History Main / NoPartyLikeADonnerParty

* In Creator/LordByron's NarrativePoem ''Literature/DonJuan'', the heroes are lost at sea and forced to eat some of their crewmembers, including Juan's beloved teacher and [[EatTheDog his dog]]. The grim scene is handled with touches of BlackComedy -- one man avoids being eaten because he has a special "present" given to him by some prostitutes (a present Byron himself would become well-acquainted with).

** ''The Oregon Trail II'' allows you to encounter the same snowstorm that the Donner Party got stuck in. The game also allows you to [[EatTheDog butcher a draft animal]] if you run out of food, although you don't get to cannibalize your wagonmates.

-->'''Taliesin:''' I'm still a little upset that we talked about eating me ''before'' [[EatTheDog the dog]].

** Another episode had the Griffins racing up Mt. Everest against The Fishmans, another family they'd become rivals with, but a massive snowstorm hits the mountain, and the Griffins get lost and run out of food due to Peter's poor packing (he thought Lois told him to bring a mix tape rather than trail mix for provisions), only to discover the Fishmans' son Ben dead from exposure. Rather than die from starvation and cold, Brian suggests they eat him, though the whole family is very reluctant...with the exception of Peter, who doesn't even wait for them to stop talking. Stewie later lampshades them resorting to cannibalism rather than EatTheDog.

Compare EatTheDog, ReducedToRatburgers, TooDesperateToBePicky, EatingShoes, ColdEquation. Contrast ImAHumanitarian, where the character eats their fellow human out of enjoyment. When animals or monsters eat their own kind, thus demonstrating they're ravenous and/or vicious, that's MonstrousCannibalism.

* This trope is suggested as part of [[spoiler: Senshi]]'s backstory in ''Manga/DeliciousInDungeon''. After being stranded in the dungeon for many days, his crew was whittled down to three people by monster attacks and starving to death. The other two left the room, there was an argument, then a loud struggle, and then only one of them came back, fatally wounded but holding a hunk of meat, saying a monster had attacked them but he managed to kill it. That meat let [[spoiler:Senshi]] survive long enough to be rescued, but it was ambiguous whether the meat he ate came from a monster or another dwarf. [[spoiler: It is ultimately subverted, however, as Laius deduces that the meat Senshi ate was actually hippogriff.]]

* The same incident that inspired ''Alive'' was earlier dramatized in the 1976 Mexican production ''Film/{{Survive}}''.

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** In the third installment, ''Literature/TheStoneSky'', a group of captured raiders are offered the chance to join the community of Castrima as they make their way across the ash-covered continent with limited supplies. The smart captives promptly agree to take jobs of hard labor. The most-stupid captive mouths off at Castrima's leader. She instantly kills him. That night, Castrima has a rich stew for dinner. "You don't think about the meat."

** In the first installment, ''Literature/TheBrokenEarth'', we learn that one group of [[AristocratsAreEvil snobby Sanzed elites]] earned the bad reputation they have had for over a millennium because they [[ImAHumanitarian maintained the practice voluntarily]] after a Season ended.

** In the third installment of the trilogy, ''Literature/TheStoneSky'', a group of captured raiders are offered the chance to join the community of Castrima as they make their way across the ash-covered continent with limited supplies. The smart captives promptly agree to take jobs of hard labor. The most-stupid captive mouths off at Castrima's leader. She instantly kills him. That night, Castrima has a rich stew for dinner. "You don't think about the meat."

* ''Literature/TheFifthSeason'''s setting has periodic "Seasons" where it turns into a barren DeathWorld, so although every walled community has large food caches reserved, it's a fact of life during a Season that "You don't think about the meat." That said, while people tacitly accept it when it's necessary, one group of [[AristocratsAreEvil snobby Sanzed elites]] have had a bad reputation for over a millennium since they [[ImAHumanitarian maintained the practice voluntarily]] after a Season ended.

Named for the famous example of the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donner_Party Donner Party,]] who ate the bodies of their comrades who had died of hunger in order to survive the harsh winter of 1846-47, and for the song "Ain't No Party Like an S Club Party" by Music/SClub7.

* [[https://comick.app/comic/cambyses-no-kuji/ojxGY The Draw of Cambyses]], a Creator/FujikoFujio one-shot, have this as the hero Sark's backstory. Originally an Assyrian soldier sent on a campaign across a desert, when they run out of food in their crusade, the army is forced to draw lots for "volunteers" as food supply. Sark unfortunately drew a short straw and [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere ditches his army]] before he can be sacrificed.

* In ''ComicBook/PocketGod'' issue #23, half of the tribe is trekking through the desert with their provisions running low. Kinsee gets so hungry, she considers eating one of the other pygmies. While they can [[ResurrectiveImmortality resurrect from death]], they keep her from doing it because they don't want to be cannibals.

* Parodied in ''ComicStrip/{{Dilbert}}''. The incompetent pilot of Dilbert's flight crashes into a mountain -- the same one that he previously crashed into ''three times''. In order to avoid frostbite, the pilot tells the passengers to beat themselves with meat tenderizers and to apply liberal amounts of Worcestershire sauce. The one person who realizes what's going on (Dogbert of course) saves them all by sending the pilot to get help from the village at the base of the mountain, via a snowball to the face. It's strongly implied since the first time, the Pilot got [[ImAHumanitarian addicted to human flesh]].

** After one survivor dies, there's a heated debate about the morality of cutting off a piece of his flesh for more fishing bait, since the fish will be eating the rest of his body anyway. They take some flesh for a bait but only catch a shark, which is too big to reel in.

* In one of the ''Literature/AubreyMaturin'' novels by Patrick O'Brian, the heroes and some crewmembers are stranded in a lifeboat for an extended period of time. One man dies, and the next morning there has been an obvious bite taken out of his leg, but everyone politely refrains from mentioning it. (They are rescued before things get much worse.)

* Creator/JRRTolkien's ''Literature/TheFallOfGondolin'': Invoked. After travelling through frozen wastes in the death of winter during nearly one month, Tuor and Vonronwë have almost run out of supplies. When they spot an Orc camp, Tuor is ready to attack them, muttering he would not turn Orc meat down right now. However, he gives up attacking them when Voronwë points out they would alert other Orcish posts.

* ''Literature/TheMartian'': When the crew of the ''Hermes'' decide to return to Mars to rescue Mark Watney a probe of supplies is put together to provide the food they'll need. During a video chat with her father, Beth Johanssen admits to him that the crew have come up with a contingency plan if something goes wrong with the probe: they'll all kill themselves to provide Beth, who's the youngest, smallest (so needs the least food), and has the necessary skillset to fly alone, with enough meat to sustain herself on the way back to Earth.

--> '''Barkwell:''' I didn't enjoy what I did. I didn't derive some ghoulish pleasure from ingesting human flesh. It was a gruesome, sickening ordeal. But had we not done it, there is no doubt in my mind but that we would have died. I am sorry that it happened the way it happened. [[IDidWhatIHadToDo But I do not apologize for surviving]].

* In ''Series/{{Yellowjackets}}'', the main cast is stranded in the wilderness after a plane crash, and while they didn't initially ''intend'' to eat [[spoiler:Jackie]] after her death, inadvertently cooking her during a failed cremation proves too tempting an opportunity for the starving team.

* 'A Tale They Won't Believe' by Weddings Parties Anything is based on Alexander Pearce (in the Real Life section.) Every second verse or so sees another member in the group dispatched.

* Happens twice in the comedy play ''The Conquest of the North Pole'' by [[Creator/JaraCimrman Jára Cimrman]], which focuses on a fictional Czech Arctic expedition who conquered the North Pole one day before Robert Peary.

* ''VideoGame/EmpireEarthII'': One of the Egyptian levels has a famine ravaging the country, along with starving people breaking into pyramids to drag out the mummified corpses to eat them. Becomes unintentionally hilarious when you notice the dead bodies are just resources like any other, and in fact nothing stops you from harvesting those corpses yourself.

* According to medieval chronicles, the knights participating in [[UsefulNotes/TheCrusades the First Crusade]] were so hungry and undersupplied at the Siege of Ma'arra that they resorted to eating meat from the backsides of slain Saracen warriors, and even "when it was not yet roasted enough by the fire, they devoured it". Some sources, including [[Website/{{Cracked}} Cracked.com]], even claim that the knights ''[[EatsBabies roasted and ate babies]]!''

* There are many [[http://history.org/Foundation/journal/Winter07/jamestownSide.cfm accounts of cannibalism]] in the Jamestown colony in Virginia during the "starving time" of 1609-10. [[http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/skeleton-of-teenage-girl-confirms-cannibalism-at-jamestown-colony/2013/05/01/5af5b474-b1dc-11e2-9a98-4be1688d7d84_story.html Recently unearthed remains]] from the colony site of a 14-year-old girl whose body was butchered with knives and cleavers after her death reveal that the Jamestown colonists did indeed resort to cannibalism.

Note that, in a real-life survival situation, this isn't all that helpful. The meat of a starving human, by definition, does not contain the necessary nutrients to support a starving human. (See [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protein_poisoning fat starvation.]]) Also worth noting is that digesting meat requires certain vitamins that can't be replenished through meat alone, potentially leading to serious malnutrition if not supplemented by other food.

* ''Series/{{Rome}}''. Vorenus and Pullo are the {{Sole Survivor}}s when their legion is shipwrecked in a storm. As they're stranded on a bar with nothing to eat or drink, Pullo suggests they drink the blood of the bodies that have washed up there, but Vorenus says the blood is salty and the bodies too putrid--fortunately the latter means they can be used as an improvised raft to escape.

* Played for humor in one episode of ''Series/TheRedGreenShow'' when Red, Mike, and Harold get snowed in at the lodge. Mike becomes convinced they need to eat Harold in order to survive and makes some thinly veiled attempts to do so.

"Well, there are at least three good reasons why you should do that," Rob replies. "Firstly, it'll be your last chance. Secondly, it'll provide more meat. Thirdly and most importantly, it's been a while since I ate anything with ''[[{{Squick}} sauce]]''!"
* A rescue team receives a transmission from the survivors of a plane crash. They only manage to relay that six people survived, before the transmitter dies. When the rescuers finally find the crash site, they see a sole survivor surrounded by bones and mutilated corpses of others. Challenged by their horrified and disgusted looks, the man jumps up to defend himself: "Look, I know how it looks. I hate myself for it, believe me. But I was desperate! The prospective of a slow excrutiating death from starvation weighed more and more on me until I couldn't take it anymore! Self-preservation kicked in and eventually overwhelmed all concerns of decency. In the end I did what I had to!" One of the rescuers finally finds his words and weekly says: "...but... it's only been three days..."

* ''VisualNovel/TheFruitOfGrisaia'': [[spoiler:Amane Suou]]'s route features a high school field trip bus crash in an isolated forest in the mountains. Weeks pass without help and eventually with the food supply having dropped to effectively nothing, [[spoiler:the survivor's first eat the dead puppy that a student smuggled with her to a field trip. That doesn't sustain them long enough as eventually some of the students start passing away from malnutrition or their injuries from the crash. The teacher 'conveniently finds' some meat at this point and distributes them to the students (Kazuki Kazami, a student partnered with Amane, refuses to eat it and successfully advises Amane to do likewise.) The meat turns out to be the remains of the dead students which he was supposed to have respectfully buried. Amane and Kazuki attempt to make their escape once it becomes apparent that at some point the teacher and the other students start to mentally degrade out of hunger and desperation to an aggressive ghoul state where they won't even wait for the other students to die on their own before consuming them]].