In a mini scandal that could make the Great Shartening of 2014 look like a cakewalk, we learn today via several Reddit threads that Soylent Food Bars may be responsible for numerous cases of extreme vomiting and diarrhea. The bars, released earlier this summer, are meant to complement the brand's line of meal-replacement products which currently includes Soylent and Coffiest. However, if the latest reports are to be believed, the new bars aren't so much saving techies time by allowing them to skip the act of eating real meals as they are rendering people completely immobile for hours while they hug the toilet.
"So I have ate [sic] a total of about 4 bars now, all different days, and I keep ending up in one or two spots," reads one such post in the Soylent subreddit. "So nauseous I have to puke, followed by horrible diarrhea [or] option 2 I don't get nauseous but still have uncontrollable diarrhea."
"For what it's worth," responds another true-believer, "I had this exact same issue today and I believe it was the result of eating a Bar from an order I placed a month ago."
And those two aren't alone. In a post titled "Nausea from Food Bars," another lover of the Soylent Bar's "portable form factor" dives into just how fucked his stomach began to feel after chowing down. "I'm currently sitting in my bathroom trying to figure out what is causing me to be nauseous and throwing up to the point of dry heaves for the second time in as many weeks," he typed — apparently from a bathroom-stationed laptop. "I find it highly suspicious that I've gotten nauseous after a couple hours each of the last two times I ate a food bar."
To which another Soylent devotee responded: "I have had the same problem! I thought it may have been the Soylent, but wasn't sure until i read this 2 vommitting episodes in 3 weeks."
And another: "I am literally sitting on the throne right now shitting my brains out for the fourth time in a month after eating 1 bar each day I got sick."
And yet another: "I just puked today. Had half a bar around 6:00 and puked around 10:00."
Here's one more for good measure: "I got my first box earlier this week. After eating one in the middle of the day I became very nauseous and had awful diarrhea."
Now, to be sure, Reddit is not a place one usually goes when in search of the unadulterated truth. However, the same warnings are being shared elsewhere, and Gizmodo picked up the story as well.
From Soylent's own message boards:
I decided to bring some food bars along for my vacation in Europe. Then the trouble started: - Vomited on the airplane to Europe. Contents of stomach: food bar, half a cliff bar and some airplane food (go figure). Vomited about 4-5 hours after consuming the food bar. - Vomited a week and a half into trip, 2 hours after consuming food bar. Nothing other than a food bar had been consumed that day. Also had diharrea. I was out of commission for the rest of the day. - Vomited 2 weeks into the trip (today), 3 hours after consuming part of a food bar. This time I cautiously only ate 1/5th of a bar. Nothing other than a food bar had been consumed that day.
This is not the first time Soylent customers have discovered problems with their un-food. In 2015, the 2.0 version of the drink (which: yeah) had problems with mold.
Which is just to say, I don't know, maybe stick to eating actual food like the rest of us?
Related: Hot New Dinner Series Makes You Pay $100 To Drink Soylent In A Drab Room