CNN Declares Daylight Savings Time Racist
Over Thanksgiving, CNN declared Daylight Savings Time a "structurally racist" practice. The network published an article arguing that changing the clocks twice a year disproportionately affects people of color, while only marginally bothering white people.
Health "reporter" Jacqueline Howard wrote there's "growing evidence that lack of sleep and sleep disorders, such as obstructive sleep apnea, remain more prevalent in black, Asian, and Hispanic or Latino communities, and these inequities can have long-term detrimental implications for physical health, even raising the risk of certain chronic diseases."
Howard concludes that people of color suffer sleep inequalities "due to social systems in the United States." She didn't cite a source for her claim. We wish she had.
Later, she blamed "historical and persistent forms of structural racism" for Daylight Savings Time supposedly hurting people of color more than white people. Howard says white privilege in the workforce allows white workers to better adjust to changes to the clock.
The article took another bizarre turn from there. According to CNN, the deaths of Breonna Taylor and George Floyd are further proof that Daylight Savings Time is indeed a racist practice.
To reach its preferred conclusion, CNN cited Chandra Jackson, a researcher and epidemiologist with the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.
"Jackson added that she often reflects on how the shooting death of Breonna Taylor in Louisville in March 2020 and the shooting of George Floyd’s 4-year-old grandniece in Houston on New Year’s Day both happened when they were asleep – and how systems of structural racism in the US can cultivate conditions that make such incidents more likely to happen in black communities." CNN reports. "It is believed that discriminatory policies and practices across sectors of society create the physical and social conditions that make it more difficult for black families to get optimal sleep and grow up healthy."
Oddly, CNN printed the above quote but then noted that Jackson is only guessing. Jackson says her claim that Floyd and Taylor's death is related to how black people adjust to Daylight Savings Time is mere speculation. "This would require research,” she confessed.
Anyway, CNN ran with the researcher's gibberish in hopes of bolstering its argument that even changing the clock is grossly racist.
Unbeknownst to CNN, a practice can be a nuisance while not racist. See, Americans of all skin colors share a distaste for changing the clock twice a year. A 2019 poll found that 71% of Americans oppose Daylight Savings Time.
Losing an hour of daylight for part of the year and losing an hour of sleep the other is a great inconvenience, no matter your skin tone.
The CNN article read similarly to the one it posted earlier this month deeming the lottery system racist for giving black people false hope. Yes, some "journalist" printed such a thesis on the web.
When the demand for racism outstrips the supply, struggling-for-purpose news networks like CNN work aggressively to racialize whatever story is in the news.
Perhaps the CNN digital team feared it would fall short of its quota this month and thereby had to settle for declaring Daylight Savings Time "structurally racist" -- 20 days after the clocks turned over.
That said, if pretending Daylight Savings Time is racist makes it go away, we will happily pretend.