Fresh homemade sweet tea with real cane sugar and lemon is much preferred.
High Fructose Corn Syrup is just sugar. The main thing wrong with it is people consume too much.
The sucrose in soda breaks down into something almost identical to corn syrup as it sits on the shelf. It is all just fructose and glucose.
The High Fructose Corn Syrup you typically see in dry goods like cereal or cookies actually has less fructose than table sugar.