Wednesday, June 24, 2015

The Space Race, or how bad intentions took humans to Heaven


Sorry the toon is late, thanks to a good news and a bad news: the awesome INSPIRE urban art festival in Moncton which I was fortunate enough to be part of. I met tons of great artists there, but on the sadder side my sister had a heart attack on saturday, so I had to spend some time with her at the hospital and/or take care of her son, little 10-year old Alex (I love to draw with that kid! He’s also the owner of the plush dog that was the inspiration for Beebee). She’s out of danger now, but will have to spend some more time at the hospital…
Great theme to work on, though. People say that Hell is paved with good intentions. The Space Race is one of the few cases where bad intentions got humans to Heaven! The first rocket-like engines ever designed were the infamous Nazi V2’s and the following Cold war gave a major push to inter-continental missile technology. The first rockets were actually missiles, with the nuclear charges at the top replaced with pressurised cabins with an astronaut in it. The John Glenns, Scott Carpenters, Alan Shephard, that left their marks in history (and had Thunderbirds characters named after them).
It’s food for thought that at the first time and the same technology that would have allowed humans to destroy the planet allowed to see it all for the first time. As if God, after Hiroshima, gave us a message:
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Dear humans;
We need to talk.
You have the technology to go in the sky, now, so come see me up here a moment. Let me show you what I’ve been seeing for millennias. Here! It’s more beautiful than any jewel in your mines and it can sustain life. It is the ONLY thing that can sustain life. It took me four billions of years to make that! You want to destroy that just to make a stupid point?
I know you humans are not that stupid!
Signed,
God