Eat Free or Die

Examining the personal thrill and political power of free food

A sign outside the church during a food distribution at the Salem United Methodist Church in Shoemakersville, Pennsylvania, in July. It was the first food distribution for the church, an effort to fill a gap in the coverage of food pantries in the area and as a response to the increased need because of the pandemic. Photo: Ben Hasty/MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty Images

They say there’s no such thing as a free lunch.

Sure, the general principle of an opportunity cost — that getting one thing we desire means giving up another we also desire — seems ironclad. Yet, whenever someone invokes this adage it’s always a finger-wagging naysayer with one pithy message: You don’t deserve that.

I’m here to tell you that you do.

Whenever someone asked me as a child what my favorite food was, I always said, “Free food.” I loved the free lollipops at the drive-thru bank teller. Somehow they just tasted sweeter than the ones you actually had to buy. I reveled in the cornucopia on Easter. It was easier to believe someone had literally risen from the dead than it was that you were just given, for no rational reason, tons of free Peeps. And I hate costumes, but the promise of Halloween was just too seductive to not partake. You just put your hand out and total strangers gave you free food.

I devoured the oeuvre of Beverly Cleary and Roald Dahl in elementary school just to qualify for a freebie in Pizza Hut’s celebrated Book It! program, which rewarded avid young readers with a free personal pan pizza that included — for just a few extra books — one free topping. Fast forward to my 40s and it’s…