# Katy Perry Space Trip Katy Perry Space Trip refers to the massive wave of memes, jokes, and online backlash that followed pop singer Katy Perry's participation in the Blue Origin NS-31 suborbital space flight on April 14, 2025. The 11-minute flight, billed as the first all-female crew in space since 1963, drew ridicule from celebrities, brands, and millions of social media users who mocked the trip's brevity, Perry's theatrical ground-kissing upon landing, and what critics called tone-deaf celebrity privilege during a time of economic anxiety. ## Origin The memes began forming in real time on April 14, 2025, as the Blue Origin NS-31 flight was broadcast live. The mission had been organized by Lauren Sánchez and promoted as a historic all-female spaceflight, the first since cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova's solo mission in 1963[1]. Perry documented the experience on social media, including singing Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World" during the flight. The backlash ignited on Twitter/X almost immediately after splashdown. Model Emily Ratajkowski posted that she was "disgusted," writing: "Saying that you care about Mother Earth and it's about Mother Earth, and you're going up in a spaceship that is built and paid for by a company that's singlehandedly destroying the planet". Olivia Wilde shared a meme of Perry exiting the spacecraft captioned "Getting off a commercial flight in 2025," while also saying she was "loving the memes". The moment that crystallized the meme wave came when Perry dropped to her knees and kissed the ground after landing. That image spread across every platform within minutes. - **Platform:** Twitter/X (initial backlash), TikTok and Instagram (meme spread) - **Creator:** Unknown (community-created from Blue Origin NS-31 footage and news coverage) - **Date:** 2025 ## Overview On April 14, 2025, Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket launched mission NS-31, carrying an all-female crew that included Katy Perry, CBS anchor Gayle King, Blue Origin founder Jeff Bezos's fiancée Lauren Sánchez, former NASA engineer Aisha Bowe, civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen, and film producer Kerianne Flynn[1]. The flight lasted 10 minutes and 21 seconds, reaching suborbital space before returning to the launch site in West Texas[1]. The internet's response was immediate and brutal. Within hours, the flight became one of 2025's most memed events, with jokes targeting everything from the comically short duration to Perry kissing the ground after landing. Celebrity critics piled on, Wendy's fast food chain joined the roast, and conspiracy theorists claimed the whole thing was faked. Slate compared the mission to the widely mocked 2020 celebrity "Imagine" sing-along video. ## How It Spread The first major brand to jump in was Wendy's. Under a Pop Crave post celebrating Perry's return, the fast food chain's X account wrote: "Can we send her back". Wendy's also riffed on Perry's hit song with a twist on "I Kissed a Girl" after she kissed the ground. When called out, Wendy's refused to apologize. Kesha, Perry's longtime rival due to the Dr. Luke legal dispute, posted a selfie on X wearing sunglasses and sipping from a Wendy's cup. The post was widely interpreted as a pointed endorsement of the roast. Comedian Caitlin Peluffo posted a viral video satirizing Perry and Sánchez that racked up massive engagement. One tweet joking that Gayle King revealed Perry "sang in space" and quipping "no wonder they came back so quickly" pulled over 400,000 likes in two days. Other celebrities who publicly criticized the flight included Lily Allen, who called it "out of touch" and slammed sending Perry to space "for absolutely no fucking reason". Amy Schumer and Olivia Munn also posted critical commentary. U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy disputed the crew's astronaut title, stating they did not meet FAA criteria because they had not demonstrated "activities during flight that were essential to public safety, or contributed to human space flight safety". By April 16, conspiracy theories were already spreading. Users on X pointed to Perry's hair "floating the wrong direction," a capsule door that appeared to open before Bezos opened the hatch, and the lack of re-entry burn marks on the capsule. The "fake hand" theory gained traction when a photo circulated showing what appeared to be a mannequin hand inside a Blue Origin capsule, though the image was actually from a 2017 unmanned test flight. In the UK, the activist group Everyone Hates Elon installed protest posters near Amazon's headquarters in Shoreditch reading "If you can afford to send Katy Perry to space, you can afford to pay more taxes" and near an Amazon Fresh store in Angel with posters captioned "Our tax avoidance is out of this world, just ask Katy Perry". On April 23, Perry addressed the criticism during her Lifetimes Tour in Mexico City, asking the crowd "Has anyone ever called your dreams crazy?". She later wrote in a social media comment that she felt "battered and bruised" but was "looking to the light". Reports surfaced that Perry didn't regret going to space but did regret "making a public spectacle out of it". Lily Allen later apologized on her Miss Me? podcast on April 28, saying "There was actually no need for me to bring her name into it, and it was my own internalized misogyny". ## How to Use The Katy Perry Space Trip meme typically takes a few forms: 1. **Duration jokes**: Compare the 11-minute flight to something that lasts longer, like a Selena Gomez social media break, a microwave cycle, or a morning commute. 2. **Ground-kissing edits**: Use the image of Perry on her knees kissing the ground and add a caption about returning from something mundane. 3. **Celebrity privilege commentary**: Frame the flight as a symbol of wealth disconnect, often pairing it with references to economic hardship or Jeff Bezos's tax rate. 4. **Gayle King reaction shots**: Screenshots of King looking uncomfortable or unenthused during the flight work as general reaction images. 5. **"Send her back" riffs**: Remix Wendy's viral tweet format by suggesting other people or things to send to space. ## Cultural Impact The backlash hit Perry's professional life tangibly. The wave of criticism coincided with her Lifetimes Tour, and coverage of the space trip overshadowed tour promotion for weeks. Slate's comparison to the 2020 celebrity "Imagine" video framed the flight as a defining example of celebrity tone-deafness in 2025. The meme wave also fed into broader debates about space tourism's environmental cost. Critics pointed out that each passenger on a typical suborbital tourism flight produces roughly 75 tonnes of carbon emissions, equivalent to what some small nations emit in a year[1]. The flight's framing as feminist progress clashed with the reality that Blue Origin's founder had donated to political candidates opposing abortion rights[1]. The Wendy's engagement became a case study in brand social media strategy, with the chain gaining significant attention for its refusal to back down. The Kesha-Wendy's-Katy Perry triangle generated its own sub-narrative that kept the memes alive for days after the flight. The conspiracy theories, while debunked by outlets like Euronews, showed how quickly misinformation could attach itself to a viral celebrity event, with theories about fake hands, wrong hair physics, and Satanic mission patches all gaining traction on X. ## Fun Facts - Perry sang Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World" during the flight. Internet users joked it was "a travesty" she didn't perform her own single "Woman's World" instead. - The flight lasted 10 minutes and 21 seconds, shorter than most TV commercial breaks during a Super Bowl broadcast[1]. - A photo used to support the "fake hand" conspiracy theory was actually from a 2017 unmanned Blue Origin test flight that carried a mannequin named Skywalker. - Lily Allen's apology to Perry two weeks after her criticism became its own mini-news cycle, with Allen citing "internalized misogyny" as her motivation for piling on. - The Blue Origin mission patch sparked separate conspiracy theories when users flipped it upside down and claimed it resembled the Satanic figure Baphomet. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is the Katy Perry Space Trip meme? It's the collection of memes, jokes, and viral backlash that followed Katy Perry's 11-minute Blue Origin suborbital space flight on April 14, 2025. The memes targeted the flight's short duration, Perry kissing the ground after landing, and celebrity privilege. ### Where did the Katy Perry Space Trip meme come from? The memes originated on Twitter/X in real time during and immediately after the Blue Origin NS-31 launch on April 14, 2025, then spread to TikTok, Instagram, and other platforms within hours. ### What does the Katy Perry Space Trip meme mean? The meme is used to mock celebrity tone-deafness, space tourism excess, and the disconnect between billionaire-funded PR stunts and everyday economic realities. It also pokes fun at the flight's absurdly short duration. ### How do you use the Katy Perry Space Trip meme? Common formats include duration jokes comparing the 11-minute flight to mundane activities, edits of Perry kissing the ground, Gayle King reaction screenshots, or riffs on Wendy's "Can we send her back" tweet. ### Is the Katy Perry Space Trip meme still popular? The meme peaked in April-May 2025 and has been declining since. It saw brief revivals when Lily Allen apologized in late April and when Everyone Hates Elon posted protest posters in London. ### What did Wendy's say about Katy Perry's space trip? Wendy's X account replied to a Pop Crave post about Perry's return with "Can we send her back." The chain also joked about Perry's hit "I Kissed a Girl" after she kissed the ground, and refused to apologize when criticized. ### What was Kesha's response to the Katy Perry space flight? Kesha posted a selfie on X sipping from a Wendy's cup while wearing sunglasses, widely interpreted as an endorsement of Wendy's roast given the two artists' history of conflict over producer Dr. Luke. ### Did Katy Perry regret the space trip? According to sources close to Perry, she didn't regret going to space but did regret "making a public spectacle out of it." She wrote on social media that she felt "battered and bruised" from the backlash. ### Were there conspiracy theories about the Katy Perry space flight? Yes. Conspiracy theorists on X claimed the flight was faked, pointing to Perry's hair direction, a capsule door opening before the official hatch opening, missing re-entry burns, and a "fake hand" photo that was actually from a 2017 test flight. ### What did Emily Ratajkowski say about the flight? Ratajkowski said she was "disgusted," criticizing the disconnect between claiming to care about Earth while riding a spaceship "built and paid for by a company that's singlehandedly destroying the planet". ### Who was on the Blue Origin NS-31 flight with Katy Perry? The all-female crew included CBS anchor Gayle King, Lauren Sánchez (Jeff Bezos's fiancée), former NASA engineer Aisha Bowe, civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen, and film producer Kerianne Flynn[1]. ### Did Sean Duffy say the crew weren't astronauts? Yes. U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy disputed their astronaut title, saying they didn't meet FAA criteria because they hadn't demonstrated activities "essential to public safety, or contributed to human space flight safety". ## References 1. [Everyone Hates Elon]() --- Source: https://meme.com/memes/katy-perry-space Published by meme.com — The Internet Meme Library