That is one problem ( displayed in the fim 'Gravity')
An other thing is the colonization of space; to who belongs Mars for instance?
At this moment all the Mars missions took high caution not to contaminate it with the biologic life from earth.
With sending people we are giving that virginity away as we did on the Moon.
Next thing is the exploitation of space and it will show that in some way we as a human race have not developed since 1600; 'i saw it first' will rule + the law of the jungle.
(neglecting the rights of living creatures that were there already)
While we are so focussed on 'technology' it is obvious that we already have enough of that to make living better for everyone here on earth.
That would be a real achievement. Sadly it is not as sexy as a rocket launch.
I agree with you 100%.
It has always struck me as absurd that we spend all this money on "space" yet there are millions of people here, on Earth, unable to find food, water or even a roof to cover them from the elements.
We fail to deliver peace, safe cities or even safe villages; we have a society where weekends turn some city streets into no-go areas at night because of the young drunks and junkies, and we have criminals on early parole because there ain't enough space to contain 'em out of our way, and that's in the so-called developed world. We can't make the trains and buses run on time and in some areas we have gone from a daily collection of domestic waste to once every two weeks. We condone a work ethic where companies are able to pretend their employees are self-employed and thus treat them like shit.
We run a medical service that is doing all that it can with the limited funds it has to supply treatment for patients, some of whom are left for hours on a stretcher in an ambulance or on a trolley in a corridor due to lack of beds and staff to cope with it all. Yet we think it desirable to throw money into rockets that, apart from communications systems, do what that we can't live without, that wasn't perfectly good enough back in the 50s?
Instead of attending even to this tiny fraction of a lengthy list of all that's obviously wrong with our society we think
about friggin' space? Are these people for real? Who gives a shit about going to the Moon except mega-rich tourists of the future or grown men who are still Superman and/or Flash Gordon fans?
If that sort of money is availabe for games and careers in sci-fi, then maybe we should seriously think about our taxation system, especially about the pockets wherein are to be found the funds to throw around on fantasies like this.
You could safely say that as a society, our sense of values can't tell its ass from its elbow.