Modified post. Read the edit at the buttom.
Now, call me crazy, I don’t think so! I have been an addict and I know how it is to be an addict, but I don’t think sugar is as addictive as cocaine. And I really am frustrated with people who say such things.
This notion that it’s as addictive drives me crazy! I mean, imagine someone gullible who says, well, “I can control my addiction to ice cream, heck I can go without ice cream for months, if it’s as addictive as cocaine, why not give cocaine a chance? It’s not like it’s gonna destroy me or something?” Yeah, I have once been this gullible (when I was younger) and I hate this.
I do crave sugar and I do occasionally (once per week and sometimes twice a month) buy sugary treats/lays packet (5 Indian Rupees, smallest one) to quench that craving, but I refuse to believe that it is as addictive as cocaine or any other drugs. PS: My last lays packet was 45 ago and I am fine, and this is the most addictive substance I have consumed.
I am pretty some people here have been addicted to cocaine (truly no judgement, I hope you are sober now), so what say you?
PS: If you haven’t been addicted to anything drastic as drugs, you are still welcome to chip in.
edit: thank you all for adding greater context.
I realize now that when they talk about sugar, they are not just talking abt lays and ice creams, but sugar in general. I get the studies now. But media is doing a terrible job of reporting on studies.
Also, the media depiction of scientific studies is really the worst. I mean, they make claims which garbage and/or incomplete data or publish articles on studies which make more alarming claims. Also, maybe wait for a consensus before you publish anything, i.e., don’t publish anything which isn’t peer reviewed and replicated multiple times. Yes, your readers might miss out on the latest and greatest, but it isn’t really helpful if the latest and greatest studies in science aren’t peer reviewed and backed up well by data.
I feel like a headline “SUGAR IS AS ADDICTIVE AS COCAINE” can and will be life destroying if you don’t give enough information. I feel like there should be an ethical responsibility to not sensationalize studies, maybe instead of “SUGAR IS AS ADDICTIVE AS COCAINE” give a headline like “Sugar and Addiction, what science says.”
also, https://i.imgur.com/VrBgrjA.png ss of bing chat gpt answering the question.
some articles: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/aug/25/is-sugar-really-as-addictive-as-cocaine-scientists-row-over-effect-on-body-and-brain
https://www.healthline.com/health/food-nutrition/experts-is-sugar-addictive-drug
https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/cravings/202209/is-sugar-addictive
https://brainmd.com/blog/what-do-sugar-and-cocaine-have-in-common/
The Skeptics Guide to the Universe podcast did a segment on this recently, looked at a bunch of different studies and came to the conclusion that the scientific consensus is all over the place on the actual adictiveness of sugar and of processed foods in general, but that there are definitely some affects going on.
deleted by creator
Crazy.
The thing that really causes addiction isn’t so much the physical dependence, but the psychological dependence.
Almost all drugs (including Cocaine) have only very short term withdrawal effects. If it was only physical dependence, all you’d have to do to break any substance addiction is to lock that person up for a few weeks, until the drugs are out of the system and that’s that.
The long-term effects are purely psychological. Usually, your life is shit, you got some pretty heavy problems or you have other psychologial issues like depression. And you know that substance X will help you to feel good, even if only for a short time. So you take the substance again to forget and feel good.
Because of this, you can get severely addicted to stuff like gaming, smartphones, social media, shopping or gambling, even though there is no substance involved at all.
Remeber the high-profile study about a rat that was locked alone in an empty cage and the only things it had available to distract itself from it’s misery where a bottle of regular water and one filled with cocaine water.
The rat used cocaine until it died of an overdose.
This experiment was repeated, but this time there was a whole rat family in a really nice cage with a lot of things to do. This time some of the rats did a bit of cocaine sometimes, but never in excess and no rat overdosed.
Sugar, together with the physical withdrawals (which do really exist), is really tough on the psychological side due to its extremely easy availability and omnipresence.
To get cocaine you need to find a dealer, spend a rather big amount of money and you are always aware that if you are caught, there are some very serious consequences.
To get sugar, you walk into the kitchen. Worst case, you go down to the next shop, spendless than an Euro on the substance and consume it completely legal without fear of any repercussions.
Or you wait until someone gifts you some sugar for birthday, Christmas, Easter, or any other holiday. Or just because they are nice.
This super easy availability means, there are hardly any barriers where you can say “Actually, I wanted to stop” and stop what you are doing.
Actually you can just decide “I want to stop” and then stop. Tell your friends you’re cutting sugar and to stop buying you treats. Stop going to the shops for donuts. Stay away from McDonald’s.
People literally do this all of the time.
It straight up is mostly personal choice and I am tired of people trying to claim it’s not.
Found the miracle healer!
You want to get out of addiction, just decide “I want to stop”.
Do you offer the same solution for other issues as well?
Depression: “Just don’t be sad”
Broken leg: “Just decide that it’s not broken any more”
If you can give something up just like that, you weren’t addicted to it. Please read my post again. There is a huge difference between “using a substance that can cause dependence” and “being addicted to said substance”.
For that very reason there are people who enjoy some wine, rarely, in specific settings, and at the same time there are alcoholics who actually are addicted.
Thanks for proving my point by showing us you know exactly what it is you’re doing when you shovel donuts in your mouth and then get angry you aren’t ripped. Or do you think we don’t know what you’re thinking when you instantly react to any kind of pushback against any attempt to hold you accountable for your behavior?
You make the choice to be obese by practicing bad lifestyle choices and refusing to take responsibility for those choices. And you do it because you want to eat sweet, delicious treats. And you are angry because you can’t accept the fact that you can’t have it both ways: you can’t eat donuts and be ripped at the same time, and you don’t want to put the effort in to be healthy, you want it done for you so you can eat what you want without consequences.
But that’s not how life works.
I say that as someone who is fat and eats donuts and drinks Cokes all the goddamn time. We do it because we want to, because we understand a large part of happiness in life comes from the food we eat and that has always been true, not because of society or any other externalities, but because that’s how life is. We do it because we like donuts and Cokes. We do it because we want to.
But there’s a price to pay for that. I’m as fat as a pile of pigshit rotting in the Texas sun on high noon on the summer solstice because of it. But I don’t worry or have feelings about it, because I understand and fully accept the consequences of my actions as an adult, and more importantly, don’t care about being ripped.
I am adult enough to be honest and make that choice and it’s time for you to grow the fuck up and do the same.
Or choose to stop eating sugary treats and actually become ripped.
It’s up to you how you’re gonna live this life.
You are projecting. I hate doughnuts. I do eat sugar but not excessively so. And I am not overweight. I also don’t care about petty beauty ideals like “getting ripped”. I am not 15 anymore.
Let me get this straight though: You say that you are “fat as a pile of pigshit”, say that you eat donuts and drink cokes all the time and that you “could stop at any time, you just don’t want to”. That’s 1:1 addiction speech.
You are addicted. Because being addicted means that you keep doing something even though you know it’s really bad for you. Being addicted means, that you are not in control.
Saying “I could quit at any time, I just don’t want to”, while your body is rotting away, means not only can you not quit even if you wanted to, but that you have so totally given up on trying, that it has become part of your identity.
That’s the exact same line you hear from old smokers with amputated legs and lung cancer.
Then you should not speak for those of us who actually are obese and for whom this discussion is relevant, should you?
Think before you open your mouth. I do it before I swallow down a Coke; you can do it before arrogantly presuming to speak for a situation that is not even yours.
The person you’re responding to is right. You are demonstrating classical signs of coping. But let’s just use your same argument, please do not assume for other people and take options away from people battling with insulin resistance. Telling a diabetic to just stop eating donuts will not cure their diabetes, they have to take a holistic approach to their entire diet not just one element of it.
The body is very empirical, if people are not getting the results they want, they need to change what they’re doing until they get those results whatever they may be. For a diabetic, or a pre-diabetic, removing carbohydrates can increase insulin sensitivity, and at least for type 2 diabetes remove the need for exogenous insulin. That’s fairly empirical. You might not like it, you might feel guilty that you’re doing something you know is bad, you might be looking for excuses, but it’s not about what you feel it’s about the results you get. And you can measure it everybody can get a glucose and ketone meter and see how their diet is impacting their health day by day or even hour by hour
Oh Jesus Christ 🤦
No, Karen, someone telling you no, we actually are making the choice to live this way is not evidence that we are addicts and have no agency. It’s evidence that we do.
But it is not surprising at all you would flat-out disrespect the very same people you’re trying to justify stripping of their autonomy because the truth is, you’re just a fatphobic authoritarian and for people like you, one of your core principles is a lack of respect for other people’s rights, boundaries and choices.
Because if I wasn’t an addict, I would not still be eating donuts and drinking Cokes, right?
It couldn’t possibly be a personal choice or anything.
The world is black and white and only sane people do the correct things and anyone who deviates from that is defective – a drug addict, mentally ill – and therefore needs their choices made for them by others to live the correct lifestyle.
And fuck our rights. Fuck our autonomy. Fuck our happiness.
Those numbers on the surgeon general’s charts need to come down and you don’t give a fuck who you have to trample over to make that happen.
That is you and how you think, and it is why obese people like myself just dismiss you, and go back to drinking Cokes and eating donuts. Those of us who are foolish enough to listen to you are the ones who suffer self-esteem problems. Those who aren’t just laugh you off, or shake their heads at witnessing the further degradation of lack of respect for human rights you are putting wildly on display right now.
So, until you’re willing to accept what I tell you at face value because I am the authority on my own choices and not you, there’s no point in furthering this discussion.
You need to dominate and assert control over other people and you’ll prove it by taking the last word like you desperately need to, so go ahead. I’m not gonna waste any more time with you.
I’m literally obese and you don’t want to listen? That’s 100% a you problem. Go look for a real addict to save.
I challenge anyone who says sugar isn’t addictive to go a week without. No sugar. No sugar substitutes like fructose. I’ve done it. It is awful.
I’ve also done hard drugs. Quitting those are awful too.
The difference is that I haven’t done drugs in decades but I still have a pack of Oreos on my counter.
Going without a basic macro nutrient making you feel bad doesn’t mean its addictive. You’d feel like shit if you tried to go without oxygen too. Your body doesn’t need as much sugar as many consume, but it’s more than nothing.
Sugar is not nutritionally required. Humans can live without sugar in their diet, including carbohydrates. Paleo/keto are viable diets the humans live with throughout history.
So it is not a necessary macronutrient. It is not necessary like oxygen.
Of course the literature has many assumptions about sugar, and it’s easy to get confused. Which is why we need more foundational nutritional research from the ground up not sponsored by corporations. To help clarify all of this.
But if you know of even one person who does strict keto, and there’s still alive, it’s clearly not as necessary as oxygen.
The human body can create glucose from fat sources, it’s called gluconeogenesis and it happens in the liver. But it only produces small amounts of blood glucose. And because it synthesize sugar from fat, exogenous sugar is clearly not biologically necessary
See, the impracticality here is not that I’d be jonesing for sugar, it’s that almost all processed food and most natural food has a little sugar in it, and also that our bodies literally require some simple carbohydrates to operate. Best case, you go on a hard keto overnight, and yes, the first week is terrible, because keto is a stupid fucking diet that doctors don’t recommend because it sucks.
Yes, if I eat nothing but beef and saltines for a week, I’m going to feel like shit. That’s not an addiction issue.
Fun fact exogenous sugar is not required in the human diet. The body will produce sugar in the liver through a process called gluconeogenesis converting fat into sugar. But it only needs to do that a little bit.
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10284150500485221
Studies done on mice, and mice addiction to sugar, and mice addiction to other drugs. Are these studies directly applicable to humans? That’s a good debate, it’s hard to say. But the studies do show that mice have a stronger preference to sugar than to other drugs.
I do keto, I go for the absolute absence of sugar, try to get less than 20 grams per day.
The first two weeks is very difficult. Especially the first 3 to 4 days. We’re talking hallucinations almost, deep cravings, it’s very difficult to kick the habit. I can’t compare it to other addictions, but the effect is very real.
Same bro. I decided I can’t be doing more than 20 grams of coke per day any more
Let me put it like this. I’m 3 months without alcohol, cannabis and now I’m cutting down social media… he said on social media. But boy, I needs my ice tea. I walk passed chocolate isles salivating. When I was younger I could empty 2x 1.5L bottles of soda in one day.
Yeah, impulse issues I got, but sugar has always been hard to get away from. Refined sugars should have an 18 year old age rating. No joke.
