Whitey on the Moon

"Whitey on the Moon" is a spoken word poem by Gil Scott-Heron, released as the ninth track on his debut album Small Talk at 125th and Lenox in 1970. Accompanied by conga drums, Scott-Heron's narrative tells of medical debt, high taxes and poverty experienced at the time of the Apollo Moon landings. The poem critiques the resources spent on the space program while Black Americans were experiencing social and economic disparities at home.

"Whitey on the Moon" was prominently featured in the 2018 biographical film about Neil Armstrong, First Man, and "Whitey's on the Moon", the second episode of HBO's 2020 television series Lovecraft Country. It received renewed interest in 2021 following spaceflights by billionaires Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson, which were seen as emblematic of the inequities highlighted by the poem.