Space Force Members Will Be Called Guardians, Mike Pence Says

Photo: Samuel Corum/Pool (Getty Images)

Outbound Vice President/gynophobe-in-chief Mike Pence announced at a press conference on Friday that enlisted personnel in the Space Force will be referred to as “Guardians.”

I have a lot of questions here. Pence apparently means “guardians” in the sense that Army troops are called soldiers, Naval enlisted are called sailors, Air Force personnel are called airmen, and grunts are called Marines. Will “Guardian” be implemented into the rank structure—like, does someone get promoted from Guardian to Sentinel to Space Paladin to Tython, The Secessionist King Of Mars or something?

Could Pence possibly be aware of Guardians of the Galaxy? If so, does he know it contains a talking raccoon he would find an abomination before his Lord? Is he aware that Guardians are also the title of the fascist foot-soldiers from the totalitarian theocratic state in A Handmaid’s Tale? Did the Space Force actually want to be called Guardians, or is this just something Pence is really excited about?

Here are some other things Pence could have went with, beyond the obvious “Spacers”:

Abyssals
Astrofighters
Celestials
Interplanetarians
Moon buddies
Rocketeers
Spacefolk
Space rangers
Star rustlers
Starship troopers
Stellernauts
Vacuumi
Voidwalkers
Vomit Cometeers
Weltraummarinesoldaten

According to the Space Force, the term “Guardians” was the outcome of a “yearlong process that produced hundreds of submissions and research involving space professionals and members of the general public.” Sure, Space Jan. The same announcement tweet emphasizes in all caps that Guardians is “a name chosen by space professionals, for space professionals,” which is a little defensive. The Space Force also touted the news with the tagline “HERITAGE + MISSION + CULTURE,” which is ominous and not as fun as, say, Adiuva me! Ego procidens or Libera temet ex inferis.

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