“Bad publicity is better than no publicity.”
“Bad credit is better than no credit.”
“Bad luck is better than no luck.”
We hear sayings like this every so often, but if there’s one place this thinking doesn’t apply, it’s in the world of sunglasses. When it comes to protecting your eyes, wearing bad – and by that we mean cheap -- sunglasses is actually worse than wearing no sunglasses at all.
Speaking to TIME Magazine a few years ago, Dr. Wayne Bizer of the American Academy of Ophthalmology said that wearing sunglasses without protection from UVA and UVB light could do more harm to your eyes than if you were forced to squint.
Here’s why: Bright light makes us squint, so our pupils constrict to limit the light getting in. When we put on sunglasses, our eyes react like they would in a darker room, so our pupils dilate to allow in light.