Why is it that Americans refer to 24 hour time as military time? I understand that the military uses the 24hr format but I don’t understand why the general public would refer to it like that?

It makes it seem like it’s a foreign concept where as in a lot of countries it’s the norm.

  • indigojasper@kbin.social
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    1 year ago

    as an american i must say i HATE this as well. people ask me why i use military time and i say it’s because there are 24 hours in the day so it makes much more sense to me. and that in other parts of the world they call it international time with the military having nothing to do with it.

    makes me wanna scream. thank you for letting me go off.

    • tempest@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      I keep telling people metric time is where it’s at but they just look at me like I’m crazy

    • /home/governorkeagan@lemdro.idOP
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      1 year ago

      Not sure if you’ve had the same experience but I had an American colleague ask me what I meant when I didn’t give the time in the 12hr format. The message was something like, “I’ve booked the meeting for 14:00”

      • Canadian_Cabinet @lemmy.ca
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        1 year ago

        Similar things happen to me. All of my devices are in Spanish in addition to 24hr, so anything automated is sent in Spanish to my non speaking colleagues

      • Stuka@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        I’m American but work on transportation where 24hr clock is…sort of the standard.

        I prefer 24hr and use it on all my devices, but outside work I pretty much exclusively communicate with 12 hr. No point in using wording I know is gonna be misunderstood when I can comfortably swap between the two.

    • johnthedoe@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      Knowing Americans they would’ve rejected it if it wasn’t called military time. In fact I reckon if you guys rebranded metric system to military measurements there might be more acceptance to it.