Wendy’s has issued a statement to People magazine amid the buzz around its anti-Katy Perry post on X that asked if the singer can go back to space (aka get off Earth). The fast food chain went viral on April 14 when Perry joined Gayle King, Jeff Bezos’ partner Lauren Sanchez and other women on a Blue Origin trip to space. The account Pop Crave announced “Katy Perry has returned from space” after the mission ended, to which Wendy’s social media team replied: “Can we send her back.”
The fast food chain wrote another post on X that was critical of the Blue Origin space launch by saying: “When we said women in stem this isn’t what we meant.”
People is running a story about how Wendy’s should apologize to Perry, with one source telling the magazine: “This was a billion-dollar brand using its platform to publicly demean a woman.” However, the company stopped short of issuing an apology in its statement to the magazine.
“We always bring a little spice to our socials, but Wendy’s has a ton of respect for Katy Perry and her out-of-this-world-talent,” Wendy’s said in an official statement.
Perry’s Blue Origin space flight sparked a lot of backlash online. Though its purpose was meant to bring attention to women in aeronautics, celebrities like Olivia Munn called it “gluttonous,” adding: “There are so many other things that are so important in the world right now. What are you guys going to do up in space?” Amy Schumer, Olivia Wilde and Emily Ratajkowski also shared posts critical of the space flight.
Gayle King defended the mission in an interview with Extra, saying: “I think it’s good that we can really address it … because I was one of those people before I went on this flight and before I became educated. ‘Why are we spending so much money on space when there’s so much to do on Earth?’ I was one of those people.”
King said her mind changed when she looked at “what Blue Origin does,” which is “to figure out a way to harness the waste here and put it in space to make the Earth a better place… I wish people would do more due diligence. And then my question is, have y’all been to space? Go to space or go to Blue Origin and see what they do and then come back and say, ‘This is a terrible thing.’”
