topic Don't Forget in Community Chat

Don't Forget

Kachina624 — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 19:38:13 GMT

It's that time of year again.

Re: Don't Forget

Nightowlz — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 19:50:29 GMT

We were just talking about that. Hate it. It already gets dark early enough.

When are they going to vote so they can change it summer hours all year round??? Git-R-Done.

Since we are retired guess we can go by whatever time we want.

Re: Don't Forget

laluzdelmundo — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 19:51:37 GMT

@Kachina624 Three cheers for darkness! Just lived thru month after month of unyielding SUNLIGHT. Besides, I've always preferred night, even love waking up before 6 am and going for a little walk before the sun is up. Probably I'm in the minority with this.

BTW, at my former workplace, someone made a sign with "hello darkness, my old friend" and displayed it over our coffee maker in the staff lounge.

Re: Don't Forget

sunshine45 — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 19:53:14 GMT

LOVE IT!

i am all for standard time year round!

Re: Don't Forget

kaydee50 — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 19:58:58 GMT

Hate it! Would refer DST all year!!

Re: Don't Forget

Mz iMac — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 19:59:48 GMT

@laluzdelmundo Do you live in Alaska?

Re: Don't Forget

Mz iMac — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 20:01:34 GMT

I thought this DLS time was suppose to end this year forever.

Re: Don't Forget

GingerHead — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 20:33:03 GMT

Fellow Vampires unite! Yay!

Re: Don't Forget

Kachina624 — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 21:27:24 GMT

@kaydee50 wrote:
Hate it! Would refer DST all year!!

@kaydee50. That would be my preference too. I heard this morning that 2/3 of Americans prefer it also.

I do understand parents not wanting their kids to walk to school or wait for busses in the dark though.

Re: Don't Forget

Kachina624 — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 21:29:44 GMT

@Mz iMac wrote:
I thought this DLS time was suppose to end this year forever.

@Mz iMac. The bill introduced last Spring in Congress never got out of committee.

Re: Don't Forget

kaydee50 — Fri, 03 Nov 2023 21:41:18 GMT

@Kachina624 wrote:

@kaydee50 wrote:
Hate it! Would refer DST all year!!
@kaydee50. That would be my preference too. I heard this morning that 2/3 of Americans prefer it also.

I do understand parents not wanting their kids to walk to school or wait for busses in the dark though.

When we lived in Henderson, NV and DH would drive to work at 6:30 am he would see young children with their parents waiting for the bus. IMO, the problem is school should start at a normal time, e.g, 9 am and not at these ridiculously early hours for young children.

Re: Don't Forget

GingerHead — Sat, 04 Nov 2023 15:13:43 GMT

@Kachina624

While DST is more popular it's been tried before and failed.

We tried to change to permanent DST in the 70's with Nixon and a big majority of people were for it but after awhile that changed when people realized that taking children to school and kids waiting for the school bus during the prolonged morning darkness wasn't a good idea.

Especially after 8 kids died in early morning traffic accidents shortly after the change.

Here's a brief history on it:

"Year-round daylight saving time (DST), signed into law by President Richard Nixon in January 1974, sought to maximize evening sunlight and, in doing so, help mitigate an ongoing national gas crisis. But while the experiment initially proved popular, with 79 percent of Americans expressing support for the change in December 1973, approval quickly plummeted, dropping to 42 percent by February 1974, reported the New York Times’ Anthony Ripley in October of that year.

The main drawback to pushing the clock forward permanently was the prolonged early-morning darkness in the winter, which left children heading to school when it was “jet black” outside, as a parent told the Washington Post’s Barbara Bright-Sagnier at the time. Writing for Washingtonian, Andrew Beaujon notes that eight students in Florida died in traffic accidents in the weeks following the change; in the nation’s capital and its surrounding suburbs, similar incidents led some schools to delay classes until the sun came up.

In October 1974, President Gerald Ford signed legislation reversing permanent daylight saving time. Though approval of the initiative had increased during the long summer days, the prospect of another long, dark—and potentially deadly—winter led lawmakers to end the planned two-year experiment early. As a Senate committee report stated, the “majority of the public” had expressed “distaste” for DST in the wintertime. Compounding the seeming failure of the experiment was the fact that the change, according to the Department of Transportation, saved little energy and may have actually caused an uptick in gasoline consumption."

Re: Don't Forget

GingerHead — Sat, 04 Nov 2023 02:52:01 GMT

Also, I just thought that history was interesting. I knew it had been tried before and changed back. I just didn't know the particulars until I just looked it up.

Re: Don't Forget

sugar plum — Sat, 04 Nov 2023 03:05:43 GMT

The majority of kids in my area don't walk to school. Their parents drive them and pick them up every day.

I live right next to the HS and the traffic is unbelievable. Same with all the other schools in my state.

I'll take DST all year round any day.

Re: Don't Forget

proudlyfromNJ — Sat, 04 Nov 2023 03:38:19 GMT

@sugar plum wrote:
The majority of kids in my area don't walk to school. Their parents drive them and pick them up every day.

I live right next to the HS and the traffic is unbelievable. Same with all the other schools in my state.

I'll take DST all year round any day.

@sugar plum What state would this be? Why don't they have school busses? Not everyone lives within walking distance.

Re: Don't Forget

haddon9 — Sat, 04 Nov 2023 03:39:48 GMT

UGH! I hate when it gets dark so early! Makes me just want to hibernate.

Re: Don't Forget

haddon9 — Sat, 04 Nov 2023 03:49:52 GMT

@GingerHead Back in the 70s most kids went to school on their own or they went to their bus stop without adult supervision. Today most kids well into elementary school have a parent either drive them to school or stand at the bus stop with them.

Now I'm going to sound like an old lady but I can remember walking to school on my own in Brooklyn, NY by the time I was in the second grade. I had to cross a busy street (Ocean Ave.) walk several blocks past Brooklyn college before I got to my elementary school.

Today I live in a very safe quiet residential neighborhood. While bad things can happen anywhere I am still amazed at all of the parents who take their kids to the bus stop every day even though most can see the stop from their homes.

Re: Don't Forget

spiderw — Sat, 04 Nov 2023 04:02:54 GMT

I welcome it getting dark early. I have never had a problem with the change and in fact prefer it. I live each day as it comes and having darkness earlier doesn't stop that or interfere.

Re: Don't Forget

sugar plum — Sat, 04 Nov 2023 04:03:43 GMT

@proudlyfromNJ

Yes, we have school buses. With parents driving their kids to school and buses, I rarely see kids walking.

I live in eastern MA.

Re: Don't Forget

geezerette — Sat, 04 Nov 2023 11:09:36 GMT

In addition to what @GingerHead posted, here is another article stating some reasons permanent DST isn't such a good idea...

The changing of the clock means misalignment with our bodies’ natural rhythms.

March 09, 2023

On Sunday most of the U.S. will advance their clocks one hour for daylight saving time (DST). The change means disruptions in the sleep patterns of over 300 million people—the effects of which will doubtless be felt and seen nearly everywhere.

Surveys from the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) have found that about 63% of Americans following the switch. But the time transition does more than just inspire mixed opinions, grogginess, and foul moods. Researchers say that the change has long-term negative consequences for our bodies and minds.

Here are 7 things we’ve learned about how changing to daylight saving time affects our lives.

Making the shift can increase your health risks.

“The scientific evidence points to acute increases in adverse health consequences from changing the clocks, including in heart attack and stroke,” says sleep expert Adam Spira PHD, MA, a professor in Mental Health.

The change is also associated with a heightened risk of mood disturbances and hospital admissions, as well as elevated production of inflammatory markers in response to stress. The potential for car crashes also spikes just after the spring forward, Spira says; a 2020 study found that the switch raises the risk of fatal traffic accidents by 6%.

DST was enacted to conserve energy—but today it may do the opposite.

Benjamin Franklin invented the concept in 1784, believing that rising earlier would economize candle usage and save people money. Pushing clocks forward to make greater use of daylight during the warmer months was formally adopted during World War I as part of a global attempt to conserve energy.

That rationale is part of what keeps DST in practice, but the theory is wobbly, according to research. Extended daylight may cause more use of air conditioning and heating.

Other proponents say the additional daylight in the evening hours during spring and summer are beneficial to the mental health of those who work during the day. That, too, has been refuted—data from a 2020 study suggests that the change exacerbates mood disorders, depression, anxiety, and substance abuse.

More after-work sunshine doesn’t necessarily mean a healthier you.

Sunlight is the most powerful synchronizer of our circadian rhythms—the internally generated clocks our bodies follow. Spira says while it’s advantageous to have more time for outdoor activities in the evening, “exposure to more light closer to bedtime makes it harder to fall asleep at our usual bedtime, and can reduce the amount of sleep we’re able to get each night.”

We also lose light in the morning, leaving many of us waking up in the dark. That’s bad, Spira says, because exposure to light in the morning has an alerting effect and helps us maintain a strong circadian rhythm.

“We function best when our sleep-wake cycle follows the sun. We get sleepy, due in part to melatonin release, when it gets dark. In the spring, when we switch to daylight saving time, we increase the amount of light we’re exposed to in the evening hours.”

Less sleep means more health risks.

Moving the clocks forward in the spring results in going to sleep and waking up before our internal clocks are ready for us to. This misalignment lasts for the duration of DST, Spira says, and can reduce the amount of sleep we’re able to get, to the detriment of our health.

“The consequences of insufficient sleep include decreases in cardiovascular health, increases in diabetes and obesity, poorer mental health, lower cognitive performance, and an increase in the risk of motor vehicle accidents,” he says.

For certain groups, these time changes have a greater negative health impact.

Populations living on the western edges of time zones—who get light later in the morning and evening—and people with little control over their schedules, such as shift workers who drive to work very early, are more at risk for misalignment.

Adolescents who get less sleep often have behavioral, learning, and attention issues, as well as an increased risk of accidents, injuries, high blood pressure, obesity, diabetes, and mental health problems. A 2015 study published in the Journal of Sleep Medicine found that during school days after the time change, students were sleepier, had slower reaction times, and were less attentive.

DST could become permanent.

There has been some buzz in recent years about transitioning to permanent DST through the Sunshine Protection Act, but Spira is in favor of permanent standard time.

“The Sunshine Protection Act would result in permanent misalignment of our internal clocks with the time on our social clocks—the clocks on our walls, wrists, and phones. That would be bad for the health of the U.S. population.”

Morgan Coulson is an editorial specialist in the Office of External Affairs at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

(Edited to remove live links.)