Why Just Diet?

I am sure that just about everyone at Classic City High School is aware that we are privileged to have our very own Jittery Joe’s. It is a great perk that everyone enjoys and appreciates about school… but, I have an issue with Jittery Joe’s that I feel needs to be addressed. Jittery Joe’s offers a large amount of items for the students and faculty to purchase. Customers can buy anything from a standard coffee to an iced coffee, from a pack of Pop Tarts to a granola bar, and from Capri Sun to diet sodas. My issue with Jittery Joe’s is that they don’t sell regular, non-diet sodas, and there is not one good reason as to why.

I have wondered for a while what the reasons would be for this. First I thought of the basic
reasons why people drink diet drinks: because they are dieting, or because they are attempting to not be put into a position where they might need to start dieting. If the school was going by this kind of logic, they are essentially saying that the student body needs to be dieting, or are pretty much at the point where they would need to do something preventative. If that is true, then in my opinion the school is wrong, and insulting both the student body and their judgment.

Not everyone needs to diet. There are alternatives, such as exercising, portioning and I’m sure the list goes on. There are other reasons why people don’t need to diet. One of which would be that many people, me included, can maintain fine physical fitness without the help of diet drinks. Another one (although probably the strangest one), as weird as it might sound, is that people have the right to be unfit! People even have the right to be obese! I am not at all recommending that anyone make use of this right, but I am saying that it is theirs to use, or not, as they please.

Another reason why the school may be choosing to not buy non-diet sodas is that diet is healthier… well, isn’t it? Not necessarily. Mayo Clinic nutritionist Katherine Zeratsky, R.D., L.D said that “some studies suggest that drinking soda of any type leads to obesity and other health problems”. One of the most widely used artificial sweeteners used in diet sodas is aspartame. Editor-in-chief David Zinczenko of Men’s Health magazine has stated that “The FDA maintains that the sweetener is safe, but reported side effects include dizziness, headaches, diarrhea, memory loss, and mood changes. Bottom line: Diet soda does you no good, and it might just be doing you wrong”. Even when it is with good intentions, is it right to sell just diet sodas in an attempt to give a healthier alternative to the regular sodas? Is the School actually helping improve the general health of the student body? Or are they just making themselves feel better about a matter which is solely the business of the students, while at the same time making it more difficult for the students to get what they want?

How is the school making it more difficult for the students to get what they want? Well, take me for example. Many times when on the way to school I feel the need for a little caffeine, so I pull into the Golden Pantry that’s on the way and grab a nice Coca-Cola. On certain occasions, the combination of both the stop and bad traffic, have caused me to be late and receive a tardy. A tardy is not just bad for me, it’s bad for the whole school, because it goes on record for the yearly attendance. The thing is that every tardy that has taken place for this reason, in the entire school, could have been prevented by Jittery Joe’s simply selling Coca-Cola, and or other non-diet sodas. I or any other student could just come to school, then get a Jittery Joe’s pass, get the bottled caffeine that we crave, and do it without getting a single tardy.

Putting aside the issue of diet sodas being unhealthy, let’s think about if the school was right, and diet was healthier. Also take into mind that the average age of Classic City students is eighteen and a half. Which essentially means, that the average student is considered old enough to buy cigarettes outside of school, is old enough to vote, and is old enough to fight for our country in the military. In spite of this, they are not considered to be able to make the choice to buy a drink that the school doesn’t consider very healthy, at school. In a School where the majority of students rush to the edge of campus to smoke cigarettes during breaks, the students are making the choice to not care about their own health. I am not asking the school to sell cigarettes (something that is known to cause throat and lung cancer, as well as emphysema); I am just asking them to sell non-diet sodas. Is that so bad? Why just diet?