#NatureNews NASA investigates renaming James Webb telescope after anti-LGBT+ claims nature.com/articles/d4158… cc @pcoffeebreak James Webb, head of NASA from 1961 to 1968, was involved in persecuting gay and lesbian people during his career in government.
"Four astronomers, Lucianne Walkowicz, Chanda Prescod-Weinstein, Brian Nord and Sarah Tuttle, lead the renaming petition. They say that Webb passed a set of memos discussing “the problem of homosexuals and sex perverts” to a senator who was leading the persecution."
"David Johnson, a historian, says there is no evidence that Webb led or instigated persecution. Webb did attend a White House meeting on the threat allegedly posed by gay people, but the context of the meeting was to contain the hysteria that members of Congress were stirring up"
"The final decision lies with NASA administrator Bill Nelson. There is no clear list of alternative names. Unofficial suggestion are Harriet Tubman, enslaved woman who used the stars to guide Black people to freedom, and Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin."
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