Glad They’re Home Safe. But Still.

A space veteran’s uneasy reaction to billionaires, teachers, and a rocket launch.

What Price the Stars? A personal reflection on space tourism, spectacle, and the cost of forgetting why we explore.

All of this began with a simple Facebook comment I made online. It read:

“Bad optics. Bad timing. Glad they are home safe, but still.”

That was the spark. Not a takedown. Not a tantrum. Just a breath of hesitation in the whirlwind of hype. So with a deeper dive into those words… here are my feelings.

There is more to this story than this symbolic meme…

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The Applause and the Silence

While the world celebrated the historic launch of the first all-woman spaceflight in over half a century—complete with sleek blue flight suits, styled hair, and pop icon Katy Perry’s eleven-minute musical journey into the heavens—I found myself sitting in quiet contemplation. It wasn’t anger. It wasn’t bitterness. It was something more difficult to express: a kind of emotional static, buzzing softly beneath the applause.

This is not a rejection of their accomplishment. Far from it. I believe in space exploration. Deeply. Profoundly. Unshakably.

But I also believe in context. And timing.

And this particular mission—this joyride into the cosmos—landed awkwardly, its jubilance clashing with the silence of a thousand science desks now sitting empty.

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A Life in Orbit

I gave 37 years of my life to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

That number is not symbolic. It’s real. It’s worn into my bones. It represents missions built by sleepless engineers, software scrubbed by hands trembling with responsibility, and countless moments of triumph and loss stretched across the vacuum of space.

I’ve written Lessons Learned that are now archived in NASA history. I’ve listened to flight teams hold their breath while a spacecraft descended onto alien soil. I’ve walked past rovers in cleanrooms and stood beside the minds who got them there.

I’ve had astronauts in my home. I’ve had mission directors shake my hand, they know my name, and more importantly, my reputation. I’ve been invited into the sacred halls of problem-solving and the sacred silences that follow both success and failure.

So when I say I believe in space, know that I mean it with the full gravity of experience. (No pun intended)

But I am a robotic space explorer. My missions don’t come home for parades. My explorers are made of titanium, solar panels, and code. They don’t breathe, but they reach farther.

Still, I admire human spaceflight. I admire its risk. I admire its poetry.

But space is not forgiving. It doesn’t allow for missteps. It is beautiful—but it is brutal.

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Remembering Challenger

Once, we sent a teacher into space. Her name was Christa McAuliffe. She represented a dream. A classroom lifted into orbit. A vision of learning without limits.

Then the Challenger exploded.

And the dream was grounded—hard.

The consequences of that loss echoed across generations. Civilian spaceflight didn’t simply pause; it disappeared from the public imagination for decades. We did not walk away from space. We limped. We learned. We learned that symbolic missions carry very real weight.

And I never forgot.

I have read both major accident investigation reports—the Report of the Presidential Commission on the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident (1986), and the Columbia Accident Investigation Board Report (2003)—cover to cover. Not once, but several times.

In fact, I kept a physical copy of the Columbia Report on my whiteboard tray, just behind my desk at JPL. It wasn’t there for decoration. It was there for deployment.

During Lessons Learned interviews in my office, especially when someone was hesitating or withholding key details, I would pull that report down like a book of sacred truth. I would read aloud from it—not to shame, but to remind. Because the pages of those reports hold hard-won wisdom written in sacrifice.

They are not history. They are instruction.

And when we forget their words, we risk repeating their tragedies.

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The Question No One Asked

So when this latest mission launched—an all-woman crew, a teacher aboard, celebrities on the manifest, and social media roaring with approval—It was in my face for very complex reasons.

Let me be clear: my hesitation had nothing to do with the women aboard. Quite the opposite. I support them. I admire them. I cheered the statement they made just by showing up. Their flight suits looked great. I’m here for all the glam if that was their choice and not a marketing firm. The heels? Sure. The makeup? Let them shine. Katy Perry’s music? I listen to it. I support their voices. I support their presence. Am I clear?!

But still, I asked: What if it had failed?

What if we had once again watched a teacher perish in pursuit of spectacle?

What if the footage from this launch turned somber, and history repeated itself with only the hashtags changed?

In the world I come from—a world built on checklists, failure modes, and sobering simulations—that question is not just appropriate. It is essential. This is complex because I know the risk is there for humans, but still… optics.

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The Age of Private Spaceflight

There’s another layer.

This mission wasn’t launched by a national space agency. It was backed by billionaires.

Not scientists. Not public institutions. But private capital and personal ambition.

Jeff Bezos. Elon Musk. Richard Branson.

Most are not villains. Their innovations are real. Their achievements impressive. They’ve reshaped the launch landscape in ways that will echo for decades.

But let us not pretend they are above critique, or are they? Is this the America where we can still hold dissenting views?

Especially now we need other views.

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A Quiet Trend Toward Erosion

I was laid off in February 2024. Not because of Musk. Not due to this administration. But because science funding was already in retreat, beginning its quiet, devastating withdrawal from the public sphere.

I was among the first waves. But many more followed.

And today, as Elon Musk’s companies gain dominance in the space sector, I watch with unease as the programs I once served are starved—while he, in parallel, trims our government’s scientific teams.

This is not innovation. It is erosion.

It hurts not just because I was let go—but because my friends remain. They work in rooms now filled with silence and uncertainty. They don’t know if they’ll have careers next year. Or next week. Or by this Friday.

All while rockets fly.

All while cameras roll.

So yes, it is hard to cheer when a billionaire sends a teacher to space... while the nation systematically fires them back on Earth.

The juxtaposition isn’t poetic. It’s painful. It’s timing.

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Applause Over Awe

Somewhere along the way, we traded awe for applause.

Once, the world wept when humans touched the Moon.

Now, we scroll by footage of zero-gravity selfies to the rhythm of pop beats.

There’s a difference between pushing boundaries and putting on a show.

I fear we’re losing sight of which is which.

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Why I Write

I had bit my lip for days, and I thought my friends would know what my social media post meant, but I was replied with “Are you serious, you of all people”.

I write because I remember.

I remember a time when risk was sacred, when missions were solemn acts of service, not marketable moments of spectacle. Click-bait. Like mines.

I still believe we can reach for the stars. But not if we trample our teachers to do it. Not if we silence our scientists to fund the lights. Not if we forget what exploration truly means.

I want us to go together—as a species, not as a reality TV show.

I want us to return to the spirit of firelight storytellers who once pointed to the sky and dreamed. But we must go with courage. And clarity. And purpose.

Not just to touch the stars.

But to deserve them.

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Let Them Eat Cake

All of this began with a simple comment I made online. It read:

“Bad optics. Bad timing. Glad they are home safe, but still.”

That was the spark. Not a takedown. Not a tantrum. Just a breath of hesitation in the whirlwind of hype.

To capture the feeling, I generated an image: Marie Antoinette, stepping daintily from a Bezos capsule, uttering the immortal line—“Let them eat cake.”

Some laughed. Some bristled. But the metaphor stuck. Because symbolism cuts quick and deep, and I’m a well known meme warrior in this regard.

So let me say plainly what I meant:

First — It was bad optics to fly a teacher into space for a media spectacle while cutting funding to educators across the country.

Second — It was bad timing, landing amid a painful season of layoffs, funding slashes, and the slow disintegration of publicly supported science.

Third — I’m glad they are home safe. Truly. Sincerely. But still... that doesn’t resolve the deeper discomfort that something sacred is slipping through our fingers.

So let’s take a moment—not to scold, not to shame—but to reflect.

Let’s pause the music. Dim the lights. And remember.

Space is not a backdrop for reality TV.

It is a frontier.

And we owe it more than clickbait.

—Charles White, Space Explorer and complex individual with feelings (sometimes)

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Bonus Content

John and Ingrid dive deep into the article above and in less than 8 minutes, they get the point Charles is trying to make…