Five lessons for humanity about trust and boundaries, consent and bodily autonomy, celebration, the dangers of technofascism and eugenics, consent, and best practices for sole proprietors.

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Since you ordered a rewrite and insist that “Godzilla is the Baby” is not a rigorous enough report, we are writing to you from Chicago.

To the surprise of no one, we had to leave Julije, our Political Analyst, in New York City—for a myriad of reasons, they’re not allowed to fly.

At the time of publishing, Tex and Egg will be on their way to their informational interview with Sue the T. rex at the Field Museum. We would like to reassure you: they packed their Sunday Best to show Ms. Dr. Sue the respect she is due. Interested members of the public can follow along at @thegodzillapapers on both Instagram and Bluesky.

Tex received your directive to produce a methods lineage report about his time with the Next Generation Foresight Practitioners. We know you said “no extensions” but can we have an extension? 

GODZILLA FIELD REPORT No. 8

• Date: April 24, 02026
• Location: Chicago/Brooklyn (remote)
• Mission: Kaiju_Love_Care_Futures_02026
• Artifacts Examined:
  • Invasion of the Astro-Monster (1965)
  • Pages 98 - 109: Invasion of the Astro-Monster, Chapter One of Part One: Beast of Burden: 1954 to 1975 of Ryfle, S., Godziszewski, E., Carpenter, J., Odaka, M., & Tomiyama, S. (2025). Godzilla: The First 70 Years: The Official Illustrated History of the Japanese Productions. Abrams Books. 
• Rations Consumed: half of a stew chicken burrito, seven espressos, three packets of Welch’s fruit snacks
• Chief of Mission (AKA Dudley the Dog) Present? No :(

We know that Deputy Director Vera Rowen finds “Godzilla is the baby” to be an unacceptable lesson for humanity, so instead of offering this as a lesson, we are simply offering it as fact. Godzilla is the baby. 

While we believe that lesson is enough on its own, we offer below five lessons for humanity about trust and boundaries, consent and bodily autonomy, celebration, the dangers of technofascism and eugenics, and best practices for sole proprietors. 

LESSON FOR HUMANITY No. 1: Not everyone is an ally or co-conspirator

The story of Invasion of the Astro-Monster centers around two astronauts who fly to one of Jupiter’s moons: the newly discovered Planet X. Upon landing, the astronauts meet the Xiliens—the suspiciously human-looking residents of Planet X. 

The Xiliens have been expecting the humans—in exchange for use of the Kaiju Godzilla and Rodan to defend Planet X from King Ghidorah (more on this in the next lesson), the Xiliens offer humanity the cure for cancer. This might “spoil” the movie, but it turns out that this was a ruse in order to facilitate a violent takeover of Earth as a water-providing colony of Planet X.

…

We had some reactions to this. At first, we thought it lovely how immediately trusting the humans were of the Xiliens. Then, as sometimes happens, things went south. We do not believe that this is an argument to not trust anyone ever, but we do think this is a good reminder to move cautiously.

Perhaps if the Earth humans and Xiliens had had a conversation about shared values and definitions of success for this proposed collaboration, the Earth humans would have spotted the Xiliens’ nefarious, Planet-X-Supremacy agenda.

Trust is important, but not everyone is safe. Some folks wish to dominate the Earth and its inhabitants. We can all work to implement small, simple checks for values alignment and safety.

LESSON FOR HUMANITY No. 2: Build consent practices into everything

In the film, the Xiliens ask Earth humans for permission to transport Godzilla and Rodan to Planet X in order for the Earth kaiju to provide assistance in the fight against King Ghidorah (who we now know was under the Xiliens’ control all along! … see Lesson No. 1).

The fact that the Xiliens asked the humans for permission and not the kaiju themselves should have been a significant “red flag” (as these things are so often called). Humans cannot speak for the kaiju, other living beings, or even other humans when it comes to issues of bodily autonomy.

We offer general rule of thumb: if they can’t consent, do not transport them to space in big bubbles.

A separate but related “sub-lesson” here is: if living beings have been kidnapped to an alien planet, and humans have the chance to bring them back to their home, that’s what humans should do, every single time.

We were struck by just how sad Godzilla and Rodan were as the humans were flying back to Earth. (This is especially sad given our finding that Godzilla is the baby.)

Bad behavior all around. What would the future look like if we respected all creatures’ autonomy?

LESSON FOR HUMANITY No. 3: Celebrate the wins

When Godzilla and Rodan defeat King Ghidorah, Godzilla does his now-famous victory dance. 

We’ve learned that this dance, called the “Shee,” was introduced by Fujio Akatsuka’s manga work called Osomatsu-kun. Rifle and Godziszewski tell us about what was happening behind the scenes:

 …people everywhere striking the pose. "I didn't know anything about this 'sheeeh, because I didn't read mangas," remembered suit actor Haruo Nakajima. "[Tsuburaya (Special Effects) said], 'It's so popular now. Let's do it! I'll decide later whether or not to use it. Let's film it anyway.' - Page 105, The First 70 Years

Let's film it anyway! While this scene made most of us at the Field Office let out a guffaw or two, we were impressed by how seriously the Toho team took this fun. Suit actor Haruo Nakajima continued,  

…It wasn't difficult because the suit was pulled up by wires.... I actually enjoyed doing humanlike actions more than the heavy-looking monster actions. But even when we were filming a comical scene like that, no one laughed. Everyone was serious about their job." - Page 105, The First 70 Years

Life can be hard. The world is, in many ways, on fire (both literally and figuratively). Godzilla’s victory dance after he and Rodan defeat King Ghidorah teaches us to celebrate the wins, even if one is on a foreign planet by no choice of one's own. This celebration and joy does not cancel out fear, grief, anger, and sorrow—they can all exist at once.

In fact, Tex was walking down Wabash here in Chicago with a new friend whose area of research is also justice-forward (contrary to what many of you at Mission HQ seem to think, Tex makes friends just fine) and they were discussing the idea of “balancing” our emotions in times of struggle.

We discussed that our emotions are not a math equation to be solved: joy and anger don’t cancel or even balance each other out. We can have fun and be joyful while moving with reverence for our work and for our people. More and more, we on the Field Office Team have been thinking that the oft-used rhetoric of “balancing” our emotions is actually the rhetoric of the capitalist state, encouraging us to optimize, optimize, optimize.  

We do not need to optimize our emotions. We can, however, access the full range of human emotion as a way to keep our humanity intact.

LESSON FOR HUMANITY No. 4: “Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of a human mind,” and also eugenics is bad

 Throughout Invasion of the Astro-Monster, the Xiliens are controlled by a supercomputer. While attempting to dominate planet Earth and wipe out all human life, the Xiliens say things like, “I was just following orders,” “The computer tells us what to do,” and “Execute Item 4 of Scenario 5.” Oppression is incredibly boring. Oppression via Artificial Intelligence is incredibly boring and fast.

This theme calls to mind the work of our colleagues at Mission Dune_Herbert_Love_Hope_01984. We recall one of the core lessons they offered to humanity, a commandment from the Orange Catholic Bible in Frank Herbert’s Dune: 

“Thou shalt not make a machine in the likeness of the human mind.”

In our universe, Artificial Intelligence is eating water, land, and life. Artificial Intelligence is enabling increasingly violent state actions and surveillance. Invasion of the Astro-Monster offers cautionary tales that humanity has all but ignored.

Still, we believe resistance is worthwhile, if not essential. 

We were aware that we may—as sometimes happens—be shoehorning a political argument somewhere it didn’t fit. We were relieved to read Ryfle and Godziszewski’s analysis:

Though the film is light entertainment, it hints at the perils of a fascist society where technology supplants free will and science supplants biology; all the women are identical, genetically engineered replicants. "That was the basis," director Ishiro Honda said, "that genetic engineering of humans was possible. We need to beware of that" - Page 102, The First 70 Years

Yes: in addition to technology ruling the day, the Xilien women are identical! They’ve been genetically engineered—not unlike various Eugenics programs, many of which were born in the so-called United States. (As we often like to remind you, the Nazis learned it from us.) 

We wonder what a future without A.I., eugenics, and violent exploitation of land, water, and life might look and feel like. We suppose this is a question for the Arts Department.  

LESSON FOR HUMANITY No. 5: Get the money up front

One of the characters in Invasion of the Astro-Monster, Tetsuo, is an inventor whose most recent invention is called the “Ladyguard.” It’s a personal alarm that emits a terrible, high-pitched alarm. When we meet him, he’s had trouble selling the Ladyguard. Somewhat miraculously, a businesswoman expresses interest and Tetsuo hands over the invention on the promise that he’ll get paid once the Ladyguard goes to market. 

Turns out, the businesswoman is a Xilien, and it just so happens that the Ladyguard’s sound is deadly to her kind. This was a classic case of “defensive purchasing,’ otherwise known as corporate fuckery.

We must say, for not living on Earth, the Xiliens are very good at capitalism. 

To mission supporters who are sole proprietors or in the business of selling your services and creativity to pay rent and other bills: get the money up front! Do not start work until you have received payment!

We hope the general public finds these lessons useful. If anyone needs us, we will be at the Field Museum asking Dr. Ms. Sue the T. rex questions about surviving apocalypse, the ethical quandaries of museums, and being very tall and old.

Yours in Science,

The Godzilla Field Office 

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