I have numerous fat friends that use the calories saved by diet foods as a green light to recover equivalent calories elsewhere.
The fatalist claim being: well, one would've just eaten that much anyway, so what's the difference?
The fatalist claim being: well, one would've just eaten that much anyway, so what's the difference?
We're humans. Not wanting to eat bitter food all the time is natural and should not be faulted. Losing weight shouldn't have to be a strenuous ascetic chore, so choosing to consume something sweet isn't the mental failing; the mental failing is choosing to choose something calorically and macro-nutritionally incorrect for one's body recomposition goals.
Could it be that not eating sugar isn't so much of a strenuous ascetic chore, but rather it's the reduction in sugar intake which is particularly (albeit temporarily) awkward?
One doesn't need to have an addiction to sweet things to want to enjoy sweet things every once in a while, though I admit that "addictions" to sweet things exist (namely my father, whom I have a hard time breaking him away from that addiction).
The point was mainly that there is a certain brand of health and fitness that says one must suffer / become a stoic ascetic in order to make progress, and it's this brand of health and fitness that is counter productive. Yes, maybe it works for many people, but it doesn't work for everyone.
I'm perfectly happy living a rather Spartan life; my 70 year old father is not and it's very difficult to change his stubborn mind.
Another way of putting it is that if you say that the only way to health and fitness is to climb over this 50 ft. wall, then you're going to get far fewer people actually putting in the effort to do so. Artificial Sweeteners are the large hand holds on the climbing wall, before they're ready to switch over.
And yes, if your goal is body recomposition, then macronutrition and caloric intake is far more important than this "artificial sweeteners make you fatter" voodoo magic nonsense.