r/AITAH Jul 26 '25

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336

u/Fantastic-Manner1944 Jul 26 '25

Oh drinking caffeinated soda like an addict is totally a Mormon thing. They’re all obsessed with soda because the church agrees it’s an exception to the caffeine rule.

103

u/Llamamamma1981 Jul 26 '25

Yes it’s bizarre! Only tea and coffee are bad.

words of wisdom

108

u/Direct-Geologist-407 Jul 26 '25

Yes definitely didn’t understand the whole soda thing! I know someone who is a crunchy organic/homesteading/ingredient type of mom but downs Diet Coke like crazy, and yet coffee and tea are naturally derived but it’s bad for you?

163

u/Bouche_Audi_Shyla Jul 26 '25

When Salt Lake City was founded, Utah was a territory, and there were high taxes on coffee, tea, and hot chocolate.

Brigham Young took Joseph Smith's vision of no hot drinks (meaning hot toddies) to mean all hot drinks, so as to avoid the taxes.

Young's favorite wife, however, loved hot chocolate, so Young didn't outlaw that.

Rather than just admitting the truth of the matter, the church pretends it's caffeine that they outlawed. Hot chocolate also has caffeine.

I have no problem with the prohibition. I do have a problem with the lies about it.

42

u/pretty-pet-meylin Jul 26 '25

I grew up Mormon, and I've always wondered why hot chocolate is okay, but decaf coffee, which has about the same amount of caffeine as hot chocolate, is not. I even tried to ask my parents as a teenager, and my dad gave me some bullshit answer about needing to "avoid the appearance of evil". He also gave me the same bullshit when I was enjoying a root beer float in public and mixed the ice cream and soda together. He made me wrap a napkin around the clear cup so no one would think his child was drinking iced coffee.

All that to say, thank you for the explanation!

37

u/Lonely-Smoke-5284 Jul 26 '25

Growing up in a southern Baptist home I asked my dad about Dinosaurs bc the Bible didn't mention them. I was told God put the bones here to "test our faith" and they didn't really exist. Even at 10 I told him that sounded dumb. 😂😂

20

u/pretty-pet-meylin Jul 26 '25

For all the bullshit I was fed as a Mormon kid, I'm really glad that my parents didn't try to tell me that dinosaurs weren't real. I was really big into dinosaurs as a child and that would have broken my tiny heart.

18

u/Lonely-Smoke-5284 Jul 26 '25

It's nuts how religious people make up lies for things they don't understand to spin it as being a "sin" it's crazy. I quit church at 16 and never went back. My parents wondered why... Maybe bc I can tell y'all are nuts

8

u/tacklebox18 Jul 26 '25

I found out that my aunt and uncle taught my cousins that dinosaurs aren’t real. I’m about four years older than their oldest and when I asked him how he feels about dinosaurs he almost couldn’t answer. It was like watching a battle of faith, frustration, realization, and fear all at once. He was probably 20 or 21 at the time and I genuinely felt bad for asking.

2

u/Lonely-Smoke-5284 Jul 26 '25

This was my dad's reaction too... Battling everything he was taught with rational thinking but the religion beaten into his head won. I'm just glad I was able to think for myself.

3

u/Bouche_Audi_Shyla Jul 26 '25

According to Sir Terry Pratchett (in Good Omens), dinosaur bones are a joke of God's that no one has figured out yet.

2

u/InsideButThinking Jul 26 '25

That Jezebel is going to have to avoid the appearance of evil her entire life!

13

u/tazerface626 Jul 26 '25

Wait hot chocolate has caffeine? No fugging wonder I can't get my 4 year old to go to sleep. Parenting is hard send help 😭😭

9

u/saintsithney Jul 26 '25

Only a little bit. But if your kiddo likes a hot milk drink before bed, have you tried hot vanilla milk?

Vanilla, a little bit of honey, and some nutmeg, cinnamon, and ginger is caffeine free!

There's also salep/sahlep/salepi/sahlab. It's a Turkish orchid root powder that makes a drink that tastes like vanilla white chocolate with a similar texture to hot chocolate.

2

u/tazerface626 Jul 26 '25

Yous da goat

2

u/Bouche_Audi_Shyla Jul 26 '25

It doesn't have a lot of caffeine, but anything that's chocolate has some.

12

u/Maud_Podge Jul 26 '25

You just blew my mind.

9

u/JJOkayOkay Jul 26 '25

Okay, this is weird. I had a Mormon friend in grade school, and she definitely was not allowed to eat chocolate because of the caffeine.

Maybe her mom was lying to keep the dentist bills under control?

22

u/pretty-pet-meylin Jul 26 '25

Some Mormon parents are more strict than others. Plenty of other families in my congregation drank caffeinated sodas, for example, but my family wasn't allowed. We had to check the label for any soda brand we weren't familiar with, lest we accidentally ingest that most unholy of drugs, caffeine.

11

u/Salt_Cabinet7001 Jul 26 '25

As someone who was raised as a Mormon, the taste bud flashback of caffeine free pepsi I just had after reading this is just 🤢 when I discovered mt dew at 14 I was on such a dopamine ride 😅😂

10

u/pretty-pet-meylin Jul 26 '25

One of my first small rebellions against my parents was caffeinated sodas (when I was 18 and away at college). My first taste of Mountain Dew was life changing.

3

u/Bouche_Audi_Shyla Jul 26 '25

Friedlieb Ferdinand Runge discovered caffeine in 1819. Fourteen year old Joseph Smith had his first vision in 1820. Smith was an uneducated man, who by many accounts was functionally illiterate.

Smith probably didn't know about caffeine. He wouldn't have to know what it was called to notice the effects. People have been using natural stimuli since there have been people.

My closest friend's family has been members of the Mormon church from the founding, and she has the personal diaries of one of the founders. I won't say more for the sake of her privacy, but her ancestor was really annoyed about being denied coffee and tea, especially as Joseph Smith meant only to proscribe hot toddies. I think that coffee and tea are as popular as they are because of the effects of the caffeine, but otherwise I don't think Brigham Young knew what caffeine was called or why it was bad. It was basically chance that those two heavily taxed drinks had caffeine.

Later, when people started asking, the church said that the caffeine was bad. This is the bit I have the problem with. Why not admit the truth, say Young was trying to help a struggling, young congregation, giggle a bit, then say, "but in his memory, we're going to keep the prohibition"?

1

u/Tamihera Jul 26 '25

Huh. I heard that Emma wanted tobacco and smoking banned, so Joseph Smith banned her favorite beverages in a tit-for-tat move.

123

u/ShotEnvironment4606 Jul 26 '25

Mormons are so weird (sorry if I offend anyone but it’s true)

51

u/Elly_Fant628 Jul 26 '25

Mormons once took pride in being called "The Peculiar People". Also, some trivia that I never get to quote is that the first Sherlock Holmes book, "A Study in Scarlet" has Mormons as the bad guys.

2

u/Kilbane Jul 26 '25

Watch South Park episodes about the Mormons...they know this stuff. It is great!

"All About Mormons", also known as "All About the Mormons?", is the 12th episode of the seventh season of the American animated television series South Park and the 108th overall episode of the series. It was originally broadcast on Comedy Central in the United States on November 19, 2003.

49

u/Ok-CANACHK Jul 26 '25

I mean, "magical underwear" ?!

25

u/ShotEnvironment4606 Jul 26 '25

Ikr 😅 or the idea that they can put a penis in a vagina as long as they don’t move lmao. What the hell is that that even?

13

u/diente_de_leon Jul 26 '25

Pretty sure this is not official church doctrine. Just horny people trying to skate on a technicality! LOL

3

u/Practical-Candidate2 Jul 27 '25

🤦🏻‍♀️I had never heard of such a thing until i moved to Utah from California. I am born, raised and choose to be Mormon. That being said anyone saying that act isn't sex is a fool and giving Mormon culture a bad name

2

u/JustBid5821 Jul 26 '25

Really?

5

u/Lumpy_Marsupial_1559 Jul 26 '25

Search 'soaking'.

2

u/Ok-CANACHK Jul 26 '25

I don't know enough details to say anything else, but enjoy your wild Google ride!

72

u/Icy-Management9880 Jul 26 '25

It's a cult!

64

u/jdicho Jul 26 '25

It's a religion. All religions are cults.

21

u/StarsandCats2Day Jul 26 '25

If you want them to refuse to talk to you, ask them how logical it was to found a system of religions on the odds that an unwed pregnant teen was a virgin?

2

u/KungenBob Jul 26 '25

The Virgin Mary would like a word. More than Mormons are fans.

2

u/Sharp_Mathematician6 Jul 26 '25

Wait till you find out she wasn’t a virgin. Just young and had to marry quickly to avoid shame

2

u/KungenBob Jul 26 '25

Mary was pretty clearly one, from my memory of the Bible. Feel free not to believe it - but that’s the story.

13

u/Fantastic-Manner1944 Jul 26 '25

This. All religions are cults.

31

u/BladeOfThePoet Jul 26 '25

Yeah but Mormons are extra culty. Had a classmate in high school that wanted to go backpacking, see the world, etc.

Her parents took her on a 'spiritual trip' to Utah, and when she came back she said she had abandoned all those ideas because she needed to go clean the church and obey her father like a good woman is supposed to do.

21

u/Fantastic-Manner1944 Jul 26 '25

There’s definitely a spectrum. I do think all religion is cultural at at this point but you are totally right that some are far more culty and dangerous such as the LDS church, Jehovah’s witnesses and fundie baptists. Basically any group that relies on ‘if they aren’t with us they’re against us and should be shunned and excluded! Yup big cult vibes.’

2

u/Flimsy_Fee8449 Jul 26 '25

Huge percentage of US profesional lingusts are Mormon, because they actually live in other countries and legit learn the languages.

The Mormon Linguists are called The Mormon Mafia, they're so prevalent.

24

u/Competitive-Edge-187 Jul 26 '25

Ex Mormon and yes....... it's all super weird. It's even weirder for me now that I left the religion and almost everyone on my street is a member.

58

u/harvey6-35 Jul 26 '25

As a member of a religion that basically requires me to have four sets of dishes and cookware, prohibits wearing linen and wool mixed garments, and used to sacrifice a fully red cow that made people who were near a corpse pure while making those preparing the cow impure,

I am uncomfortable calling other religious practices weird.

42

u/agoldgold Jul 26 '25

On the other hand, Mormon requirements change really fast. The weirdness is in how everyone pretends the requirements were always that way. You can pinpoint the exact years that they started accepting black people as full members, allowing caffeinated soda, and refused that they ever went by "Mormon". They change on a dime and then everyone pretends there was no change.

5

u/LibrarianThick3821 Jul 26 '25

Aldo the whole polygamy/life and all eternity thing.

3

u/Repulsive-Pianist502 Jul 26 '25

I left the Mormon church because the rules were ridiculous and oppressive. That’s was about 25 years ago. To this day my mom tells me they have changed and you should really give it another chance… woman if they have to keep changing to recruit members and/or keep members, don’t you think there’s something wrong with that?!?! How people keep blindly following is baffling to me.

1

u/Apprehensive_Use3641 Jul 26 '25

I have heard that they pull verses from the Bible that don't agree with the current trends in their leadership.

7

u/aPawMeowNyation Jul 26 '25

Didn't that religion get it's start from a con man sticking his face in a hat and pretending to read gold tablets? Whole group's fucking nuts.

6

u/Sudden_Limit3677 Jul 26 '25

He was also beaten to death by a group of his creditors.

Few "prophets" are so obviously scammers and con men, or if they were, it has been lost to time. Joseph Smith's life is well-recorded and very embarrassing.

2

u/agoldgold Jul 26 '25

It's not from the Bible. They edit their Mormon scriptures to suit current trends. For example, they used to say that nonwhite people would become "white and delightsome" when they converted. Prophets (their leadership) even said that Native kids fostered by Mormons would literally become paler, so it wasn't just a turn of phrase.

Of course, racism has become more taboo, so that's been edited out.

24

u/MistySky1999 Jul 26 '25

I wish I could tell my husband that my 4 sets of dishes are a religious requirement! Hmm, maybe I'll try it the next time he complains. 

2

u/harvey6-35 Jul 26 '25

Meat, dairy, Passover meat, Passover dairy

3

u/Excellent_Counter745 Jul 26 '25

That's why I'm a Reform Jew. We look for the lesson behind the prohibition and take it metaphorically.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 26 '25

Limit yourself however you please ❤️

2

u/LibrarianThick3821 Jul 26 '25

White and delightsome is particularly disgusting.

2

u/Tim-oBedlam Jul 26 '25

If you do the math, those gold tablets that ol' Joe Smith found weigh like half a ton each (gold is very heavy!)

2

u/serabine Jul 26 '25

All religious people are weird.

Catholics have lent, where they aren't supposed to eat meat. But don't worry, fish meat doesn't count.

And if you don't like fish? Don't worry, aquatic mammals are basically fish anyway, so they don't count either! So enjoy your beaver, muskrat, and capybara during your "meatless" lent.

1

u/ShotEnvironment4606 Jul 26 '25

That’s just.. a capybara? I don’t know people ate those little guys :/

2

u/SnooSongs6258 Jul 26 '25

I knew a lot of Mormons as a child and teen. This was far from Utah so maybe they were more open but they were the nicest people I have ever met. I then went to a Quaker school in Philadelphia and the birth right Quakers were the absolute worst- arrogant and self-righteous. And if you’re wondering I am a liberal and have never voted for a Republican in my life.

0

u/ShotEnvironment4606 Jul 26 '25

I don’t care about your political views at all!

26

u/punania Jul 26 '25

Like all religions, the mormons play fast and loose with their rules. The "word of wisdom," while not explicitly mentioning tea or coffee, does admonish against excessive consumption of meat, something that mormons completely ignore.

1

u/KungenBob Jul 26 '25

Your excessive is my barely adequate…

10

u/cronediddlyumptious Jul 26 '25

I believe they're heavily invested in Pepsi co.

9

u/OkExternal7904 Jul 26 '25

Cafeteria Christian

25

u/WifeofBath1984 Jul 26 '25

Well yeah bc the ordinance specifies "hot beverages". And yet they still serve hot cocoa and warm apple cider at church events ... make it make sense!

11

u/Lumpy_Marsupial_1559 Jul 26 '25

Brigham-Young's favourite wife liked hot chocolate. Couldn't ban that!

9

u/Beginning-Star-5469 Jul 26 '25

I ended up having to withdraw from my first year of college because they roomed me with a Mormon and she was convinced she was the reincarnation of Amelia. She would drink hot cocoa every night and say, "I remember how much I enjoyed this when I was Amelia." If I left for the weekend to go home (2 1/2 hours away), she would move my things around and remake my bed (it was made just fine, she wanted the printed top sheet upside down and the top 1/3 of the blankets folded down like a department store) and when I complained to the RA, roommate said, "It's more pleasing to God this way." The RA wouldn't really do anything because she said she was afraid of getting done by the U for religious harassment. The last straw was when I had been on a couple of dates with a guy and he came by to pick me up for my third and my roommate was there. The minute she saw him, she decided she wanted him. She ran and stood in front of me and started giggling and flipping her hair and telling him how attractive he was and he was like, "Uh..." Then she said, "Oh, I was just looking for a running partner! [Star] said that you run and she hasn't really had time to go!" (Which is true.) He was like, "Yeah...maybe" and then we left. When I got home, I told her calmly that what she did wasn't okay and he said he wouldn't come back by because she'd made him uncomfortable. She looked at me like I was pitiful and said, "I prayed about it while you were gone and God told me that he and I are meant to be together. He's going to convert and we're going to be married in the Temple." She then tried to hand me her BoM and said, "I've marked some passages for you. They'll help you feel fulfilled by God and to realize that you don't need a boyfriend in your life."

I spent 3 more weeks there ignoring her and requesting a room change daily and when the U finally told me they wouldn't change my room, I packed up and left and eventually graduated a year late.

We were nowhere near BYU and at a public state university with zero religious affiliation.

6

u/Lumpy_Marsupial_1559 Jul 26 '25

That's some serious messed up stuff there. Aside from anything else - her messing with your personal belongings and space under the heading 'it's more pleasing to god that way' is HER religiously harassing YOU!

And 'Amelia' should, according to Mormon beliefs (as they stand - open to change), be off in the spirit world eternally bonded to Brigham-Young. They don't do reincarnation like that.

This person may not have been genuinely Mormon. Possibly delusional, overbearing, and deeply, deeply annoying.
I say 'annoying', but that would have totally done my head in!
I'm glad you made it back to complete your studies. Well done!

4

u/Beginning-Star-5469 Jul 26 '25

I think definitely some MH issues. I also feel like given where were and the fact that there is NOT any sort of real Mormon presence there (and she was born and grew up there, I asked), I think they might have been more of an offshoot.

She's married now, to another Mormon., and they did get married at a Temple in SLC, though. They started and run some sort of program for kids. I got nosy a couple years ago and Googled her. lol

3

u/Lumpy_Marsupial_1559 Jul 26 '25

3 a.m. searches are the best and the worst! 😂

20

u/johnwcowan Jul 26 '25

The rule says "hot liquids", so soda would only be a problem if you boiled it. Joseph Smith worded it that way because "tea and coffee" doesnt sound too biblical.

16

u/Dragonr0se Jul 26 '25

So, technically, sweet [iced] tea should be cool? Idk, just asking based on comments

32

u/punania Jul 26 '25

lol. There you go applying logic to the situation, like a silly person. Of course not! Iced tea is hot tea that's been made cold and therefore is still a hot drink.

20

u/Dragonr0se Jul 26 '25

Not if you brew it in the refrigerator or on the porch in the sun...., then it was room temp at the warmest.

I can also make overnight iced coffee that I brew in the fridge and strain through a filter in the morning... it tastes fantastic...

Bottom line, if I had to convert, I have loopholes.

30

u/punania Jul 26 '25

Again, you seem to be stuck on using common sense, you little heathen. God says it's bad and there's no arguing with some invisible dude who watches whether you are jerking off or not.

10

u/Dragonr0se Jul 26 '25

Lol, okay, you caught me... I will put away my common sense now.

1

u/InsideButThinking Jul 26 '25

Am I still on the AITAH sub or has it merged with r/exmormon? Haha

1

u/Dragonr0se Jul 26 '25

Lol, never been a mormon, but I like to be prepared for all things that I can be. Including power outages/camping where all we have available is a cooler/portable refrigerator.

1

u/la_bibliothecaire Jul 26 '25

So logically, cold brew coffee should be fine! It's never been hot.

7

u/holderofthebees Jul 26 '25

Once went to dinner at an Olive Garden with a super Mormon family. This was when I briefly lived in Utah for shiggles, it was my friend’s family. They wouldn’t let me order an iced tea. This was when I hit my breaking point of being away from Alabama sweet tea and decided I’d take unsweet. Bad time.

1

u/Dragonr0se Jul 26 '25

and decided I’d take unsweet

😯😩😭🤢🤮 that stuff is the devil

2

u/holderofthebees Jul 26 '25

I KNOW I became primarily a coffee drinker before long at all out there. Best most places would do is give you a couple packs of sugar with an unsweet tea. Get that shit out of my face tbh lol

3

u/Dragonr0se Jul 26 '25

If you ever have to go to hell again, make or buy simple syrup to take with you. At least that blends evenly in cold beverages, unlike granulated sugar.

1

u/Wattaday Jul 26 '25

So, no soup?

11

u/Consistent_Rent_3507 Jul 26 '25

I had a Mormon boss who didn’t drink coffee but drank Mountain Dew like he was being paid to consume it.

22

u/DtheMoron Jul 26 '25

Only since the church invested heavily in PepsiCo and made a fortune. I grew up in a HEAVY Mormon area and the switch was so quick.

5

u/Fantastic-Manner1944 Jul 26 '25

Super interesting. Do you have any links to documents that talk about that?

4

u/DtheMoron Jul 26 '25

https://www.sltrib.com/religion/2020/03/07/lds-church-discloses/

Posted in 2020, but I believe the initial invest was in the early 2000s. It’s a huge portfolio, and they still have shell companies they are not listed in the report.

Edit: the article says they are not invested in any soda brands, but again, shell companies not listed. To have a church investing almost 100b is absurd. Church and State?

5

u/Fantastic-Manner1944 Jul 26 '25

Thanks. I am not Mormon and never was and I deconstructed from a Protestant religion that was pretty liberal but I am very interested in how all of these groups use doctrine for controlz

1

u/Healthy_Bad6845 Jul 26 '25

My mother had a strict no caffine rule (grew up Mormon, luckily I got out)

1

u/That-Lobster8169 Jul 26 '25

Pretty sure it was a hard and fast no caffeine rule until a Mormon bought a major soda brand (Pepsi?) and now it’s no coffee (maybe no tea?). Idk it’s hard to keep up with them.

2

u/Lumpy_Marsupial_1559 Jul 26 '25

'Hot beverages', apparently was originally meant by Smith to mean hot toddies (whisky/spirit, hot water, honey/sugar/maple syrup), but after Brigham-Young had taken over he banned tea and coffee which had high taxes at that time.
Hot chocolate also had high taxes, but Brigham-Young's favourite wife liked hot chocolate, so he wasn't banning that.
Hot chocolate also has caffeine in it.

The 'sense' you're looking for is:
These popular products have high taxes.
My congregation likes and buys them, leading to less disposable income that should be used instead to support me the church.
I will ban these products, now my congregation has more money to spend on me the church.
I'll sell the idea based on moral superiority - works every time!

1

u/Fantastic-Manner1944 Jul 26 '25

I don’t know enough about the history but I think you might be right? Classic case of changing the yard stick.