressive new world then issues like these should be at the hearts of our efforts from the very start. I hope Musk and his peers open up that discussion sooner rather than later, and I hope that people like Lee can take part in it. The last thing we need is to wake up in 50 years and find that a bunch of #gamergate nobheads are running Mars.

This whole article:




http://www.theguardian.com/science/the-l...are_btn_tw

Post: #2

According the accompanying photograph, the solution lies in importint a bunch of female 5's 3's to Mars.

This will mean no racism, no classism, no sexism and plenty of masturbation.




Edit: "5's" is too lenient.

Post: #3

They must be forgetting about the countless number of white men who:

1.) Studied astrophysics and quantum mechanics
2.) Built Rocketships
3.) Pioneered Space Travel
4.) Trained them for their journey into space
5.) Will likely be conducting their launch sequences and monitoring all activities while in space

Oh... and this article was written by a man... lol let's see a pic of this guy.

And let's just ignore men like this, whose accomplishments should be overlooked because their t-shirts were sexist and misogynist. He's also WHITE!!



Also, her (I mean his, still can't believe a man wrote this) idea to get rid of racism and sexism is... (drum roll please) no white men allowed! Wow! What a great, rationale solution.

One of my biggest gripes with SJW's is that they disregard the accomplishments of any person who doesn't help facilitate their narrative. For example, if Hilary gets elected, everyone will be saying how great it is we have the 1st female president. Yet, they ignore the fact that the majority of her cabinet and advisers will be men, not to mention the fact that she is only where she is because of her husband.

There's so much more to say on this article, like how the author mentions "the 1st women to be raped in space has been born." Really? That's what your worried about? Men are trying to put our civilization on Mars and manginas are already worrying about rapes in space that haven't even happened!

Post: #4

Quote:Americans spread across their content with the thought and consideration of a chilly lover stealing the duvet in their sleep.

Post: #5

(05-07-2015 09:35 PM)infowarrior1 Wrote:  

Quote:I’m a fan of SpaceX, after some initial scepticism. I think it’s usually better to do something, however imperfect, than nothing, and I admire people like Elon Musk who take on the hard challenges, and make progress in spite of naysayers. I think Lee is absolutely right though when she says:

“When we look around and see a homogenous group of individuals discussing these issues – issues that command insane budgets, we should pause. Why aren’t other voices and perspectives at the table? How much is this conversation being controlled (framed, initiated, directed, routed) by capitalist and political interests of the (few) people at the table?”

It’s early days, but if we really want to create a progressive new world then issues like these should be at the hearts of our efforts from the very start. I hope Musk and his peers open up that discussion sooner rather than later, and I hope that people like Lee can take part in it. The last thing we need is to wake up in 50 years and find that a bunch of #gamergate nobheads are running Mars.

Apparently, space isn't "diverse" enough. Get real.

What "other voices and perspectives" should their be? SpaceX is a 3P endeavour. Capitalists and government working together to accomplish the goal is the whole point. You'll have to excuse them for not inviting the feminist, LGBT and socialist crowd to "the table" when they have SFA to contribute other than to say "space is 'ism or 'ist". That kind of "perspective" doesn't get anyone any closer to actually getting to Mars.

I don't know about anyone else, but the first mission to Mars should probably pick the best people available and not worry about filling quotas of sufficiently "diverse" individuals to satisfy the social justice warriors (which is impossible to do in any event).

(And yes Tuth, for my 200th post, and going forward, I have located the shift key.)

Post: #6

People have always tried to build Utopias. This is one attempt. The idea has no merit. Trying to do something complex like building a sustainable settlement on another planet is difficult enough. Why not make it impossibly more complicated by attempting idealistic social control at the same time, which has proven numerous times in the past to fail?

http://www.history.com/news/history-list...ted-states

Quote:2. Fruitlands (1843-1844): The Farm Without Farmers
Fruitlands was founded in Harvard, Massachusetts, as a self-sufficient farming community by Charles Lane and Bronson Alcott, two men with no practical experience in either farming or self-sufficiency. In contrast to the more freewheeling ethos of Brook Farm, Lane advocated a far more rigorous lifestyle. Settlers were forbidden to eat meat, consume stimulants, use any form of animal labor, create artificial light, enjoy hot baths or drink anything but water. Lane’s ideas later evolved to include celibacy within marriage, which caused no small amount of friction between him and his most loyal disciple, Bronson Alcott, who had relocated his wife and four daughters to Fruitlands in a characteristic fit of enthusiasm. Bronson’s family included a young Louisa May Alcott, future author of “Little Women.” Louisa, her sisters and their mother appear to have been saddled with the lion’s share of labor at Fruitlands, despite lip service from Lane about the alleged equality of the sexes. When winter set in and life at Fruitlands became increasingly harsh, most of its original members fled for more congenial settings. Louisa later wrote a scathing, barely fictionalized report of life at Fruitlands called “Transcendental Wild Oats.” The community lasted less than seven months in total.

Quote:4. Oneida (1848−1881): The Complex Marriage
The Oneida colonists in upstate New York considered themselves all to be married to each other in a practice they called “complex marriage.” Monogamy was thoroughly rejected, and all decisions about childbearing and procreation were handled by committee. Not to say there weren’t slip-ups: A number of children were born without the sanction of the community, though they appear to have been provided for just as if they’d been planned in accordance with the rules. Mothers were only given the care of their offspring for the first few years of life, while the community at large assumed responsibility for older children.

It's laughable that this would be given serious consideration.

If colonization of space is going to happen, they need to get out there and get it done with the best possible social environment, which likely means no females at all until the experienced men, without the friction of women in the environment, build a large enough base that women can then come over. There needs to be enough space so people can escape without driving each other insane, without the only alternative being a short walk, without a spacesuit, onto the martian surface.

Post: #7

The unfortunate fact is that until we get better methods of space travel, with our current limitations, a 5'3" woman will eat half the calories of a 6" man. And that makes big fucking difference for travelling to mars.

You don't woman female astronauts? Well guys, we better actually figure out some kind of awesome FTL drive that destroys current limitations.

Post: #8

(05-07-2015 10:34 PM)Tytalus Wrote:  The unfortunate fact is that until we get better methods of space travel, with our current limitations, a 5'3" woman will eat half the calories of a 6" man. And that makes big fucking difference for travelling to mars.

You don't woman female astronauts? Well guys, we better actually figure out some kind of awesome FTL drive that destroys current limitations.

Prolonged Zero-G exposure destroys muscle mass and bone density. You need rigorous daily exercise to slow the deterioration.

Every gram sent into space costs a (literally) astronomical amount, but sending the sex that already has less muscle and thinner bones just to save weight would be self-defeating.

Female astronauts should be called space women. I bet zero gravity sex isn't all that much fun either, so what exactly is their purpose?

"I'd hate myself if I had that kind of attitude, if I were that weak." - Arnold

Post: #9

^Even the prologned daily exercise doesn't slow the deterioration that much. Perhaps by 10%. You need to produce some kind of centrifugal force for artificial gravity if you want long term space flight.

This whole thing is a very timely concept. SJWism coming to nasty, privileged space.

Have to get my book out this year. It'll piss them off so they'll market it for me.

Post: #10

(05-07-2015 09:35 PM)infowarrior1 Wrote:  

Quote:The white, male European conquerors of the New World and 19th-century American pioneers of Manifest Destiny still colour the space age, so is it a myth that we’ll turn nice on Mars?

Quote:We’re going to Mars – eventually. The quest to reach the dusty red planet is our version of Manifest Destiny, the 19th-century philosophy that saw Americans spread across their content with the thought and consideration of a chilly lover stealing the duvet in their sleep. There were a lot of different versions of it, but the main themes, as summarised by Wikipedia, should sound quite familiar:

The special virtues of the American people and their institutions;
America’s mission to redeem and remake the west in the image of agrarian America;
An irresistible destiny to accomplish this essential duty.
So 150 years later, Elon Musk (of Tesla and SpaceX) is arguably the most visible example of Manifest Destiny in the space age. He’s the de facto leader of a western “liberal technocratic” consensus that harbours a long-term ambition to put humans on the red planet. Not because they can, but because they feel we must. Phil Plait banged his hammer on this particular nail in a recent article for Slate in which he describes a tour of the SpaceX factory:

“[A] feeling I couldn’t put my finger on before suddenly came into focus. The attitude of the people I saw wasn’t just a general pride, as strong as it was, in doing something cool. It was that they were doing something important. And again, not just important in some vague, general way, but critical and quite specific in its endgame: making humans citizens of more than one world. A multiplanet species.”

Manifest Destiny. But historically, this kind of attitude has come with two big problems.

Firstly, destiny is rarely great for the people already at the destination. When Africans moved north to colonise Europe they obliterated the Neanderthals. When Europeans seized the New World, its cultures were virtually extinguished. Luckily the only population on Mars that we know of is a handful of rovers, but no doubt we’ll start a war anyway, before dragging them into some form of slavery or oppression. It’s just what we do. Second, whose destiny is it anyway? Who gets to go? D N Lee wrote a fascinating deconstruction of this in Scientific American where she makes a number of interesting points. Not least, how little attention this question has been given in the rather white and male race to conquer Mars.

The first objection she raises is to the idea that we’re “stuck” on Earth. “Stuck?! Why would we be stuck on Earth? Stuck implies left behind in a bad situation.” This is one bit I disagree with. As long as we’re on one planet, however good it is, we’re a single freak event away from joining the dinosaurs. Self-sufficient colonies elsewhere make for a good insurance policy. Her next point is critical though:

“I’m nagged by frames or narratives that are presented as universally attractive and necessary and heroic where the protagonists seem to mostly reflect Hollywood action movie casts and plots. *eye rolls*

“I began to question, first in my mind then out loud – whose version of humanity is being targeted for saving?”

To paraphrase Douglas Adams: “Space is white. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly white it is.” It’s also very male and European. Women in space-colony fiction have generally been presented as sexy walking vaginas, whose main purpose is to provide the male astronauts with a place to dock their penis at night. This being necessary in order to “ensure the survival of the species”.

If you think that attitude doesn’t exist in the real world, it’s worth recalling the comments of Prof Anatoly Grigoryev, a doctor and key figure in the Russian space programme. “Women are fragile and delicate creatures; that is why men should lead the way to distant planets and carry women there in their strong hands.”

No wonder Lee says, “I see only a very narrow invitation to this lifeboat.”
The problem with Lee’s argument is that she’s fighting against possibly the most pernicious space myth in existence, a myth far worse than moon landing conspiracy theories. It’s a myth almost universally believed, that sits at the core of liberal technocratic thought, and has been embedded in practically every other work of speculative fiction for the last half century.

In fact we’ve already seen this in a Mars mission simulation that took place in 1999 and ended in chaos, as summarised by Helen Lewis in New Statesman:

“…the Russian captain forcibly kissed the only female crew member, a 32-year-old Canadian health specialist called Judith Lapierre. “We should try kissing, I haven’t been smoking for six months,” he reportedly told her. “Then we can kiss after the mission and compare it. Let’s do the experiment now.” Two of her Russian crew mates then had a fight so violent that it left blood splattered on the walls, prompting another member of the team, a Japanese man, to quit. Lapierre stayed only after the astronauts were allowed to put locks on their bedroom doors.”

The first woman to be raped in space has probably already been born. And if that last sentence makes you howl with protest or insist that such a thing just wouldn’t happen, then I’d stop a second and ask yourself why.

I’m a fan of SpaceX, after some initial scepticism. I think it’s usually better to do something, however imperfect, than nothing, and I admire people like Elon Musk who take on the hard challenges, and make progress in spite of naysayers. I think Lee is absolutely right though when she says:

“When we look around and see a homogenous group of individuals discussing these issues – issues that command insane budgets, we should pause. Why aren’t other voices and perspectives at the table? How much is this conversation being controlled (framed, initiated, directed, routed) by capitalist and political interests of the (few) people at the table?”

It’s early days, but if we really want to create a progressive new world then issues like these should be at the hearts of our efforts from the very start. I hope Musk and his peers open up that discussion sooner rather than later, and I hope that people like Lee can take part in it. The last thing we need is to wake up in 50 years and find that a bunch of #gamergate nobheads are running Mars.

This whole article:




http://www.theguardian.com/science/the-l...are_btn_tw

"How our future Mars Colony can be free of sexism and racism..."

.....and bangable women.

Post: #11

Space is Robot, most likely Wall-E. And if we eventually manage to set up permanent human colonies, they'll be a microcosm of Earth's then population.

We won't know what humans in space will look like, no more than someone growing up in the 1400s knew what the Americas and Caribbean would look like in the year 2000.

We also evolve rapidly, a few generations in a different bio-sphere might be enough to change space humans from Earth humans.

Post: #12

The fact that women are not already on Mars shows how pervasive the Galactic Patriarchy truly is.

Post: #13

We sure as hell won't have to worry about the Martians invading the earth to steal our women when they see those three homely broads. "Yecch! Those Earth women sure are ugly!"

Post: #14

It won't matter ultimately. They'll go to Mars, stand there in the wasteland, look at each other, and say "This sucks!".

End of problem.

Post: #15

This is fantastic.

No self-respecting man would want to live on Mars. This would be a wonderful opportunity to make Mars a haven for SJWs and libtards. Give them their own fucking planet and get them off Earth.

They can have this for the next hundred million years for all I care:



I'm happy as a clam with what we've got here:

Post: #16

My worst nightmare is that my descendants will live in a world where interplanetary space travel is possible but prohibited by psychotic SJW world rulers who want to keep everyone here under their thumb.

Post: #17

This article is left wing clickbait. Even lefty friends on FB have complained about how "the Guardian has become awful". It was awful before, but there's a reason why they've started hiring people like Lindy West etc...they bring clicks. They got a new editor last year I think, and apparently they've gone the route of all MSM and gone for clicks. It's the only way to survive in today's online world.

Expect more of this nonsense.

Post: #18

At 37% of Earth's gravity, the women will all be fat anyways. Look at people in those mobility scooters, they're invariably 100 lbs overweight because the little exercise they would have gotten from having to stand up in 9.8 m/s^2 gravity is gone. On Mars you'd have 250 lb women skipping around like they're 95 lbs, who would then rapidly turn into a 500 lb woman, especially being stuck in a aluminum box for the rest of her life. Also since the men would probably be stuck doing all the work anyways.

Post: #19

There will be a time where the governments of Earth will have very little control over outer world colonies. We already see it now with other countries throwing their influence around and it isn't welcome so to say mankind should set aside differences when exploring space is idiocy.

Whats to say children born on a Earth-like planet will have any allegiance to Earth in the future?



This is the sci-fi fan in me talking.

Post: #20

Rape culture...

IN SPACE.

It's one small step for man, which is oppressive because what about people who can't even walk, did you ever think about them, reeks of patriarchy tbh.

Post: #21

(05-07-2015 10:34 PM)Tytalus Wrote:  The unfortunate fact is that until we get better methods of space travel, with our current limitations, a 5'3" woman will eat half the calories of a 6" man. And that makes big fucking difference for travelling to mars.

You don't woman female astronauts?

No way dude - have you seen Apollo 13? Do you think a crew of broads could have figured a way out of that?

And it doesn't matter if they're losing the tools along the way.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqOJCEGITjs
"We made a mistake"

http://www.menarebetterthanwomen.com/wom...-everyone/

Post: #22

Wait... if space is populated by white males then it WILL be free of racism and sexism.
In all seriousness, at the rate these people are going it will be the Chinese (who don't care about -isms at all) who will make it. White male civilizations will be too degraded to make the trip.

Post: #23

You have to give men a reason to spend their remaining years on a dead dusty rock in space. Hot easy space pussy is a great motivator.

Post: #24

(05-12-2015 09:03 PM)Parlay44 Wrote:  You have to give men a reason to spend their remaining years on a dead dusty rock in space. Hot easy space pussy is a great motivator.

Better than spending it with that "dead dusty rock" in bed!