This is 200 Words, a column where people we admire write 200 words about anything they want.

Dearest readers,

We’re wrapping up this weekend with 200 Words from one of the most insightful people we know. Chris Gayomali is an award-winning journalist and friend of the mag who is trying to understand what wellness looks like in a sometimes unwell world. He also hosts the Superhuman podcast, writes the health and wellness newsletter HEAVIES, and is the editor of SSENSE. Prior to that, he spent nearly a decade at GQ editing and writing features, including his viral 2022 story on artificial leg lengthening, which, dare I say, foresaw looksmaxxing’s arrival in the mainstream. He is also a brand consultant with C47 Creative and a creative strategist with the Office of Applied Strategy.

Long story short, Chris definitely knows what’s cool, what’s good for you, and what’s not. And today, Chris is defending good old-fashioned, full-sugar, regular Coca-Cola. His words are below.

Having a Coke with Chris Gayomali

Earlier this month, WSJ published a dispatch from the frontlines of the culture war between Diet Coke and Coke Zero enjoyers. TL;DR: Diet Coke sales have remained flat since 2006, while sales of the insurgent Zero accounted for 52% of the growth in soft drink sales last year.

This made for some good tweets: “Coke Zero drinkers are not persons in any morally or intellectually significant way, they’re philosophical zombies.”

Counterpoint: “Diet Coke is the Bulls. Getting by on nostalgia while the future passes them by.”

I’d like to propose an alternative: regular Coke. Coke is perhaps mankind’s greatest invention. It tastes like nothing else found in nature, ours and ours alone, untouched by the grace of God.

If you’re going to indulge, why settle? Why vape (uncouth, antisocial, requires mini-USB chargers) when you could smoke a cigarette (sophisticated, ritualized, makes you hot)?

That’s to say nothing of Mexican Coke (replaces high-fructose corn syrup with cane sugar) or, better yet, the Passover Cokes with yellow bottle caps (available in bigger bottles at most Jewish supermarkets). The first sip of a cold, crisp Coca-Cola with crushed ice verges on divine, the closest we get to remaking ourselves in His image.

Culture Notes

• RIP Kiki’s. This tweet broke the news that the iconic Dimes Square dining fixture was shut down for…not paying their taxes. This is what happens when you let downtown darlings do your bookkeeping for you. Frequent diners held a candlelight vigil on Wednesday. That being said, the Grill is still open.

• RIP (even more sadly) to David Hockney. I think he truly understood 20th-century California because he was an outsider to it and loved it all the more for its foreign nature. He depicted the promised land that it was, along with the alienation that chasing said promises wrought upon its inhabitants. His paintings of swimming pools, like A Bigger Splash, are just flat and bright enough to feel like you’re dreaming.

• On a happier note, the parade celebrating the Knicks’ NBA Championship win was held in the Canyon of Heroes (the stretch of Broadway between Battery Park and City Hall). I just learned that they’re called ticker-tape parades because, before confetti was invented, people used to throw rolls of ticker-tape from the roofs of buildings. I think there’s a re-enchantment of New York occurring right now. The magic has returned to the city, and I hope it’s here to stay.

• What if everything you ever did on the internet was published for everyone to see? That’s the litmus test that NYMag—and everyone else—seems to be asking. If you want to read about what we at Byline think about living a digital life, read some of our essays about sexting, asking AI for advice, parasocial relationships, and the cloud.

• Last night we went to the Woah Vicky reading at Le Pere. Full brief coming soon. We also went to the Mermaid Parade, which you can read about on Harry Hill’s Stuff.

Our Out of Body issue is live—right now. Read it here. Pre-order print here.