Why they resorted to cannibalism
TheDuck
Banned
I've repeatedly seen this question asked in regards to Episode 2, with people often pointing out how they should have plenty of food. Thinking about it in detail, I've had some thoughts:
First, keep in mind that the St. John's fell victim to both the bandits and walkers, so who knows how much of their food and supplies were stolen. It's even possible that some of their farm hands took some stuff before leaving.
Second, think how much food they needed. They had to keep a family of three grown adults fed enough to defend the place from bandits and walkers, should the need arise, as well as do farm work and keep the fence maintained. They also needed enough to placate the bandits, of which there are about a dozen or so. Then they need some to trade to people for gas, which is linked heavily to their survival and safety.
Third, they only had one cow, who they believed to be sick. Also, since cows only produce milk while pregnant and a few months after, it was only a matter of time before they had none, since there were no male cows for Maybelle to mate with.
Fourth, even if they had the means to plant food and grow it, there was no guarantee something wouldn't go wrong. Also, things take time to grow, during which they could starve, be attacked by the bandits, or run out of the gas that keeps them safe and their dairy running.
With need for so much food and limited time to acquire it, they were in quite a bind.
Comments
Even if they were in a bind, I would have assumed that the best option is to leave the area and get away from the bandits. Sure it's a big risk of being hunted down, but there was a chance of relocating to a safer area and not having to constantly worry about paying for protection and having an easier time to manage supplies.
As for their cannibalism, they don't seem to be biased at whoever they're cooking, since they decided to chop up Mark who wasn't even a threat to him, and their excuse is that "he was going to die, anyway" when he only had an arrow to the shoulder (unless his artery was ruptured, of course) and not to his heart or other major organs. And how many people do they have to bring over to their home and have them chopped up before anyone in the outside got suspicious of people vanishing, like Carley and Doug when Lee and the others vanished in their home?
Their cannibalism would eventually be exposed to the bandits, and unless they don't care whether they're eating human meat or not, they're likely to burst in their house and kill the family for tricking them.
In the end cannibalism wasn't a wise choice, even if they were in a bind.
Luring in families to butcher, feeding us Mark's severed legs, treating it like a game. There's no real justification on their part, they had just lost it.
Even if they were hard up on crops and supplies, cannibalism was no contingency plan.
I'm not trying to justify, I'm trying to explain it.
Lilly didn't even want to leave the Motor Inn when supplies became scarce, so is it really a surprise that the St. John family didn't want to leave what had been their home for decades? The farm was clearly important to them, as was everything in the house itself, and was also important to their departed husband/father. Then there's the electric fence to think about.
I don't think it was likely anyone would notice. They probably targeted solo people or small groups, for the most part. With Lee's group, I think they were hoping to "convert" some of them.
And I'm saying the explanation is that they were mental if they thought that what they were doing was a reasonable option.
I don't see you coming up with any kind of alternative.
Ration crops and take your chances on the road, accept in an armed group like Lee's and fortify against the bandits, don't try to eat the family of the vet that's agreeing to help your last cow.
Just about anything would have been better than opting to become cannibalistic serial killers.
You might want to read my above reply about why they would not want to leave their farm. Also, they wouldn't have had much luck. Look how Lee's group fared, in the end. They knew there were bandits out there, who would be furious and out for blood if their deal stopped. Andy and Danny can take care of themselves, but Brenda cannot. And getting to her is all you'd need to do to make the other two surrender.
Why are you acting like this deal gave no other option but to eat people? It had only been a few months, they never phrased it as a last painful act of desperation, they just thought that it was natural now.
They're trying to justify it, but it seems unlikely they've been doing it all along. I've given a pretty good possibility for why they might have resorted to it.
I don't think they were murders before the apocalypse either, but I don't think there was a huge sense of reasoning for what they did beyond increasing instability and what they tell us.
"We go after folks who were going to die anyway. One way or another."
"This is the way the world works now."
Again, justification. That suggests they have at least some stability left. I don't see them as just randomly deciding to eat someone.