Josh wrote: ↑Tue Nov 08, 2022 9:31 amNobody has to walk in the dark on a road. Urban areas have sidewalks. Where I live most parents drive or walk their kids to the end of their driveway. People in more compact subdivisions use the sidewalk to get to the pickup point.
You have absolutely no idea how wrong this is.
Just to provide one very mundane and ordinary example, when my family and I lived in suburban TX we were 6 blocks from the local elementary school so too close for bus service and they expected kids to walk. It was just over 1/2 mile. The first block was within our subdivision where there were lights and sidewalks. These were the last 5 blocks to my daughter's elementary school.
Notice no sidewalks, crosswalks, and for the most part no streetlights.
That is pretty much typical of most of suburban Texas and much of the rest of the US. It is dangerous enough to have kids walking on such streets during daylight hours. I don't know why we would deliberately make them take such routes to school in pitch darkness during 4-5 months per year.
We didn't let our kids walk to school. My wife or I drove them. But many may families and kids don't have such luxuries.
Ken,
Very few people in suburbs are privileged enough to live a short walk from school. It seems in such cases a parent could walk with them. This is basically a non-issue.
In my town the people in town have crossing guards at intersections for families who live close to school. Other people drive or use the school bus.
In any case, moving clocks around isn’t the right answer.
So don't move the clocks around. Leave the clocks on standard time year-round like we used to do.
In any event I find it curious that you find forcing millions of kids to walk to school in the dark on dangerous streets (as would happen if we kept DST year-round) to be a "non-issue" but having to change your clock twice a year on Sunday is a horrible inconvenience and crisis that requires Federal intervention. Most people use their cell phones and computers to tell time these days anyway, and they change automatically. You don't even have to hassle with the inconvenience of resetting your clock.
Like I said, I'm agnostic on this whole subject. I'm only pointing out one of the very real disadvantages to keeping clocks on DST year-round. Apparently we don't really care about kids in this country. At least other people's kids. Which I suppose is not any big news. It has been like that for a long time.
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
If you don’t like your public school’s times, attend school board meetings and organise with other parents to change them. (Be careful - the government and activist groups have said that parents who go to school board meetings are white supremacist terrorists.)
Or organise a private school. We set up car pools, and families that live close to church ride their bikes. Our schools do not start at some insane early hour but instead a reasonable time like 8:30.
I also don’t see why a parent can’t go with their child to and from school.
Josh wrote: ↑Tue Nov 08, 2022 12:11 pm
Nobody forces anybody’s kids to walk in the dark.
If you don’t like your public school’s times, attend school board meetings and organise with other parents to change them. (Be careful - the government and activist groups have said that parents who go to school board meetings are white supremacist terrorists.)
Or organise a private school. We set up car pools, and families that live close to church ride their bikes. Our schools do not start at some insane early hour but instead a reasonable time like 8:30.
I also don’t see why a parent can’t go with their child to and from school.
No one forces you to turn your clock back either. You can just be an iconoclast or non-conformist and keep your clocks set to whatever time you want year-round.
0 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
Ken wrote: ↑Tue Nov 08, 2022 12:30 pm
No one forces you to turn your clock back either. You can just be an iconoclast or non-conformist and keep your clocks set to whatever time you want year-round.
Again, instead of trying to use FEDERAL STATE POWER (which is something you seem to love) to force everyone to change their schedules, why not just adjust the children's school schedule so they aren't in the dark, if that concerns you so greatly?
Ken wrote: ↑Tue Nov 08, 2022 12:08 pm
Most people use their cell phones and computers to tell time these days anyway, and they change automatically. You don't even have to hassle with the inconvenience of resetting your clock.
The inconvenience is trying to keep track of which things change automatically and which don't, since so many clocks are embedded in our routine. I just remembered I haven't changed the thermostat at home.
1 x
I grew up around Indiana, You grew up around Galilee; And if I ever really do grow up, I wanna grow up to be just like You -- Rich Mullins
I am a Christian and my name is Pilgram; I'm on a journey, but I'm not alone -- NewSong, slightly edited
Ken wrote: ↑Tue Nov 08, 2022 12:30 pm
No one forces you to turn your clock back either. You can just be an iconoclast or non-conformist and keep your clocks set to whatever time you want year-round.
Again, instead of trying to use FEDERAL STATE POWER (which is something you seem to love) to force everyone to change their schedules, why not just adjust the children's school schedule so they aren't in the dark, if that concerns you so greatly?
The government imposition was switching to daylight savings time in the summers in the first place. Before that noon meant mid-day with the sun at the zenith as it had been for thousands of years.
Why not just stop changing clocks FORWARD in the spring and leave things on "God's Time" as they say in Guatemala? Then we can all be happy.
2 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
Move clocks forward two hours. And make DST the new regular time. One hour ahead isn’t enough any more. One hour doesn’t last as long as it did years ago when we were younger. Inflation.
To bad we left abandoned sun dial time in favor of fiat time.
Changing Clocks to Daylight Saving Time Is Bad for Your Health: A neurologist explains why our bodies fare better when aligned with the natural light of standard time
Americans are split on whether they prefer permanent daylight saving time or permanent standard time.
However, the two time shifts – jolting as they may be – are not equal. Standard time most closely approximates natural light, with the sun directly overhead at or near noon. In contrast, during daylight saving time from March until November, the clock change resulting from daylight saving time causes natural light to be present one hour later in the morning and one hour later in the evening according to clock time.
Morning light is essential for helping to set the body’s natural rhythms: It wakes us up and improves alertness. Morning light also boosts mood – light boxes simulating natural light are prescribed for morning use to treat seasonal affective disorder.
Although the exact reasons why light activates us and benefits our mood are not yet known, this may be due to light’s effects on increasing levels of cortisol, a hormone that modulates the stress response or the effect of light on the amygdala, a part of the brain involved in emotions.
Adolescents also may be chronically sleep deprived due to school, sports and social activities. For instance, many children start school around 8 a.m. or earlier. This means that during daylight saving time, many young people get up and travel to school in pitch darkness.
The body of evidence makes a good case for adopting permanent standard time nationwide, as I testified at a March 2022 Congressional hearing and argued in a recent position statement for the Sleep Research Society. The American Medical Association recently called for permanent standard time. And in late 2022, Mexico adopted permanent standard time,, citing benefits to health, productivity and energy savings.
The biggest advantage of daylight saving time is that it provides an extra hour of light in the late afternoon or evening, depending on time of year, for sports, shopping or eating outside. However, exposure to light later into the evening for almost eight months during daylight saving time comes at a price. This extended evening light delays the brain’s release of melatonin, the hormone that promotes drowsiness, which in turn interferes with sleep and causes us to sleep less overall.
Because puberty also causes melatonin to be released later at night, meaning that teenagers have a delay in the natural signal that helps them fall asleep, adolescents are particularly susceptible to sleep problems from the extended evening light. This shift in melatonin during puberty lasts into our 20s.
1 x
A fool can throw out more questions than a wise man can answer. -RZehr
DECEMBER 21: WINTER SOLSTICE 
