“There are only nine meals between mankind and anarchy”

GURPS · Jan 31, 2022

So I saw this comment on Facebook:

Dear city dwellers, google the 9 meal rule and then think about why its a terrible idea to piss off the people who deliver your stuff. and could you do me a favour and not collapse the supply chain until I get home next week? that would be super. thanks.

Here we go. Just like Mass Formation Psychosis, another term I had not heard of, the “9 Meal Rule.”

Here’s what the internet says about the 9 Meal Rule.

“A popular saying is that “every nation is about three/six/seven/nine meals away from anarchy/revolution.” That is, hungry people are desperate people who will topple any government. “It is well for us to recollect that even in our own law-abiding, not to say virtuous cases, the only barrier between us and anarchy is the last nine meals we’ve had” was cited in print in 1896.
“There are only nine meals between mankind and anarchy” was said by writer Alfred Henry Lewis (1855-1914) in a March 1906 issue of Cosmopolitan Magazine. “It’s only nine meals between men and revolution” was cited in print in 1943.

I thought it might be one of those phrases that really had no provable attribution, but nope, I found it in the digitized archives of Cosmopolitan maintained by various universities, in the March 1906 issue in an article titled, The Day of Discontent.

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There it was.

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I downloaded the full article into a pdf, so you can read the whole thing. You’re welcome. They were talking about troubles of the time, social discontent, part of which related to food but also the rise of socialism. It’s worth a read because so much parallels current problems.