Argumentative Essay On Female Astronauts

The United States Space Program was really started when Russia began their space endeavors. On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched the first satellite that orbited the Earth. This pushed the United States to put more time, energy, and money into their space program, thus launching the race to space between the USA and the Soviet Union. However, all of the USA astronauts were white men. This was still during a time where minorities were not given full equal opportunity, and neither were women. It took over twenty years for women to be able to go to space, and this almost had to come after the entire women’s movement. Women had to fight for their right to be in space. It took even longer for there to officially be a female astronaut, despite multiple characteristics pointing out that they might in fact be better candidates for space. According to the documentary, …show more content…
However, there were qualifications in place that automatically knocked women out of the running. Applicants were required to have experience flying jets with the military, but at that time, women were not allowed to do that kind of thing with the military. Therefore, even though NASA was not technically actively discriminating against women, women were not able to meet the requirements. It took so long for women to be able to become astronauts because of discrimination in related fields, such as the military, and the fact that people always seemed to come up with a reason why women would not work well in space. For example, the documentary discussed using the bathroom in space. For men, there was a condom-like device that was relatively easy to use, and they would simply slip it on and urinate. However, being that women’s bodies are very different, it was argued that it was too difficult to come up with an efficient urination device for women. Menstruation was also brought up with female