Greetings, Earthlings. It is once again I, Xylb’tok of Mars, reporting live from orbit with another instalment of How Not To Run a Planet. Just when we thought you had exhausted the available combinations of hubris, incompetence and self-inflicted chaos, Week 50 arrived like a drunk uncle at a wedding – loud, unpredictable and determined to embarrass everyone in attendance.
This week brought withdrawals from global cooperation, imaginary space fauna achieving interplanetary travel, ICE agents dispatched to sporting events, a penguin refugee crisis, and a Superbowl snub so petty it deserves its own commemorative plaque. Make yourselves comfortable. We Martians have already started stress-eating meteor dust.
Global Health? Never heard of Her
The United States has now officially withdrawn from the World Health Organization, again, ending decades of participation in the global body tasked with coordinating responses to pandemics, disease outbreaks and public health emergencies.
This was framed as a bold assertion of sovereignty. From Mars, it looks more like cancelling your fire insurance because you dislike the font on the paperwork. The WHO exists to share information quickly, coordinate research and stop diseases from hopping borders like caffeinated rabbits. Leaving it does not make germs respect national pride. Viruses, famously, do not read press releases.
Martian epidemiologists remain baffled. On our planet, when someone suggests abandoning shared health infrastructure, they are gently escorted outside and asked to reconsider their life choices. Earth, meanwhile, appears to be running a live experiment titled What If We Just Wing It?
Climate change: simply log out
Not content with ditching global health coordination, the United States also completed its withdrawal (not for the first time) from the Paris Climate Agreement, once again stepping away from the international effort to limit global climate change.
This move was presented as economic realism. From Mars, where we still study how atmospheric collapse works in exquisite detail, it reads as wilful denial of facts. Climate change does not vanish because you stop attending meetings about it. It simply continues, unbothered, while you argue with a mirror.
Leaving the Paris Agreement is rather like unplugging the smoke alarm because the beeping is annoying while the house is on fire. The flames do not care about your feelings.
Haggis have reached the Moon – and Mars confirms the rest
In perhaps the most joyous scientific confusion of the week, reports circulated on Earth claiming that haggis have been spotted on the Moon. Before anyone panics, this does not involve launching Scotland’s national dish into orbit. These are the legendary wild haggis creatures of folklore – the shaggy animals traditionally said to run sideways round hills and confuse tourists for sport. And yes, they were all offered refugee status on Mars, once our officials heard The Elon had eyes on their Lunar house, and realised that Trump might mistake the Moon for Greenland.
Some earthlings, of course, insist these creatures are mythical. From Mars, we feel duty-bound to correct the record. They are very real. Very alive. And at the time of writing, several are confidently making their way up Olympus Mons with the air of beings who have always known they belong there.
The Facebook image portraying “galactic haggis” hopping about lunar terrain allegedly caused mild hysteria among space agencies and immense delight everywhere else. Long a staple of Scottish banter, the haggis has now achieved interplanetary status, proving that folklore travels faster than rockets and with far better PR. Note, their legs are as well adapted to walking round the Martian mountainsides as round the slopes of Lunar craters.
Martian scientists report that the low gravity suits the haggis perfectly. They bounce. They scamper. They appear deeply unimpressed by humans. Frankly, after this week, we understand why.
The Superbowl snub nobody asked for
Cultural diplomacy took another hit when El Taco announced he would not attend the Superbowl, following the news that Bad Bunny and Green Day would perform the halftime show. He explained that he “isn’t into them”.
Sir. They are not into you either. This is not a mutual heartbreak.
Declining the Superbowl because you dislike the performers is like refusing oxygen because you don’t care for the branding. Bad Bunny and Green Day will continue existing, thriving and performing regardless. The only casualty here is dignity.
From Mars, this sounded less like a scheduling conflict and more like a sulk conducted at scale. Somewhere, a very wet lettuce nodded in solidarity.
ICE at the Winter Olympics: what could possibly go wrong?
In one of the more baffling announcements of the week, Agent Orange declared that ICE agents will be sent to the Winter Olympics to “boost security”.
Because nothing says relax and enjoy elite sport like a heavily armed immigration enforcement presence roaming ski resorts. Truly, the biathlon has never needed more tension.
From Mars, this feels like deploying guard dogs to a yoga retreat. The Olympics already involve extensive security planning with local and international agencies. Adding ICE into the mix suggests less concern for safety and more enthusiasm for visibility.
It also raises the unsettling image of agents in tactical gear attempting to chase figure skaters across ice rinks, which we sincerely hope remains hypothetical.
Melania’s Film: Now With FIFA Recognition?
On the cinematic front, Melania Trump’s film has reportedly bombed at the box office. Reviews ranged from polite confusion to active bewilderment. Rumours have reached us that FIFA will nominate Melania for their inaugural FIFA Academy Award for Best Film.
We have no idea what that award might entail, but the idea of a football governing body pivoting into film criticism feels entirely on brand for this timeline. At this point, reality is simply throwing genres into a blender and seeing what happens.
Martian critics remain open-minded. Art is subjective. Box office numbers, less so.
The Greenland Penguin and Martian Asylum
Perhaps the week’s most unexpectedly charming cultural artefact arrived in the form of the Greenland penguin meme. The internet, doing the educational work others refuse to, highlighted a small but important geographical detail: penguins do not live anywhere near Greenland, in fact they are native to Antarctica, which as anyone with a basic understanding of geography will tell you is the opposite side of the world to the Arctic Circle, which is where you will find Greenland. Nature, as ever, has a strong relationship with maps.
As images spread, juxtaposing icy imperial ambition with a creature that very much belongs on the opposite side of the planet, irony reached near-perfect form. If Earth is going to redraw the world based on vibes and wounded pride, the least it can do is consult an atlas.
Penguin morale is high. Martian morale is improved. If Earth continues to misunderstand geography at this rate, Mars may need to expand its refugee programme to include maps.
In response, the Martian Council of Cultural Refugees moved swiftly and with far more competence than most Earth governments. Mars has officially granted refugee status to the penguin in question. We are pleased to report that he is settling in well, enjoying the low gravity, sliding enthusiastically across red-dust dunes and enrolling in advanced ice-sliding courses. Citizenship papers are currently being processed.
Minneapolis protests and solidarity from Mars
This week also brought painfully stark moments that were difficult to watch and impossible to laugh off. In Minneapolis, federal immigration enforcement agents have been at the centre of national outrage after the deaths of two American residents – Renée Nicole Good and Alex Pretti – during aggressive operations by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and related federal agents. Good, a 37-year-old mother, was fatally shot during an encounter with ICE officers earlier in January. Less than three weeks later, Pretti, a 37-year-old intensive-care nurse, was killed by ICE agents during a protest against the heightened federal presence in the city. Videos circulating online challenge official claims about the circumstances of both shootings and have fuelled widespread anger and demands for accountability and reform.
These tragedies have sparked sustained protests not just in Minneapolis but across cities nationwide, with demonstrators condemning the violence, calling for the end of aggressive federal enforcement tactics, and demanding that ICE leave communities that feel under siege.
From Mars, then, come these words – not satire, not irony, not detached observation:
There are no words sufficient to convey how we Martians felt watching these awful events unfold. We would like to say clearly and without irony that we stand with all the protestors today, tomorrow and for however long it takes. We see you, we hear you, and we are with you. Justice, dignity and accountability are not radical demands – they are the foundation of any society that wishes to call itself civilised.
Final thoughts from orbit
Week 50 has delivered a familiar pattern: retreat from cooperation, escalation of spectacle, and decisions driven more by ego than evidence. From abandoning global health and climate frameworks to inserting enforcement agencies into sporting events, Earth’s leadership continues to confuse noise for strength and isolation for independence.
From Mars, the wobble is no longer subtle. It is rhythmic, persistent and worryingly self-reinforcing.
We will continue watching. Partly out of concern. Partly out of professional obligation. And partly because if we don’t document this, future historians may assume it was satire.
Until next week, Earthlings. Please remember: cooperation is not weakness, climate does not negotiate, and penguins absolutely do not live in Greenland.
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