The problem I have with "everything in moderation" is what is moderation???? To someone eating 100 pounds of sugar a year maybe moderation is 50 pounds of sugar a year (seems like average now is around the 50 pound per year mark). Yet in early pioneer days (1800's) 5 pounds a year was average consumption. So is moderation 3 pounds or 50 pounds or 25 pounds a year?????? Maybe if a person is over eating something to excess and they know it is excess, moderating that habit is probably a good idea. But one persons moderation may be another's excess or vice versa.

So a person has to first determine what an acceptable dose is before they can moderate that dose. And some things are probably not a good idea at any dose. For example tea to drink made out of fresh poison ivy leaves is probably not a good idea in any dose. Some things are just unhealthy in any dose so it makes more sense just to avoid them, even if they don't kill you immediately. But they may taste good so we eat or drink them anyway. That is kind of the way I look at soda pop sweetened with sugar or high fructose corn syrup. They are not a health drink in any stretch of the imagination. But people drink them anyway because they taste good (and are probably somewhat addictive because of the sugar and caffeine, they were sure for me). Now I just avoid them. Moderation would not work well for me.