I was driving back from work lunch about 10 minutes before totality and passed literally dozens of people standing on sidewalks and in roadways just staring directly at the sun… gonna be a lot of blindness after this
Not trying to down play the health risk for staring at an eclipse, but dipshit in chief stared at the last one and didn't go blind. What kind of harm to his vision do you think he experienced?
Does it depend on close you are to the totality? Are a bunch of people going to need glasses after this latest one?
Some of it is that people didn't get the memo, some of it is that people got told incorrect information, some of it is that people got sold bad glasses, and some of it really is that people didn't listen to the warnings.
Mostly in Illinois, and on Amazon, some people who literally bought ISO 12312-2020 instead of ISO12312-2 glasses. There is a story on it.
I knew nothing about the proper ISO for eclipse glasses beforehand but if I was going to risk my eyesight and the eyesight of those who I love like that, you bet I was going to learn about it via due diligence.
Most people however seemed to have screwed with their eyesight by just looking at the sun. Seems political inclination was really not a factor. Stupidity or lack of education were.
You can buy glasses approved by the American Astrological Society, which independently checked that the glasses were safe. (They're supposed to meet an ISO standard, but this is a double check.) Also, you can test them at home, by looking at lightbulbs and around your house. If you can see anything that isn't the emitting source of a bright light (like the actual diode of an LED) then they're not dark enough.
I just poked a hole through a dozen or so sheets and held it over another pile of sheets. Trivial and worked well enough for seeing the partial eclipse.
Same here, followed proper procedure and was extra careful to have them on as soon as totality came to an end. My eyes felt strained after I googled to see if I needed to be concerned.
Most of the glasses say not to use them for longer than 3-5 minutes total over the course of the eclipse. So if people were sitting there staring at it for the entire event with the glasses on, their eyes going to hurt.