Soda isn't culinary shit, it's just heavily processed now. I've had a fresh lime soda made of freshly carbonated water and lime syrup (lime juice and sugar ) that was actually very tasty. You overprocess something to make it cheap and mainstream, and of course it's not going to be healthy. When was the last time you bought a container of fruit juice that was 100% juice and didn't cost triple the price of an equally sized juice cocktail or juice drink? Here's a good one, how many 100% juice drinks are 100% of the same juice? Juicy Juice was notorious for that. Ideally we should only eat fruit and drink only water. Course, that means you have to buy water now, since only a few places in the world offer decent tap water. A 16 ounce bottle of water, btw, costs as much as a 12 ounce can of soda, or a 23 ounce can of Arizona iced tea (another sugary atrocity that just tastes awesome).
If you'd like to know why so many people drink so much soda, it's because a 2 liter bottle of generally any soda in most super markets only costs a dollar and fifty cents, unless you get a sale where then it's a buck. The equivalent 2 quart (wait sorry, moat orange juice companies changed that, now 59 ounce) container of Orange Juice now costs minimally 3 dollars when on sale, generally 4 or better otherwise. Even if we succumb to lower value juice drinks like ocean spray juice cocktails (30% juice, 40 grams of sugar per serving roughly) or tropicana fruit punches (15% juice and about the same sugar content) we still see prices twice as high as the equivalent 2 liter bittle of soda. Guess what ladies of gentlemen, healthy=expensive. Not everyone is a multimillionaire like michael bloomberg, most of us actually work to get paid (check bloomberg's yearly salary as mayor, guarantee you'll be shocked). If I had a 6figure salary I'd probably be drinking only 100% fruit juice as well, but til I hit the mother lode and make some serious cash, soda is cheaper, and diet soda is sugar free anyway.
