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Meet the Obsessive Calorie Counters of Reddit
The internet’s favorite diet has a dark side
Like kitten heels or mom jeans, diet trends have a Hydra-like way of resurrecting themselves. The low-carb rallying cry of Atkins dieters in the early 2000s eventually died off, then assumed its new form as paleo. In the ’90s, Americans faxed each other about the cabbage soup diet; in 2018, the Kardashians shilled for laxative tea on Instagram. And on it goes, despite a growing body of scientific research suggesting that dieting, no matter the name or frame, is not a sustainable way to lose weight or maintain that loss.
Perhaps the most surprising resurgence is the renewed fascination with a diet that’s been a staple in American culture for over a century. It isn’t keto or plant-based; it doesn’t emphasize clean eating or whole foods. It’s just old-fashioned calorie counting — now known by its catchy acronym, CICO, short for “calories in, calories out.”
CICO has exploded in popularity over the last two years, and perhaps nowhere is it more apparent than on Reddit.
Tallying one’s daily calories has been practiced since the advent of modern dieting itself. When physician Lulu Hunt Peters published Diet and Health: With Key to the Calories in 1918, it became the country’s first diet bestseller, according to the Science History Institute, selling over two million copies. In it, Peters included recommendations for target caloric thresholds based on weight, gender, and activity level, and a calorie directory of more than 100 different foods, from frankfurters to macaroons.
Peters’ advice is more drastic than what’s considered safe today. And in an era when dieting and weight loss have seemingly taken a backseat to healthier ideas about body positivity and eating well, mathematizing one’s intake can feel at odds with our modern way of talking about health and wellness. It’s the stuff of rice cakes and Olestra chips — a hallmark of a bygone era.
Still, much of diet culture continues to echo Peters’ insistence on meticulously quantifying, and limiting, calories — and in recent years, what was once a private endeavor has become, for many, a highly communal experience. CICO devotees…
