To think that caffeine & sugar are drugs?

.

everyone is taught at school that caffeine is a drug (repeatedly) some people listen at school, some people don't. What do you want to change about it?

It's not fine though is it? - Because if you teach teenagers that sugar is a drug then you are teaching them something that isn't true 😕

Caffeine is a drug (a legal and relatively mild one, a stimulant). Sugar is not.

I think the point that @sixtyandsomething is making is that caffeine is not harmful to the extent that drugs such as cocaine, cannabis, nicotine, heroin etc are.

You don't need to teach children that caffeine is an evil drug that you need to stay away from it because it will harm you.

Things like coffee also have a lot of health benefits. Sugar is one of the joys of life - a slice of cake is a wonderful thing.

Just teach moderation and due care, same with sugar and chemical additives and all of these sorts of things.

If you instil the fear of god into children about relatively minor things like caffeine and sugar, they are going to end up with food issues and eating disorders.

It's about moderation in all things.

If you think sugar is a drug, what about salt , some think we consume a lot of ?

Absolutely agree. The number of people that I have seen develop orthorexia type disordered eating due to keto is madness.

Keto is not a diet for real life. Short term weight loss, maybe.

up until 1960s/70s and the advent of UPF, people regularly ate sugar in various eatables as part of their diet without gaining excessive weight.

It's not necessarily about sugar per se, but the other things it comes with, the marketing of such sugary products, the availability of them, the advertising of them, the packaging, the addictive UPF style ingredients they are combined with, the way the recipes are designed to be addictive, the emulsifiers, flavourings and so on plus the omnipresence of these products all around, the changes in our food culture. So many factors.

@foghead @ViaBlue Yes, we all know that ketosis is a thing and the keto diet is a thing. But it's a survival mode. It's not the ideal. Your body is designed to use sugar/ carbohydrate to produce energy.

The fact that your body has a survival mode in which you don't need to eat sugar to live is not a reason to teach children that sugar is a drug 😕

nobody* is seriously disputing that caffeine is a drug, just that it has relatively few damaging side effects compared to other drugs,

*well maybe a couple of people who were not paying attention at school.

My point is, it is a drug, it is known to be a drug, it is taught at school that it is a drug and I don't really see what your issue it

Caffeine withdrawal is awful; headaches, flu-like aches and pains, can't think straight. I've been through it a few times over the years and it's always the same but generally over after about two days.

Whether people like it or not, caffeine is, in fact, a drug. For a long time drugs education has focused on helping children understand that there are drugs which can help us and drugs that can be harmful and much depends on how we use them. I'm surprised more people haven't experienced their children coming home from school and sneering at them 'You're on drugs' because they drink coffee and they've just been taught that caffeine is a drug.

I was looking this up.
There are 10 foods that can cause druglike symptoms.
Sugar.
Coffee.
Tea.
Peppers can give pain relief.
Turkey can make you sleepy.
Sweet potatoes make you mellow.
Grapefruit alters some heart drugs.
Milk again sleepy.
Willow bark tea pain killers.
Spices also cause things .
Can't remember the last ones.

We always preferred our kids to have sugar rather than artificial sweeteners. They didn’t like fizzy drinks anyway really and as adults aren’t really coffee drinkers. Would far rather they drank coffee though than, say, smoked cigarettes or vaped (they don’t).

sugar doesn't change behaviour, that has been proven over and over again

Caffeine is absolutely a drug, it's the most widely consumed psychoactive drug in the world.

Really? https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/advances-in-psychiatric-treatment/article/neuropsychiatric-effects-of-caffeine/7C884B2106D772F02DA114C1B75D4EBF

I wouldn’t be scaring kids and equating food products/ingredients with drugs - you will just give them a complex and could lead to restrictive eating or an eating disorder.

Or they will get a bit older, realise it’s not true and wallow in an orgy of UPF at every opportunity. Just try to promote balanced diet.

The kids I knew who had a very “clean” diet at home with no treats were noticeably greedy at parties or playdates because they never got sweeties or cake etc. at home. Not sure what happened when they got to be teens with autonomy over what they ate.

Exactly this. Aspartame does far worse to me than a cup of coffee or a bar of chocolate does.
The stuff (along with the supposedly better for us crap sweeteners) should be banned as far as I'm concerned.

This is ridiculous. Fruits contain sugar! And coffee is incredibly healthy. You’re being too simplistic. Like literally anything, both could be bad if done wrong (like in disgusting sugar filled energy drinks). The only thing I tell my children about caffeine is that I drink black coffee due to its health benefits. What else is there to say? It’s ridiculous to compare them to drugs.

😂😂😂

dont be ridiculous

@Bringbackthebeaver Look up ketosis.

You must definitly can live without consuming glucose. Our bodies are dual fuel and we are designed for metabolic switching.