I wish Germany would bring its sugar tax that we abolished in 1973 back. To be fair a lot of people are agreeing it has to come back by now, so chances are good that we'll soon have one again.
this post was submitted on 12 Jul 2024
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It worked so of course they didn't extend it to other things with more hidden sugars (things like pasta sauce, flavoured yoghurts etc)
gtfo of here with sugar in my pasta sauce. It makes no sense and tastes bad.
And boxed macaroni and cheese, hamburger helper, etc. NoW wItH AdDeD SuGAr! Get all the way out of here with that nonsense. Stopped eating it a while ago, but people depend on cheap easy meals.
I like sugar in some pastas it cuts the acidic down for me.
Add a tiny bit of bicarb to cut the acid down. Sugar just makes it sweeter and doesn't actually do anything about the acid.
If something was too acidic I'd probably add a sprinkle of MSG, or Parmesan if you don't have that.
Parmesan makes sense, it's a bit alkaline so will act to help neutralise the acid. You could also put a small amount of bicarb in.
Great! Let’s do the States too!
Cook county tried it in Illinois a few years back, and it really made no sense.
It didn't apply to juices (even though juices are loaded with sugar) and it taxed sugar free sodas the same as their sugar sweetened versions. They charged 1 cent per ounce for the tax. It was repealed 4 months after initiating it.
So they didn't try a sugar tax, like Finland didn't try basic income because opposing politicians sabotaged the trial in the planning stage to make the results worthless.
Cough Cough... Now follow suit America. I am sick of seeing people being so unhealthy and addicted to this drug.
The comments here are incredible. Are we being botted by Big Sugar?
No, people are just gullible and love to feel like they know something everyone else doesn't
A billion dollar industry would never do such a thing.
That, and sugar is insanely addictive.
And the amount of aspartame has doubled
So? That's way less bad
Aspartame can lead to overeating. Some research also point to liver cancer.
Ok, now do sugar, and compare the statistical quality of the evidence too please
But sugar sucks too? I'm not defending either.
As someone with an intolerance to artificial sweeteners, I'll never forgive Jamie Oliver for pushing the sugar tax, alongside his insistence on "improving" school meals that resulted in mass outsourcing of school food to the lowest bidder.
Kids aren't drinking less soft drinks than before, the drinks themselves have just replaced sugar with chemicals and byproducts that aren't particularly healthy themselves...
replaced sugar with chemicals
OH NO, NOT SCARY CHEMICALS!!!111
Sugar is a chemical, ya dolt. So is water. So are most of the components that make up you.
Man, education has really taken a nose dive...
Maybe leave the cuntery back over at Reddit...
This community is supposed to be for uplifting news.
The community name isn't a license to say dumb things and not be called out for it
Then call it out, but maybe not be such a cunt about it. It's an embarrassment for the fediverse that someone can't be civil to what is a fair comment, even if it's not factually accurate. Even on cesspools like Reddit you wouldn't see this kind of toxicity.
It's an embarrassment for the fediverse that someone can't be civil to what is a fair comment
It wasn't a fair comment though was it it was an attempt to spread utterly false information. Also I'm sorry, but I completely do not accept this premise that somehow Lemmy is better than Reddit.
It was absolutely a fair comment.
The quoted part of the comment makes it seem like "chemicals" is the subject of the assertion. It's not. The comment goes on to describe what chemicals and why they're a concern.
Yes, it's not a great comment, it's not eloquent, it could be more concise... but that doesn't mean it's appropriate to make disingenuous misrepresentations about the authors intended meaning.
Okay well I will challenge the content of the comment and you can make arbitrary and utterly unfounded comments about my assessment.
But apparently I'm not allowed to call out insanity wherever it appears because that would be rude. God save me, I was rude to an ass wipe.
The point that should be taken from your comment is not that they replaced the sugar with something else because we dont yet know if the aspartame is better or worse than sugar, though we do k ow that sugar is bad in large quantities.
What should be noted is that the study found that sugar consumption has halved, which seems to be a no brainer as the majority of soft drinks either contain half the amount or no sugar. I belive in the UK at least pepsi has half the sugar and almost everything else has no sugar. Coke is the only one that still has the full sugar content it had before. But they sell coke zero at such a low price now and push it with alternative flavours that it is being consumed in higher quantities than ever.
The point being, yeah, the tax stopped drinks makers using sugar so the sugar consumption dropped.
Like i stopped using salt to season my food and i found that my salt intake lowered... wow. Thats crazy.
Have you considered drinking unsweetened stuff? Either plain water, or "flavoured" water. Basically soda without any sugar or sweeteners. It's surprisingly tasty, and pretty much as healthy as pure water.
Alternatively there are tons of different sweeteners. Some like stevia should be fine even if you have issues with, say, aspartame.
Sadly, Stevia doesn't agree with me either, although I don't feel as ill as if I have drinks with aspartame, which is what most drinks in the UK use.
I recently bought a soda stream for just this, since I now mostly drink sparkling water. There aren't many cordials here that don't use a sweetener, and many of my previously favourite kombucha brands now use aspartame - but there's enough to have some choice.
What do the kids drink instead?
Possibly water, or perhaps tea
or perhaps tea
With more sugar
Sweetened tea gets a big L from me, tastes like shit. Unsweetened all the way.
bruh just ban all sugary drinks, it's not that hard
It's people like you that we can't have nice things. oh some Germans in Germany has started genociding Jews out of existence, so that must mean that all Germans are evil Nazis. you only consider moderation when their is a obvious utility. like oh you don't need alcohol to survive, but because some people get addicted to alcohol. we must ban alcohol, so no one will get addicted ever again. we seriously need to learn moderation and nuance. we really need to collectively agree that I'm not your mom and neither is the government. Otherwise we will be asking ourselves, what is the point of enjoyment? People who are miserable breath just fine, and if you enjoy something too much you might get addicted.
I agree completely with your comment but I think you probably shouldn’t have brought the Holocaust into it really!
That's not because the sugar tax was enough.
It's because the drink manufacturers mostly just stopped selling the full sugar versions, which kind of sucks for anyone who hates the taste of artificial sweeteners. Even squash like Robinsons became undrinkable. It tastes like battery acid.
There's only really Coca-Cola left that tastes the same as it did before. Lemon and lime drinks like 7-Up or Sprite almost cover the taste of it, so they'll do in a pinch. Otherwise I just drink water and cider. Apparently alcoholic drinks don't need to tell you how many calories are in them either, so I'll assume it's none and carry on looking confused when I get on the scales.
It's because the drink manufacturers mostly just stopped selling the full sugar versions
Which was a result of the sugar tax. They didn't just suddenly drop the sugar content for no reason.
The sugar tax didn't include artificial sweeteners? That's an oversight. Those things are bad for you in ways that are different from digestable sugars.
They're nowhere near as bad as consuming a huge amount of sugar.
They only cause issues for a vanishingly tiny amount of people that have pre-existing genetic conditions.
That's highly debatable. It's swapping one set of side effects for another, especially when drunk at high volumes.
It's not highly debatable, it's been studied to death. Sweeteners have existed for a long time.
There were rumours they cause cancer, this has been proven false. There were rumours they cause headaches, this has been proven false. There were rumours they cause infertility, this has been proven false. There have been rumours they stimulate your appetite, this likewise has zero scientific backing.
Aspartame, the most common sweetener, does cause issues for people with phenylketonuria, a rare genetic disorder, because it contains stuff they can't metabolise. But so does a long list of foods people eat every day.
Some polyol sweeteners have a mild laxative effect if consumed in very high quantities, but the same is true for stuff like tea, coffee, most fruits, etc.
Sugar is far worse for your health.
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