Business Insider Literally Practices Lunatic Journalism

During that flurry of visits, the US planted not one but several flags, presumably still in the name of mankind rather than the stars and stripes. Most of those star-spangled banners planted in the moon’s soil still appear to be standing, passing on a message to future explorers not dissimilar to “Kilroy was here.” The hope never really existed that those flags might someday serve their usual mission on earth of inspiring crowds by “gallantly streaming” in the evening breeze or “the dawn’s early light.” For the moment there is a dearth of spectators on the moon to “proudly hail” the flags. Moreover one can hardly count on the moon’s unique source of a breeze – the solar wind – to animate a piece of cloth made rigid for the needs of an ephemeral photo shoot..

So, if there has been very little concrete action since the last manned mission to the moon in 1972, why did Business Insider feel compelled to share with its reader this interview Bill Nelson? What is the compelling drama we need to know about? Very simply, Nelson wants us to understand, before it’s too late, that evil people – clearly the enemies of the US – may be up to no good with Lady Luna, the princess of the night.

The threat, this time, isn’t coming from Russia, but, even more ominously,  from the true designated enemy in the new Cold War: China. Nelson describes the crisis in these terms: “It is a fact: we’re in a space race. And it is true that we better watch out that they don’t get to a place on the moon under the guise of scientific research. And it is not beyond the realm of possibility that they say, ‘Keep out, we’re here, this is our territory.’”

Today’s Weekly Devil’s Dictionary innovates by offering a pair of definitions that will be given to the term in its edition of the year 2223:

Space race:

1. A competition that emerged in the 1950s – following the Soviet Union’s successful launch of a manned Sputnik satellite – that served at the time to excite the media, as it was touted to be the factor that could prove whether capitalism or communism is the best social and political system for humanity. It was revived more than six decades later, in the early 21^st century, when hyperreal nostalgia for the original Cold War began to dominate the news cycle in the US.

2. A term used to describe the new branch of the human race quickly evolved beginning in the late 21^st century, created by the diminished gravity of Mars and space itself. The race is sometimes referred to as the Muskian ethnicity. It lost its ability to interbreed with humans after a mere three generations after being recognized as a biological reality.

Contextual note

Pardon my impertinence, but how is this a news story? How can Business Insider waste its readers’ time and attention on an article that does nothing more than cite one man’s musings, clearly designed to inspire fear of an eventuality that, in reality, does not appear to be in “the realm of possibility.” 

Neither Nelson nor the author of the article, Kate Duffy, bothered to mention a small but significant detail: that a 60 year-old  international agreement on the exploitation of outer space actually puts such an eventuality beyond the realm of legal possibility. Here is what the the UN’s Office of Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) announced as recently as 2017: “UNOOSA and China are reiterating their shared commitment to the peaceful exploration and use of outer space, as well as underlining the significant contributions that space activities can make to sustainable development.” UNOOSA’s Director Simonetta Di Pippo added this statement: “I greatly appreciate China’s contribution to international cooperation in the peaceful uses of outer space and its ongoing and wide-ranging support of the Office’s activities.”

Moreover, in a note at the very end of the article, Duffy admits that she made no serious effort to back up Nelson’s accusation or put it in perspective. “NASA,” she admits, “didn’t immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment, made outside normal US operating hours.” Just as she didn’t have the time to research the existing law on the exploitation of space, neither did she have the time to get a second possibly corroborating opinion.