Why Katy Perry and Lauren Sanchez's all-female space trip might not be as pro-feminist as you'd think

Girlbossing too close to the sun... Kármán line?

The all-female Blue Origin rocket launch made headlines this week, but the "Taking up space" crew have been widely criticised - and it's easy to see why.

Celebrities on board the Jeff Bezos-owned Blue Origin NS-31 mission included pop star Katy Perry, CBS Mornings host Gayle King, Bezos' fiancée Lauren Sanchez, aerospace engineer Aisha Bowe, civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen, and film producer Kerianne Flynn, in the first all-female crew since 1963.

The 11-minute journey just past the Kármán line - the border between Earth’s atmosphere and space - might be short, but it's a pricey seat. Although Blue Origin does not publicly list prices on its website, it's widely reported that a whopping $150,000 deposit is required to secure a place on the mission.

Celebrities are already accused of being out of touch with the general public, so the eyewatering cost of this trip hasn't gone down well, particularly given the rising living costs millions of Americans are facing at the moment - particularly for women who are "more likely to be concentrated in low-wage jobs, be responsible for caregiving, and experience sexual harassment and assault," on top of the loss of reproductive rights in the country.

It's pretty dystopian for elite members of society to embark on a trip that lasts less time than three of Perry's hit songs (I'm talking 'California Girls', 'Roar', and 'Teenage Dream') under the guise of female empowerment, when in reality it's space tourism - a growing industry estimated to be worth $1.3 billion in 2024 - and in this case, wrapped with a feminist bow on top.

What's next? Influencers being launched up on a space brand trip, as social media users are already predicting.

Other celebrities have vocalised their criticisms of the rocket launch.

"I know this is probably not the cool thing to say, but there are so many other things that are so important in the world right now,” actress Olivia Munn said on the matter. “What are you guys gonna do up in space? What are you doing up there?”

"And by the way, if you want to go to space, why do you need to tell us about it? You know? Just go up there, have a good time, come on down... I know this is obnoxious, but it's so much money to go to space. There's a lot of people who can't even afford eggs."

Celbs such as Olivia Wilde (left) and Olivia Munn (right) have critiicsed the recent Blue Origin's all-female crew launchPhoto by Phillip Faraone/Getty Images for Breakthrough Prize and Photo by Theo Wargo/Getty Images

She added: "Space exploration was to further our knowledge and to help mankind. What are they gonna do up there that has made it better for us down here? I mean, I don't know if all that rocket fuel is good. This is a lot of resources being spent."

Meanwhile, director Olivia Wilde took to Instagram to denounce the flight, where she shared a meme which included an image of a smiling Perry holding up a Daisy and another of Perry kissing the ground after the brief journey into space with the caption: "getting off a commercial flight in 2025 #BlueOrigin."

"Billion dollars bought some good memes, I guess," Wilde wrote.

Perry brought a daisy, which is her daughter's name, on board the flight and said afterwards it was "... a reminder of our beautiful earth and the flowers here, and the beautiful magic that is everywhere..."

The singer sang 'What a Wonderful World', and upon landing, she and fellow passenger King also kissed the ground when they returned from this brief flight.

Model Emily Ratajkowski slammed the female crew, accusing them of hypocrisy regarding the environment.

“That space mission this morning – that’s end-times s**t. Like, this is beyond parody,” she said.

She continued: “[Saying] that you care about Mother Earth and it’s about Mother Earth, and you’re going up in a spaceship that is built and paid for by a company that’s single-handedly destroying the planet?”

"I’m disgusted. Literally, I’m disgusted”.

Upon receiving backlash, King responded by saying that she wished "people would do due diligence," and that "we use space technology all the time” and so “every time a flight goes up, they get some type of information that can be used for something else.”

"And then my question is, have y’all been to space? Go to space or go to Blue Origin and see what they do and then come back and say, ‘This is a terrible thing.'"

Because everyone has the $150,000 deposit just sitting in their bank accounts...

Perry's post-launch comments are also coming under fire too, when she said: "I think this experience has shown me you never know how much love is inside of you — how much love you have to give and how loved you are — until the day of launch."

"Multimillionaire tells us we need to go to space to feel loved. She was there five minutes," one TikTok video criticised Perry's remarks.

With this newfound love and empathy, Perry and her counterparts should focus on helping to solve the very real problems women face on a daily basis here on Earth.

Elsewhere, Emily Ratajkowski slams Katy Perry's Blue Origin space mission: 'This is beyond parody', and Is Katy Perry an astronaut? This is why she may not be

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