China Demands Physical Perfection from She-Astronauts

You thought being an astronaut in America was tough? Forget advanced degrees and 1,000+ hours of flight time—in China, if you're a woman with dreams of space, you need a perfect face and no BO.

China Military News reports two female "taikonauts" have made the next cut for the country's Shenzhou-9 mission space mission, declared sufficiently "flawless" for the vacuum. So why's physically verboten for would-be space women of China?

• NO "decaying teeth"
• NO scars
• NO cesarean births
• NO single ladies
• NO "body odor"

This sounds more like a checklist for hiring at a moon base strip club, not an elite group of highly educated and highly skilled space explorers, but, hey, priorities, I guess. But China says its insistence on pretty astronauts is justified—according to an editor at the China Academy of Space Technology's magazine, anything short of a flawless body could cause a cosmic crisis:

The women could not have decayed teeth "as it might cause great trouble or a disaster in space." Pang said a scar might open and start bleeding in space and the cramped conditions would intensify body odour.

And you thought getting hit by space debris or burning up upon reentry was precarious. Godspeed you, Chinese rocket ship beauty queens. You'll be an inspiration to other physically-flawless girls all across your country. [Chinese Defense Mashup]

Note: Is it just us or does that photo of an alleged Beautiful Chinese Astronaut look photoshopped? Her face looks like it was drawn on!