Liu Yang Becomes China's First Female Astronaut

China launched Saturday a rocket bearing three astronauts and an experimental orbiting module intended to presage a full-fledged space station at the end of this decade. While that's big news in itself, the launch also marks the first trip for a female Chinese astronaut. The BBC has a brief video, including part of a pre-launch press conference introducing 33-year-old astronaut Liu Yang, as well as her crewmates.

Re:Okay, and?

[w.hamra1987]

Was there something about being a woman that made it problematic being in space

you mean besides the monthly "make no sense, freak everyone out" day? no, i don't think there's any difference.

Re:Okay, and?

[swalve]

I think that's the point: there is no reason why there shouldn't have been women doing it all along. So it's notable when the status quo changes.

Lucky girl

[Anonymous Coward]

Lucky she wasn't forcibly aborted at seven months...

Re:Okay, and?

[ShanghaiBill]

I am not sure why it matters that she's the first female astronaut.

It matters to those of us trying to raise daughters. They need as many role models as we can give them. I want my daughter to ask for a lunch box with a picture of Liu Yang or Sally Ride, and not the "Disney Princesses".

Doing shit everyone else does... with a vagina!

[Anonymous Coward]

SO special!
Don't they realize that highlighting this as special is sexism?
In a non-sexist mind, this is just a normal thing, and in no way special.
And as long as we don't stop nonsense as this, sexism won't stop.

Re:Okay, and?

[Jeremi]

This Liu Yang is surely a good astronaut, but as the news about this launch is more than half about having a woman on boars, makes me wonder what the real reason is to chose her over one of the other candidates they have.

This is one of the burdens pioneering women have placed on them: people are always second-guessing them, wondering whether they got their position on the merits or if are being given special treatment because they are women. Minorities often get a similar response ("oh s/he only got the job because of affirmative action"). Hence the saying "you've got to be at least twice as good as anyone else to be accepted as equal".

She was chosen 14 years ago

[dbIII]

The flight is to test a manual docking procedure and she's one of the experts in operating that system. She started her astronaut training 14 years ago, so she was chosen as a potential astronaut way back then.
Why assume that she was chosen for any other reason? The press is going to make a huge deal about it no matter what the reason because a female face in space sells advertising space - however they don't get to make the call, especially not in China.

Re:Doing shit everyone else does... with a vagina!

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly... But everyone will ignore you because, gender equality man! Anything* a woman does is inherently more worthy of attention than the same thing done by a man because you don't want to be sexist do you? Do you? (*Anything except whistling at the other gender, which is forbidden for men but permitted for women. Bunch of moms whistling at the Disney boy du jour = "oh come on, the boy likes it"; bunch of dads whistling at the Disney girl du jour = "OMG perverts! Go to jail!")

Re:Okay, and?

[wvmarle]

I do not second-guess any women on the Shuttle missions.

I do second-guess this case because the news about this rocket launch is literally >50% "we got a woman in space" and There is no reason to me this woman would not be as good as their male counterparts. She used to be a fighter pilot, so has a proven track record in another high-demand job. It's just how the news overly focusses on having a woman in space that makes me suspect that the selection criteria for this mission included "must include a female".

It is almost like if you would report on the first Apollo moon missions as "we got a man in space, and outside of orbit! Oh yeah they also touched down on the moon. This man is fantastic, his family is great, he worked so hard to get in space and put evreything aside. His wife and kid followed the launch at home."

Now what is the important part: a man/woman in space, or the exploratory and scientific reach and objectives of the space mission?

Re:HAIL CHINA!

[Anonymous Coward]

Rank Country (or dependent territory) Prisoners per 100,000 population

1 United States 730 ICPS
2 St. Kitts and Nevis 649 ICPS
3 U.S. Virgin Islands (USA) 539 ICPS
4 Georgia 536 ICPS
5 Russia 522 ICPS
6 Seychelles 507 ICPS
7 Anguilla (UK) 480 ICPS
8 Rwanda 450 ICPS (c.)
9 British Virgin Islands (UK) 439 ICPS
10 Bermuda (UK) 428 ICPS

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate [wikipedia.org]

Re:Congratulations for being the 56th female visit

[shutdown -p now]

Who cares, if the end result is that many more girls figured they could try their luck in fields they wouldn't have considered before because of cultural conditioning?

Re:Okay, and?

[AmiMoJo]

Not all women are thus affected, and men in space have similar issues with feeling horny and frustrated on a much more regular basis. Part of the psychological evaluation all astronauts undergo is to evaluate their susceptibility to those issues and to see how suppressant medication works.

Come on guys, drag yourselves into the 21st century.

Re:Okay, and?

[w.hamra1987]

which brings an interesting question... can astronauts really spend long times in space (months or maybe over a year) without any sexual thinking at all? i mean... at some point, if you do.. you have to unload... uhm.. are they allowed to?

Re:Okay, and?

[Anonymous Coward]

Russians, on the other hand, managed to get one up in the air pretty quickly (for propaganda reasons, obviously) and then the next woman Russian astronaut had to wait a while too.

Of course, if USSR does anything -- it is for propaganda reasons, if USA -- it is for the benefit of humanity.

Your statements are the perfect illustration of the fact that American propaganda is even more pervasive than Soviet one.