Why Everyone Hates Us (DST Edition)

By now, you’re probably aware that yesterday, the U.S. began Daylight Saving Time, where we all move the clocks ahead an hour in order to have more daylight during hours when people are actually awake. (If you don’t know this, you’re probably wondering why the timestamps of all these posts are off today.)

The idea was supposedly invented by Benjamin Franklin, although the article he proposed it in was a satire. So, basically, it was an idea so stupid he used it in a fake article.

Like on many things, though, Ben is wrong and DST is awesome. (You all know the famous quote of his that he was most certainly wrong on. A penny saved is worthless.) We get more light while we’re awak, making seasonal affective disorder sufferers like me less likely to cry themselves to sleep at night. (Less likely.)

Every year, they trot out people on television who are against Daylight Saving Time — Note: They might not. I’m kind of just assuming they do. — and they come up with the only valid argument against DST: It hurts farmers, since cows can’t change their internal clock.

This is a strawman argument. It seems to me any actual old-time family farmer would suck it up and just continue to do his work, the cows be damned. The real complainers are the huge factory farm corporations, which are paid by the government not to plant crops and lose an extra [x] dollars a year due to DST and just have to whine any chance they can get.

Aside from that argument, though, there’s really an imbalance, as CNN.com showed in this chart over the weekend:

Oh. It lessens crime, saves energy and reduces accidents, but, you know, I can’t remember to change my clock.

Daylight Saving Time [CNN Student News]