Space Tourism Isn't Worth Dying For

rudy_wayne writes with this opinion piece at Wired published in the wake of the crash of SpaceShipTwo, which calls the project nothing more than a "millionaire boondoggle thrill ride." A selection: SpaceShipTwo is not a Federation starship. It's not a vehicle for the exploration of frontiers. Virgin Galactic is building the world's most expensive roller coaster, the aerospace version of Beluga caviar. It's a thing for rich people to do. Testing new aircraft takes a level of courage and ability beyond most humans. Those engineers and pilots are at the peak of human achievement. What they're doing is amazing. Why Virgin is doing it is not. When various corporate representatives eulogize those two pilots as pioneers who were helping to cross the Final Frontier, that should make you angry. That pilot died not for space but for a luxury service provider. His death doesn't get us closer to Mars; it just keeps rich people further away from weightlessness and a beautiful view.

Comments

Fuck you Wired

[Kagetsuki]

Way to totally fucking miss the point and way to totally fucking mis-interpret Virgins intentions. Seriously, 5 minutes of Google searches could have saved you from looking like such awful fucking idiots.

Also fuck you for basically dis-respecting and dis-reguarding everyone involved in Virgin Galactic. These are people puting a fuck of a lot into making space travel a reality and just because the rich will be the first to enojoy the fruits of that labour doesn't give you the right to bitch. It's exactly the same situation in every industry, including passenger ships, trains, and aircraft. You give Branson shit for this when he's one of the few rich guys out there actually pouring money into this kind of thing. Bill Gates can shove his malaria garbage up his ass for all I care - that's not bringing us into a new era.

Seriously, I hope you fucking die in a fire Adam Rogers. Fuck your "opinion" and fuck you.