After beheading the King, the French revolutionaries came up with a brilliant idea: let’s make the day 10 hours! This is no joke: left-wing “experts” actually changed the length of minutes, hours and weeks in the name of science.
This is the story of that disaster.
The designers responded, “Only according to the principles of reason and science.”
The French Revolutionaries had three reasons for adopting a new calendar.
- To eliminate religious consciousness from French society.
- To make time more “rational”.
- It heralds the arrival of an era of equality.
In their zeal they have forgotten the essential element of humanity.
This is a story of political arrogance. The revolutionaries overestimated the power of science and underestimated the tenacity of religion. In their new utopia, an hour was equal to 100 minutes and a minute was equal to 100 seconds. The New Year changed from January 1st to September 22nd: a radical attempt to redefine time itself.
Rutgers University sociologist Eviatar Zerubavel says the 10-day week was meant to disrupt “the traditional and sacred seven-day cycle” and to confuse people and make them forget about “Sunday.”
That is, a day to go to church and face God every week. The French Revolutionary calendar was designed by the top experts of the time. The chief designer was physics professor C.G. Lom, who also worked with mathematicians and astronomers. For these experts, traditions and old customs were not important. The designers followed “only the principles of reason and science.”
“The Revolutionary calendar was introduced at a time when progress and modernity called for the complete annihilation of the old order,” Zerubbavel points out. “The beginning of a new, republican era meant a complete break between the past and the present.”
Ring the bell?
Every calendar has its “important days”, which take on symbolic importance. The revolutionaries changed the first day of the year from January 1st to September 22nd, the day of the “foundation of the French Republic”. Society began to revolve around politics, not religion.
“Saints’ days, Sundays, church holidays, and other days that had a distinctive religious connotation were abolished. Each day became mathematically and symbolically similar. Differences between people and on the calendar were erased.
By adopting a calendar rhythm foreign to the rest of the world, the French created an artificial barrier to communication, understanding, and ultimately trade.
How do you schedule deliveries to a country that can’t translate the calendar to your own? Imagine you’re French in 1793. Not only have revolutionaries beheaded the King and massacred their own people, they’ve also created a 10-day week. There are now 10 hours instead of 24, and you have to throw away your old clocks and instincts.
By denounceing all authority as arbitrary, revolutionaries ultimately undermine themselves. he Who will rule when there is no king? Looking back, we can see the “boomerang effect” of the calendar redesign: if the old doctrine was random, why is the new doctrine better?
people Disliked The new calendar caused confusion as people had to work nine consecutive days instead of six. Special clocks were made to translate the French Revolutionary calendar into the Gregorian calendar and vice versa. People’s long-standing habits were altered without their consent.
Stalin also instituted a new calendar. The week was shortened to five days, eliminating Sunday as a day off. Each day of the week was assigned a color, and workers were also given a color. They had days off on their colored days. Family and friends were all assigned a color, so they didn’t spend time together.
The French Revolutionary calendar, designed by the greatest scientist of the time. A failed dream… a symbolic warning. An attempt to restructure time through politics, not the divine. Rational and rational, and therefore failing. A symbol of the madness of equality.
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218 years ago, a man ended the tyranny of artificial time and returned the country to the Gregorian calendar.
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