Featured Image Credit: katyperry / Instagram
It's all gone a bit wrong for Katy Perry, and while the Woman's World singer attempted to prove it's a 'woman's world' when she joined the first all-female spaceflight since Valentina Tereshkova's 1963 solo trip, her Blue Origin trip has spectacularly backfired.
Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin organized the all-female flight that included the Amazon overlord's fiancée Lauren Sánchez, journalist Gayle King, aerospace engineer Aisha Bowe, research scientist Amanda Nguyen, businesswoman Kerianne Flynn, and Perry.
While each woman brought something to the 11-minute trip (including just four minutes in actual space), Perry has become a scapegoat for the mission's controversy. As well as complaints about how much it costs to go to space, there's the potential environmental impact, and some calling an 'insult' to NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams who were stuck in space for 286 days.
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Even before Perry and co. took flight, star Olivia Munn referred to it as a 'gluttonous' waste of money in a time when many are tightening their belts. While King and Sánchez have clapped back at their critics, Perry has been savaged by the general public and even the fast food chain Wendy's.
Following reports that Perry regrets her behavior while on the trip, the star herself has spoken out about the backlash she's been facing.
Although she's currently on the road with her Lifetimes tour, she's taken time to make an emotional statement about her time since landing back on Earth.
After a Katy Perry fan group booked a Times Square billboard to congratulate her on the opening week of her tour, it reminded the Roar singer that 'she is never alone' and has a legion of loyal supporters. Responding underneath, Perry admitted that she feels like a 'human piñata' and accused the internet of being "a dumping ground for unhinged and unhealed" people. An emotionally charged Perry wrote: "I can continue to remain true to myself, heart open and honest especially because of our bond.
“Please know I am OK, I have done a lot [of] work around knowing who I am, what is real and what is important to me.
"My therapist said something years ago that has been a gamechanger, ‘no one can make you believe something about yourself that you don’t already believe about yourself’ and if I ever do have any feelings about it then it’s an opportunity to investigate the feeling underneath it.
"When the ‘online’ world tries to make me a human piñata, I take it with grace and send them love, cause I know so many people are hurting in so many ways and the internet is very much so a dumping ground for unhinged and unhealed."
Perry concluded: "I’m not perfect, and I actually have omitted that word from my vocabulary, I’m on a human journey playing the game of life with an audience of many and sometimes I fall but … I get back up and go on and continue to play the game and somehow through my battered and bruised adventure I keep looking to the light and in that light a new level unlocks."
Perry has faced a barrage of critiques from big names, including Lily Allen, although the latter has since apologized and explained that while she disagrees with the April 14 flight, "There was actually no need for me to bring her name into it, and it was my own internalised misogyny. It was just completely unnecessary to pile on with her."
Despite Perry baring all to her critics, it looks like her trip to the stars could be one that continues to haunt her.
