Going To The Moon Is Sexist, Claims NYT Article: Spacesuits Accommodate Male Sweat, Ladder Rungs Spaced For Men

[Teh One Who Knocks]

By Ellie Gardey - The Daily Caller




Female astronauts face sexism as a result of a “legacy of gender bias” in the space program, argues a New York Times essay published Wednesday to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing.

“If we do not acknowledge the gender bias of the early space program, it becomes difficult to move past it,” says the article, which is entitled “To Make It to the Moon, Women Have to Escape Earth’s Gender Bias.” The essay argues the modern day space program continues to be oriented to men over women.

Men and women wear the same spacesuit today, but this is problematic, the article alleges, because men and women have “different sweat patterns.”

“Men sweat more than comparably fit women, and the areas where they sweat the most occur in different parts of the body,” the essay says. “In other words, when it comes to temperature-controlling garments, the needs are different for men and women.”

The author, Mary Robinette Kowal, compares the difficulty with sweat in spacesuits to debates regarding air conditioning in offices: “We are already aware of this in relation to office temperatures. Temperatures are set for men, which leaves women carrying sweaters to work.”



Another facet of the space program that is sexist, according to Kowal, is that the ladder rungs on the new ship and lunar platform for the upcoming Artemis missions “are set at the optimum distance for the average man.” In addition, the pistol-grip cordless drill for Artemis missions is “sized for a man’s hand.” Even the distance from the seats to the control panels in SpaceX’s Dragon Crew capsule are sexist as they are “optimized for men,” according to the article.

The article describes an episode from April in which two female astronauts intended to perform a spacewalk, but they could not do so as they did not have enough correctly-sized spacesuits. The failure to have suits that fit women is also a result of gender bias, says Kowal.

A NASA official wrote a letter in 1962 to a little girl who wanted to be an astronaut. The letter said, “we have no present plans to employ women on spaceflights because of the degree of scientific and flight training, and the physical characteristics, which are required.”



The first woman to fly in space was Russian astronaut Valentina Tereshkova in 1963. Women were only permitted to enter the astronaut program in the United States in the late 1970s, and the first American woman in space was Sally Ride in 1983. No woman has walked on the moon, and 61 out of 537 space travelers had been women by 2016.

The New York Times article garnered wide attention. Many called the essay hypocritical because of a history of sexism in journalism.

The Washington Post published an article Tuesday saying the culture that put men on the moon was “mostly white and male.”

[PorkChopSandwiches]

Just identify as a man, problem solved

[Hal-9000]

So if women weren't allowed to enter the astronaut program until 1970, the question resides there. Who made the rule and why. Was it because women couldn't physically withstand the physical rigors of being an astronaut? Like firemen?

[Teh One Who Knocks]

So if women weren't allowed to enter the astronaut program until 1970, the question resides there. Who made the rule and why. Was it because women couldn't physically withstand the physical rigors of being an astronaut? Like firemen?

If I had to guess, I would say that's probably a fair assumption as to why.

[Hal-9000]

If I had to guess, I would say that's probably a fair assumption as to why.

It must be. Nasa was pretty progressive otherwise hiring those black women to run the first computer inputting and do all of the math computations (mostly by hand) for the moon landings.

You gotta think. Late 50's, early 60's and they hired women of color to work in the command center? Hidden Figures is a good movie about the time.

[DemonGeminiX]

We should round up all idiots that bitch like this and launch them into space without spacesuits.

[Godfather]

So if women weren't allowed to enter the astronaut program until 1970, the question resides there. Who made the rule and why. Was it because women couldn't physically withstand the physical rigors of being an astronaut? Like firemen?

Good question. I did some digging and read a few sources for fun tonight. It does go a deeper than just physical requirements, it was a political debate then too, and there are some interesting stories here.


Early NASA criteria was that you had to be a highly experienced test pilot (meaning military aviation experience, then becoming a test pilot) for the Mercury Seven and NASA's Group 2 and 3 Astronauts. It wasn't until NASA Astronaut Group 4 in 1965 that they accepted a few non-pilot scientists with doctorates... but women weren't military aviators until the mid 70's, so none were qualified for Groups 1-3. The last Apollo astronauts came from Group 6, and the final Apollo mission was in 1972. So experience during that small window of the Apollo program was a major issue. The "Pilot Paradox" it was called.

There were early proponents of female astronauts like Randolph Lovelace, the doctor in charge of astronaut medical, who wrote a paper arguing that women would be good candidates in the 50's, as they were lighter and showed strong psychological testing. Female aviator Jerrie Cobb recruited women 'The Mercury 13' (interesting wiki-article) who apparently passed the same biomedical testing as the Mercury astronauts, but long-story-short their efforts ended when they couldn't get military or NASA funding for their study to access proper facilities in order to go any further.

Cobb went to Washington and there was a House Committee Hearing on Sex Discrimination, where Cobb argued sexism was barring them from being astronauts. Jacqueline Cochran (a female non-military pilot) however undermined the testimony of Cobb and Lovelace, arguing it would basically be a distraction to the space race, women would drop out of the program having children, etc. Some in the Subcommittee were apparently sympathetic, but couldn't get past the lack of flying experience of the candidates (though some did have 8000-11,000 hours in jets).

As you'd expect there was old-timey sexism. At that same Subcommittee, John Glenn testified women weren't fit for space and "The fact that women are not in this field is a fact of our social order." There are other examples of bad cases being made against female astronauts like 'women's menstruation would be impossible to handle in space.' There's also am anecdote about Pres. LBJ shutting down a letter heading for NASA's James Webb asking for reconsideration of the requirements for women writing "Let's Stop This Now!". Stuff like that which doesn't age well, but ultimately was a sign of the times.

Would it have been possible for a female astronaut to have been accepted into NASA Groups 4-6 and walked on the moon? Looking back, perhaps... but Group 4 had only had 1% female applicants (4/400)... and given that the vast majority of Apollo astronauts were aviators, and that the space race was an extension of the cold-war, can you really go back and try and unravel these incredible scientific accomplishments (where plenty of women participated on the ground), for not being on the forefront of inclusivity-for-the-sake-of-incusivity? And if you're going to do that, do you not then need to argue that more women should have died as pilots in Vietnam in Korean, and as test pilots? . Clearly some will try in this age of woke-ness and revisionist history There's just no leg to stand on to claim the moon landing was a sexist NASA movement from what I can see.

The first American woman flew in space just 13 years after Apollo 11. Can we just be proud of that and move on?

[Hal-9000]

Some good stuff there GF, thanks.

Yeah I read about some of the old timey sexism and the article all but said women weren't allowed to enroll in certain pilot programs.

Kinda cool we're chatting about this today

Wanna hear some other interesting stats? Check out Neil Armstrong's past. He was the first civilian in space, being a test pilot without military background. He also had the least amount of logged time in space before Apollo 11 with something like only 13 hours. Buzz Aldrin was actually considered one of the smartest astronauts in the space program and rarely made jokes during missions. He was such a brainiac that some mission control techs would ask him to solve equations for problems. Buzz was only know for his sense of humor years after the Apollo missions.

Armstrong's Gemini 8 mission was fascinating. That was the one where they were doing a docking test and his vehicle started spinning out of control. He eventually stopped the malfunction and figured out how to do it when the craft was tumbling at the rate of 296 degrees per second. That's a complete Barfarama scenario and his copilot was amazed Armstrong got it back under control, probably saving their lives.

And most people know that when Armstrong and Aldrin were in the LM descending to the moon, the onboard computer had calculated the place to land. Armstrong saw the area out their tiny window and determined the terrain was too rough and he took over manual control of the lander. He used thruster rockets to fly over the intended landing site and by the time they landed, they had 16 seconds of fuel left. That meant they either landed, they aborted the landing, or used up too much fuel and wouldn't be able to get back to the capsule. His coolness under pressure was amazing.

[Hal-9000]

and in keeping with the thread...have you ever seen a woman back up a car??

[Godfather]

Some good stuff there GF, thanks.

Yeah I read about some of the old timey sexism and the article all but said women weren't allowed to enroll in certain pilot programs.

Kinda cool we're chatting about this today

Wanna hear some other interesting stats? Check out Neil Armstrong's past. He was the first civilian in space, being a test pilot without military background. He also had the least amount of logged time in space before Apollo 11 with something like only 13 hours. Buzz Aldrin was actually considered one of the smartest astronauts in the space program and rarely made jokes during missions. He was such a brainiac that some mission control techs would ask him to solve equations for problems. Buzz was only know for his sense of humor years after the Apollo missions.

Armstrong's Gemini 8 mission was fascinating. That was the one where they were doing a docking test and his vehicle started spinning out of control. He eventually stopped the malfunction and figured out how to do it when the craft was tumbling at the rate of 296 degrees per second. That's a complete Barfarama scenario and his copilot was amazed Armstrong got it back under control, probably saving their lives.

And most people know that when Armstrong and Aldrin were in the LM descending to the moon, the onboard computer had calculated the place to land. Armstrong saw the area out their tiny window and determined the terrain was too rough and he took over manual control of the lander. He used thruster rockets to fly over the intended landing site and by the time they landed, they had 16 seconds of fuel left. That meant they either landed, they aborted the landing, or used up too much fuel and wouldn't be able to get back to the capsule. His coolness under pressure was amazing.

All fascinating stuff, can't get enough of it.

On the topic of civilians, Harrison Schmitt was the only other civilian to walk on the moon (Apollo 17 ) and the only non-aviator and scientist to fly in the Apollo program (looking at the list of Apollo astronauts only he and Armstrong are listed as civilians but Armstrong of course was a pilot as you mention). Schmitt was no slouch though - he was a PhD geologist who collected some of the best moon samples brought back including those that suggested the moon once had a magnetic field. He also is believed to be the man who took the famous Blue Marble photo.

Did you happen to watch First Man? I can't fully recommend the entire movie, it was a bit underwhelming IMO and Ryan Gosling's portrayal of Neil Armstrong felt overly morose (like he was still playing his character from Drive ), though it's understandable given the losses that close group of astronauts and their wives had to endure with so many dead friends and close calls... Anyways, it had a few incredibly tense scenes like Armstrong's manual landing on the moon you mentioned with fuel running extremely low, as well as the Gemini 8 mission which should've killed him. If you can even just find those two scenes on YouTube they're worth watching.

[Hal-9000]

All fascinating stuff, can't get enough of it.

On the topic of civilians, Harrison Schmitt was the only other civilian to walk on the moon (Apollo 17 ) and the only non-aviator and scientist to fly in the Apollo program (looking at the list of Apollo astronauts only he and Armstrong are listed as civilians but Armstrong of course was a pilot as you mention). Schmitt was no slouch though - he was a PhD geologist who collected some of the best moon samples brought back including those that suggested the moon once had a magnetic field. He also is believed to be the man who took the famous Blue Marble photo.

Did you happen to watch First Man? I can't fully recommend the entire movie, it was a bit underwhelming IMO and Ryan Gosling's portrayal of Neil Armstrong felt overly morose (like he was still playing his character from Drive ), though it's understandable given the losses that close group of astronauts and their wives had to endure with so many dead friends and close calls... Anyways, it had a few incredibly tense scenes like Armstrong's manual landing on the moon you mentioned with fuel running extremely low, as well as the Gemini 8 mission which should've killed him. If you can even just find those two scenes on YouTube they're worth watching.

Yep I saw Ryan portray Armstrong. I liked the flight scenes and have been aware of the events for years. Truly astronauts are the most courageous test pilots in history.

They didn't even know how far the lunar lander legs would depress into the moon's surface. It could have been bad

[SpurNine]

Life is sexist, important biological differences are built in. Ether learn to except yourself for what you are or pray for reincarnation before your next hard reset.