Frazz by Jef Mallett for September 21, 2023

I grew up in Chicago in the 60s. You couldn’t pay me enough to go back there now.

For years I had hoped to see a manned Mars mission before I die. But despite all the talking about it, I don’t see it happening. The Mars mission, not the dying. The dying I see all too clearly.

People are able, however unwilling, to eke out a marginal living in some pretty terrible situations. Those who don’t HAVE to do that, very much want not to.

I won’t go into Seattle anymore. It’s heartbreaking.

When you defund the police the crooks can smash your front door in broad daylight to steal everything you own.

My mom keeps saying we can fix climate change, pollution, etc by colonizing Mars. I’ve tried to explain that even the parts of Earth we’ve screwed up are way more habitable than Mars.

If Thog the caveman had waited until all the Neanderthals on Earth were properly fed, housed, and safe before inventing the wheel, we’d all still be dragging stuff around by hand. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

But there are people in the other parts of town that do not look like me! On Mars there are no people that do not look like me.

With my horrendous navigational skills, I’ve ended up in every part of town at some time or another. No big deal-in daylight.

If we settles Mars, how long before we have the same problems on Mars?

The problem isn’t earth, the problem is humans.

As for the technological questions, show me you can make part of the Sahara fertile. Then maybe we’ll talk about Mars.

New places for graffiti. Tagger heaven. Hint: Don’t wear your helmet backwards.

Currently, there are no people on Mars. That’s all the incentive I need.

I recall a few years back, there was talk about an attempt to colonize Mars, either privately funded or by some nation that doesn’t have its own space program. It would have been one-way at best, plain suicide more likely — and there were huge numbers of people signing up for it! Reminded me of a sci-fi short story about a program to reduce the “overpopulation” of Earth by sending specially qualified people to a beautiful planet — all the people who were dumb enough to think they were “specially qualified” and that there really was such a planet in reach of our technology…

Mars is a lot safer than some parts of town.

I, too, saw the ’69 landing and I was awed to see come alive what once only happened in comics and movies. It gave me high hopes that mankind would advance to the planets in increasing numbers and that the nations would eventually work together in developing true space travel. I also hoped that collaboration would also lead to more cooperation between the nations. My hopes have faded to faint gray ash.

if you want to know about how people actual live and think in different parts of our country watch Peter Santenello YouTube video’s, he goes into areas that we can’t or won’t go into and lets the locals tell their story

That’s why I want everybody’s kids in the same schools with everybody else’s kids, learning that we actually can get along.

“Sloopy lives in a very bad part of town (ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh)

And everybody, yeah, tries to put my Sloopy down (ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh)

Sloopy, I don’t care what your daddy do (ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh)

‘Cause you know, Sloopy, girl, I’m in love with you (ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh)" – Hang On Sloopy, The McCoys, 1965

The thing is that, unless humanity gets off this rock, it’s going to be wiped out when another rock comes along. Ask the dinosaurs.

.

(Whether or not humanity being wiped out is a bad thing depends on your own personal views.)

Panel two, for very good reasons.

Mars. The ultimate gated community of the stupidly rich. Who are they going to find to do any work for them?

The movie ‘WALL-E’ made me skeptical of colonizing space. I say we make our communities on earth safer. If Elon Musk wants to live on Mars, I’m not stopping him.

Going to Mars is about five orders of difficulty beyond the moon. Just being in space for as long as it will take (setting aside the cosmic rays) will have negative effects.

Because Mars isn’t overpopulated with scary people who would kill you for being different from them, or being from the wrong side of the street.

“Ah, you may leave here for four days in space,but when you return, it’s the same old place.”~P F Sloan, “Eve of Destruction” (1965)

Major Strasser : How about New York?

Rick : Well there are certain sections of New York, Major, that I wouldn’t advise you to try to invade.

Because a manned mission to Mars could become the first step to colonizing other parts of the solar system and possibly releaving severe ecological pressures here on Earth. Getting some one to go to a different store/restaurant/movie theatre, is just a way to make their extrovert friends more insufferable.

I’m not sure how realistic it is to get people TO Mars, let alone live there. The latest info on the tolls of weightlessness and radiation on the human body is pretty bad.