# What is up with overweight people and Diet Coke? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** soda-softdrinks\ **Created:** [June 4, 2009, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738 "2009-06-04T19:32:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Rushgeekgirl](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rushgeekgirl/32/3715_2.png) [@Rushgeekgirl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rushgeekgirl)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/61 "2009-06-05T03:34:13Z")
I used to drink a two liter of regular Coke every day. For the past six months I’ve switched to Coke Zero and I’ve lost 40 lbs. It’s not just because of that, but it’s a big part of it. I’m still fat. Just not AS fat. So that is why you’d see this fat girl drinking a Coke Zero. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/62 "2009-06-05T03:47:52Z")
Gee, PA and Cisco, you two must be a gas at parties. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 4:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/63 "2009-06-05T04:14:31Z")
Does it even occur to the OP that even overweight people are capable of making intelligent choices? I eat a relatively healthy diet, which includes diet soft drinks (not just Coke). This way I keep my weight down, keep my blood sugar stable, keep my cholesterol and blood pressure down. If I guzzled syrupy calorie-laden soft drinks that jeopardize my health, would that make you happy? Or would you find another reason to be judgmental? ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/64 "2009-06-05T04:28:30Z")
Please. Because I don’t like artificial sweeteners? Yeah, I’ll never reach Page-and-Plant-with-a-fish status until I start rockin’ the Coke Zero. Heh. ---
**Author:** ![missred](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/missred/32/14096_2.png) [@missred](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/missred)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 4:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/65 "2009-06-05T04:42:28Z")
When the OP mentioned other choices, I wonder if s/he has ever taken a good look at the sugar free choices that most places offer in soft drinks. I can rattle them off the top of my head for 95% of restaurants and fast food places out there: diet coke, water, coffee and (sometimes) unsweetened iced tea. Of the listed choices, my personal favorite is the unsweet tea, but only if it’s fresh (around here, sweet tea is the default). If that’s not available and it’s not breakfast, then it’s diet coke. Would I like to have as many options as the folks who drink sugared drinks? Hell yeah! Start with diet pepsi or tab for colas, add something with no caffeine, like diet A&W or sprite zero, then move on to stuff like selzer, sugar free lemonade or crystal light-type beverages. I would order any of those instead of diet coke in a heartbeat. If it’s diet coke specifically that you’re wondering about, it’s because it’s the one of the few sugar-free options available at most venues.\* missred…fatty…has been drinking diet beverages for forty years because I like them! \*If it’s diet drinks in general, then, well, everybody else has pretty much covered that. ---
**Author:** ![Idlewild](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/8491ac/32.png) [@Idlewild](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idlewild)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/66 "2009-06-05T04:47:48Z")
I drink diet coke at fast food places just to fuck with the heads of the thin people. Then I go and drive on parkways and park on driveways. ---
**Author:** ![ParentalAdvisory](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/53a042/32.png) [@ParentalAdvisory](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ParentalAdvisory)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/67 "2009-06-05T05:24:48Z")
> [@Inner\_Stickler](#): > > Gee, PA and Cisco, you two must be a gas at parties. Oh get off it. Worse has been said by others. Maybe not in this thread, but don’t be all _gasp_ when we’re having a discussing on a controversial subject with valid points being stated on both sides. ---
**Author:** ![Inner\_Stickler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inner_stickler/32/318_2.png) [@Inner\_Stickler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inner_Stickler)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 6:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/68 "2009-06-05T06:34:40Z")
I’m not being all _gasp_. I’m far too immature for that. But telling everyone to just put the fork (or soda can) down and all their problems will be solved is pat and not helpful or polite. Just because it’s the internet doesn’t mean you have unleash your inner rudeness. ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 6:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/69 "2009-06-05T06:40:35Z")
Who the hell said that? I said artificial sweetners aren’t food and no one is obligated to drink soda. Fuck, I also said I drink soda! ---
**Author:** ![Mosier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ea924/32.png) [@Mosier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mosier)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 6:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/70 "2009-06-05T06:47:31Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#): > > Is it healthy to only drink soda/milk instead of water? Like, are you hydrated enough? I’m sure it’s hell on your kidneys. ---
**Author:** ![Lynn\_Bodoni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e47c2d/32.png) [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 7:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/71 "2009-06-05T07:53:55Z")
> [@Dripping](#): > > How can you tell from looking at an obese stranger that they are “consistently overweight”? Maybe the guy lost 100 pounds over the last 2 years and is still steadily losing. You can’t tell just by spying on what some fat stranger is eating the minute you meet them. :rolleyes: Maybe the cheeseburger and (OMG lets laugh at the fatty) _ **diet coke** _ is a well-earned reward for meeting a certain weight loss goal. This describes me, except that I won’t be drinking diet Coke, or any diet soda. Anyone seeing me for the first time will see that I’m quite overweight. They won’t see that I’ve lost well over a hundred pounds lately, and I’m still losing. People who see me regularly will occasionally comment that my face looks thinner, or that I seem to be walking with less difficulty. When I go out to eat, it’s a treat. My husband and I usually eat homecooked meals, because that way, I can better control what’s in the food we eat. At home, I try to eat foods that have been minimally processed. For instance, I’m likely to make some sort of rice dish from scratch, rather than use a boxed rice dish, even though the box dish is usually a lot easier. Someone who sees me eating some manicotti at a restaurant doesn’t know that I’ve already asked for a box, because I know that I can’t eat that whole serving, and they don’t know that for the past week I’ve been eating stirfries that are mostly veggies, and very little rice. They only see that I’m eating some manicotti, which is, I admit, loaded with fat. Or at least it sure tastes that way. > [@missred](#): > > When the OP mentioned other choices, I wonder if s/he has ever taken a good look at the sugar free choices that most places offer in soft drinks. I can rattle them off the top of my head for 95% of restaurants and fast food places out there: diet coke, water, coffee and (sometimes) unsweetened iced tea. > > Of the listed choices, my personal favorite is the unsweet tea, but only if it’s fresh (around here, sweet tea is the default). If that’s not available and it’s not breakfast, then it’s diet coke. > > Would I like to have as many options as the folks who drink sugared drinks? Hell yeah! Start with diet pepsi or tab for colas, add something with no caffeine, like diet A&W or sprite zero, then move on to stuff like selzer, sugar free lemonade or crystal light-type beverages. I would order any of those instead of diet coke in a heartbeat. > > If it’s diet coke specifically that you’re wondering about, it’s because it’s the one of the few sugar-free options available at most venues.\* > > missred…fatty…has been drinking diet beverages for forty years because I like them! > > \*If it’s diet drinks in general, then, well, everybody else has pretty much covered that. I generally will just drink water, unless I’ve decided to let loose and have tea. Some artificial sweeteners will trigger my IBD, and sometimes I can have them with no problem, and sometimes I can have a limited amount of them, and sometimes they will trigger a monstrous attack. I prefer to avoid them altogether, and eliminate that potential attack. Usually I can drink one or two glasses of tea, but if I drink more, then again, the caffeine sometimes triggers an IBD attack. There’s also the issue of freshness. Fresh tea is the drink of the gods, stale iced tea is horrid. I can usually have some Sweet’N’Low, but I have to limit myself, again. Before I had full-blown IBD, I could and I would try to choose soft drinks that had no sugar and no caffeine in them. Oddly enough, it’s not just colas that have caffeine. I’ve found it in cream sodas, orange and strawberry sodas, and even in lemon-lime sodas. Some brands of root beer have it, others don’t. Usually caffeine free sodas will put those words on the front of the can or bottle. Sodas that contain caffeine will usually list it in the tiny ingredients field. As for people not liking water, I’m lucky in that I live in a city that has decent tasting water. I’ve visited Chicago a couple of times, and if I lived there, I’m sure I’d have a home water cooler. Chicago city water tastes FOUL, it has sulfur in it. Chicago has many things to offer, but good tasting water is not one of those things. There are other cities that also have bad-tasting water, but Chicago sticks out in my mind because I remember going down to the hotel lobby and buying several bottles of water, just because I couldn’t stand what came out of the faucet. ---
**Author:** ![Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/72 "2009-06-05T07:59:42Z")
> [@ParentalAdvisory](#): > > If an consistantly overweight person switched to diet soft drinks, they’re likely overcompensating somewhere else to get the same satisfaction. In other words, you just pulled this statistical probability out of your asshole and are waving around the results. You have no idea if what you just said is true, but you’re content assuming it’s true. ---
**Author:** ![corvidae](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/898d66/32.png) [@corvidae](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/corvidae)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 11:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/73 "2009-06-05T11:35:08Z")
I always just assumed it was a caffeine thing, and diet coke was the delivery system of choice. ---
**Author:** ![gigi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a587f6/32.png) [@gigi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gigi)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/74 "2009-06-05T13:11:35Z")
> [@Linty\_Fresh](#): > > Addicted . . . to food? Well, maybe I’ll just quit food cold turkey then! :rolleyes: > > Here’s a hint: Not every unhealthy behavior involves addiction, not even the ones that involve fooling yourself. Are you saying you don’t believe there’s such a thing as addiction to food? The “cold turkey” joke comes up in OA meetings. ---
**Author:** ![Dung\_Beetle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dung_beetle/32/7945_2.png) [@Dung\_Beetle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dung_Beetle)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/75 "2009-06-05T13:50:16Z")
Mom very rarely allowed us soda as kids, and that carried over to my adulthood. I drink a soda less than once a week, and at that time I get a Coke Classic. Yahoo! I think of it as liquid candy. I’ve noticed that Diet Coke is insanely popular, but it tastes chemical to me. I also don’t care much for water. I drink coffee almost exclusively, and sometimes get painfully dehydrated. ---
**Author:** ![PatriotGrrrl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/9dc877/32.png) [@PatriotGrrrl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PatriotGrrrl)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/76 "2009-06-05T14:17:27Z")
> [@ParentalAdvisory](#): > > what I meant to say was that if you’ve just switched to diet soda with the explicit reason to lower calories, the calories that are saved there are compensated with an extra slice of pizza for example in an addict. > > People have switched to diet sodas with the intention of lower calories, but also add another twinkie in the mix, essentially nullifying the purpose of diet soda in their goals to lose weight. So in other words, gradual weight loss by voluntarily consuming fewer calories doesn’t work because people are incapable of choosing to consume less? Is there some special “ParentalAdvisory Approved Weight Loss Method” that does work, or are fat people just doomed to stay that way forever? ---
**Author:** ![Aangelica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b2d939/32.png) [@Aangelica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aangelica)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/77 "2009-06-05T14:54:12Z")
Or, possibly, (to respond to the OP) Fatty McFatterson (who’s _snerk_ having a diet Coke with their burger - who does she think she’s fooling with that?) also has blood sugar issues and is not drinking full-sugar beverages as part of an overall effort to avoid diabetic coma and subsequent death. Or Fatty McFatterson there has _low_ blood sugar issues, and doesn’t drink full-sugar beverages as a lifestyle choice to avoid a heinous blood sugar crash later in her day. You can be fat and still have problems with persistent low blood sugar. In fact, it’s possible to be fat in part _because_ you have problems with persistent low blood sugar. Basically anyone with blood sugar troubles (diabetes, insulin resistance, hypoglycemia, any one of several metabolic disorders that scramble the body’s blood sugar regulation) is well-advised to avoid the Hell out of full-sugar sodas. If you really want a beverage with a load of sugar in it, you’re miles better off having fruit juice. Hell, even _pastries_ are a better idea than a full-sugar Coke. Not all people with blood sugar issues are slender. But, hey, don’t let me stop you from poking fun at fat people drinkin’ diet soda. ---
**Author:** ![Stan\_Shmenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/94ad74/32.png) [@Stan\_Shmenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stan_Shmenge)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/78 "2009-06-05T15:18:56Z")
> [@Cisco](#): > > The stuff they sweeten diet sodas with doesn’t have any calories because _it’s not food_. No way that shit’s good for you. I’ll take sensible eating and exercise and an occasional soda made out of food. Yeah, because HFCS is sooo natural… :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Cisco](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ccd318/32.png) [@Cisco](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cisco)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/79 "2009-06-05T15:26:35Z")
God damn. I guess this topic really is too emotional to discuss rationally here. ---
**Author:** ![Labrador\_Deceiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7c8e57/32.png) [@Labrador\_Deceiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labrador_Deceiver)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2009, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738/80 "2009-06-05T16:08:05Z")
> [@ParentalAdvisory](#): > > Oh get off it. Worse has been said by others. Maybe not in this thread, but don’t be all _gasp_ when we’re having a discussing on a controversial subject with valid points being stated on both sides. I’m not convinced your points are valid. People aren’t addicted to calories. They may be addicted to feeling full, or have some sort of need to eat all the time, but addictions are about cravings. If you can satisfy the craving for a sweet drink with a diet drink, you aren’t going to go looking to obtain extra calories from pizza. That’s nonsensical. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-up-with-overweight-people-and-diet-coke/498738.md?page=5)