This week, I heard someone who works in the anti-hunger field ask a speaker how to handle (and prevent) food pantry shoppers feeling “entitled” to food, and I can’t stop thinking about all the ways to unpack this concern.

Anti-hunger and food banking staff do this work to have a positive impact on the world, with the bold aspiration of eliminating hunger entirely. With a fundamental ambition to do good, it can be hard to tolerate situations and people that don’t leave us with a warm glow.

When these interactions don’t feel good, it’s easy to justify a defensive response to preserve our feelings of appreciation and impact. Staff and volunteers should feel this way- but not at the expense of the people we serve.

Every food pantry client IS entitled to food.

The power differential that exists between food pantry staff and clients unfortunately offers an opportunity to demand behaviors from people experiencing hunger– commonly humility, gratitude, and submission. Giving free food to an individual who behaves in this manner is much easier and more gratifying than someone complaining about the selection, quantity, or model of distribution.

While some attitudes and behaviors are harder to deal with than others, everyone deserves to eat, no matter what. While it’s easy to say, “they can just go somewhere else” to avoid challenges or confrontation, this is false.

Finding transportation to another location may be impossible, distribution hours might not work with their schedule, previous incidents of harassment at other pantries may make them uncomfortable returning, or other organizations might not have resources that meet client nutritional or cultural needs.

I’ve heard tearful stories of food pantry clients being turned away because they didn’t have proof of address, citing fears of exploitation, or because an intake form was completed incorrectly, and they were accused of fraud. I’ve listened to panicked tales of waiting in line for an hour only to see the pantry doors close the moment the distribution ends, leaving clients still waiting without food.

These experiences elicit anger and frustration from people experiencing hunger, but this very justified emotional reaction too often leads to accusations of entitlement.

Believing that people aren’t entitled to food is synonymous with the idea that everyone doesn’t deserve to eat.

How do anti-hunger organizations perpetuate the idea that people aren’t entitled to food?

Are you open to criticism?

Defensiveness is often the first reaction to a complaint, especially when it’s something we’ve poured our heart and soul into making perfect. It’s entirely human to want to react to any attitude besides humility with deflection. As we’ve been conditioned to believe that hunger is an individual failure, it’s a logical next step to treat criticism as an attitude problem rather than a genuine concern. But dismissive attitudes towards shoppers can foster environments which consistently disregard the needs, and even the humanity, of the people we intend to help.

Catch your malicious compliance.

Are you holding your shoppers to the letter of the law, or the spirit? If someone was in line before you closed, were they really too late or can you still serve them? If a mistake is found in their paperwork, can you help them fix it rather than accusing them of ill-intentions? If someone is struggling to self-regulate, can you give them a granola bar and a bottle of water before accusing them of disrespect? Setting your guests up to fail is an active way to increase conflict, resentment, and hostility on all sides of the relationship between organization and community. Maybe your policies are inflexible for a reason, but I’ve too often witnessed their enforcement as a tool to demand submission from shoppers, which further models the acceptability of this attitude to volunteers.

If someone doesn’t get food from you, they might not eat at all.

Imagine the panic and fear of having your food security depend on someone else’s interpretation of your attitude. Consider the humiliation that accompanies the demand to humble yourself to deserve food to feed your family tonight. If we want to build anti-hunger systems that actually fight hunger, we need practices and models that support, rather than subjugate, people experiencing hunger. It is entirely possible, while uplifting the dignity and respect of every person experiencing hunger, to ensure everyone is served well. De-escalation techniques are a vital resources, and every direct service organization should host regular trainings so that everyone has the tools they need for their community to thrive.

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Of course, this work is more fun when everyone is kind, humble, and deferential. But demanding this behavior implies that people experiencing hunger are only deserving of what we decide they’ve earned. Everyone is entitled to food, and it’s up to us as anti-hunger advocates to figure out systems that honor this reality.

The opinions expressed here are solely my own and do not express the views or opinions of my employer.

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