We Fly

Watching the final launch of Atlantis this morning, I finally put my finger on what bothers me so fundamentally about the privatization of space travel.

For fifty years, the accomplishments human spaceflight—all that brilliance and innovation and technology and sheer goddamn pluck—have very literally belonged to all of us.That launch this morning? All that pride, and all that inspiration? It was ours.

Human spaceflight will continue, but it’ll no longer belong to everyone. It’s the difference between a state park and a private garden.

Some things should belong to no one—and to everyone. And this is one of them.

Notes

  1. kamemihari reblogged this from mariecarlson and added:
    Just one of the reasons why this whole thing makes me so inexpressibly sad.
  2. mariecarlson reblogged this from ragnell
  3. ragnell reblogged this from postcardsfromspace
  4. lightthiscandle reblogged this from postcardsfromspace and added:
    What’s neat is that your comments remind...of something an astronaut wrote nearly...
  5. kaiyves reblogged this from complex34 and added:
    Quite right, sir.
  6. complex34 reblogged this from kaiyves and added:
    I agree…and disagree with postcardsfromspace. While it absolutely must belong to everyone, I believe the future of...
  7. website666 reblogged this from postcardsfromspace and added:
    From postcardsfromspace:...The US government is supposed to be “for
  8. sheetsofanemptycanvas reblogged this from postcardsfromspace
  9. beautiful-anomaly reblogged this from spaceandstuffidk and added:
    Everything about this. Why are my cries still spouting.
  10. nicholasreznikov reblogged this from postcardsfromspace
  11. fuckyeahnasa reblogged this from spaceandstuffidk and added:
    This times a thousand
  12. spaceandstuffidk reblogged this from postcardsfromspace
  13. davidwynne reblogged this from postcardsfromspace
  14. postcardsfromspace posted this