That doesn't make sense, your body needs minerals as well but that doesn't mean you have to eat dirt, rust, or chalk. As far as nutritional value goes, sugar is one of the least healthy sources of energy, especially in its refined form (which is what this article is about). Mankind evolved through millions of years without even having access to refined sugar.

Also, how is alcohol less of a nutrient than sugar? It gets metabolised to carbohydrates your body can use as energy, store as fat, etc. Apart from the fact there's an extra metabolic step required to convert them to carbohydrates your body can burn as fuel, there isn't much difference compared to sugar, at least not from a nutritional point of view (obviously this says nothing about other health effects alcohol has).

You need minerals. You get minerals from food. Those minerals are in a bioavailable form. Eati g dirt or rust or chalk isn't useful because the minerals contained by those items are not so bioavailable and they contain far more minerals than are needed.

You're totally right about sugar being a problematic source of energy. A thin spread of honey on toast? Tasty and not so bad. A fistful of sugar in a drink twice a day every day? Obviously really bad.

One of the problems with the "sugar is toxic" mantra is that we risk making the same mistake as that "fat is evil" crowd. Selling a sack of sugar (sweets / candy) as "FAT FREE!" Is obviously really bad.

Alcohol isn't a nutrient, but the carbohydrates it provides are. But alcohol is actually toxic.