How a Lawsuit Against Coca-Cola Convinced Americans to Love Caffeine | Hacker News Reader

How a Lawsuit Against Coca-Cola Convinced Americans to Love Caffeine

time.com

20 pointslaurex15 comments

I gave up caffeine and sugar. Being outside of the craze it is pretty amazing how people talk about caffeine. People seem to believe that humans were completely unproductive blobs until caffeine came along. You hear things like "you don't want to talk to me before I get my coffee in the morning" and "developers are machines that turn caffeine into code".

I was the same way. I cut it out and for about a month it was the least productive I had ever been. Since then it has been great though, no more slump when I don't drink it, no more withdrawal headaches, no more cravings for it. I would go so far to say it is liberating to not rely on these foods.

Agreed. Due to a health issue, I stopped my intake of caffeine at the beginning of the year. I was actually recuperating in the hospital or bed for most of the "giving it up" period so I didn't have a chance to experience the productivity issue, but now that I'm back to work, I don't find I'm any less productive than before even when tired.

The few times I've inadvertently had caffeine since then it's astounding how potent it is. I didn't realize this when I was still ingesting large quantities daily in the past. Now it makes my heart race, my blood pressure go up and actually makes me feel dizzy and frankly, not good. But, the "high" is still there and it definitely makes me antsy and hyper.

If I may ask, and you don't have to answer, what medical condition calls for stopping caffeine? I've read a few people (a lot here) who wrote the same thing.

I have an auto immune disorder (my brother is diagnosed celiac, so it is probably celiac). I had sinus headaches my whole life. Like I remember waking up one day in high school with a clear nose and it was remarkable. (I had digestive issues too but to be honest I didn't mind too much compared to the headaches.)

Girlfriend told me there was something wrong with me and to do an elimination diet. It was the best I ever felt. I stopped eating gluten and felt a lot better but I would still get headaches sometimes. It took about 5 years of narrowing down foods to get the complete list. I don't eat gluten, caffeine, sugar, sodium nitrites (deli meats, celery), and msg (flavored chips). Sugar was the hardest to give up but it's worth feeling good.

There is this woman online, Mikhaila Peterson, who had horrible arthritis and found that eating only meat fixed it. [1] It's a little extreme IMO but it is cool to hear a relatable story. Auto immune issues are wild.

1. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7fncJdVjy5U#

Thanks! Very interesting.

Sorry, I didn't see this until just today, so you may miss this, but in my case I had a stroke due to an up to then unknown hole between the atria of my heart. I needed to keep my heart rate and blood pressure down prior to a repair procedure, so I had to give up caffeine (among many other things, like walking up hills!)

If you replace the word “coffee” with “drink”, “cigarette”, or “heroin” it’s pretty easy to understand where they’re coming from. Addicts are pretty miserable until they get their first fix of the day, and although I’m not comparing the severity of caffeine addiction’s effects on an addiction to heroin, alcohol, or cigarettes, the basic point remains.

Headline is misleading. Not only does the article provide no contextualizarion about the “coffee-swilling journalists” covering the trial, it also abruptly ends at the trial settlement and says very little about how Americans’ perspective on caffeine changed as a result, only that the test results made caffeine look good.

A good read, for sure, but does little to describe how Americans - who were apparently drinking twice as much caffeine in Coca Cola then as now - came to love caffeine.

If this had been an Atlas Obscura piece, I expect I would have come away with a feeling of fullness and satisfaction, like eating a well balanced meal. Instead I feel empty and unfulfilled...like drinking a can of soda.

OP here: I debated posting this for reasons you mentioned, but there were interesting tidbits unknown to me in there, (such as Sprite containing lithium), and just the general idea about how 'drugs' or addictive substances become more acceptable or in some cases, less, is worth some discussion. You might enjoy this book: <https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2014/03/24/caffeinated-a-hist... for a deeper dive.

Caffeine, and coffee directly, has been popular in America since the revolutionary war. The title is clickbait because all the article talks about is a weird lawsuit relating to Coca-Cola.

Coffee and Coffee Houses were part of the US Revolution. Americans switched from tea to coffee as the tension grew with England.

http://ushistoryscene.com/article/american-drinking/

Well, there article mentions they were primarily concerned with children, and that Coke once had as much caffiene as a can of Redbull. Do a google news search for "children energy drinks", and you will see that absolutely not much has changed.

If caffeine were invented in the 60s or 70s, it almost certainly would have been banned along with amphetamines and everything else. Same with alcohol and nicotine.

Amphetamines predate the 1960s: See https://www.sciencehistory.org/distillations/magazine/fast-t... and https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/drugs/buyers/...

One takeaway from the article, IMO, is that American hypocrisy and flip-flopping wrt drug use has a long history. Something that is acceptable today becomes unacceptable tomorrow and then later acceptable again.

Invented?

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