The Dilemma of African Astronauts

The first thing any totalitarian power does once they rinse the smell of the previous regime from their newly blood soaked desk, is to write new nuptials and writs, to boast, to give the people an illusion of progress measured against other nations and increase the vain of the insane. Russia and America are prime examples especially during the cold war, where whomever did better in space was like having the bigger dick. Space travel was treated like an athletic sport.

India which is aiming at super power status, has already started investing heavily in space programmes (example in March it was announced that $1.45 billion would be allocated for the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to see the ISRO website go to http://www.isro.org/) despite the fact that Indians cannot afford even the most basic education of primary school.

It is strange that none of the many African dictators who already squander their blood money they get on arms or their own 'sick' pleasures have not been attracted to the idea of been the first African Nation to hold the prestige of having an astronaut shot out like a cannonball into the wilderness of space. Africa is the only continent left that has yet to do so.

The first African-American in space Guion “Guy” Bluford, Jr looks more like a disc jockey than an astronaut. A girl told me during my research on African astronauts that 'well if I could marry an astronaut well Guion you'd be my dream spaceship boat.' I plan on getting her a Guion poster for her next birthday.

The famous iconography of 2001: Space Odyssey ( see Animaniacs parody above) where in an African desert an ape-like early human tosses a bone into the air which via a match cut is transformed into a orbital satellite millions of years in the future. Our deepest roots lie in Africa, we all descent from there, so why not an African in space to fulfill this moving and symbolic cinematic gesture?

What we do have is Mark Shuttleworth from South Africa (whose net worth of £150 million ) the first citizen of an independent African country to go into space. He paid 20 million yoyos for the privilege. In the software world he has been given the title Self-Appointed Benevolent Dictator for Life. There is more information on this tourist visiting space at http://www.africaninspace.com/

The image above is the thought provoking ancestral etchings of an Ancient Astronaut via Cave Art found in Val Comonica, Italy. The image of an African tribe or a truly indigenous African folk becoming a school of colourful astronauts without compromising their spiritual or personal selves would be a momentous event. It would make an interesting composition from an artistic or environmental position. It would no doubt be the spectacle of the first half of this century. Imagine sending a tribe of nomads to another planet to live. The National's Song Looking For Astronauts expresses poignantly in its music and lyrics how I feel about African astronauts:

It's a little too late, too late, too late for this
Isn't it a little too late for this?
Little too late, too late for this
Isn't it a little too late for this?