Willingly or not, prison will be a learning experience for anyone sent there. For me, the lesson learned most pertinent to the ongoing disaster was when I served on the Jaycees popcorn crew for the weekly Rec Department movie showing. And my recollection is that I was at least partially responsible for the mini riot that broke out one time. No those guys weren't starving, but popcorn was a luxury item of limited availability. The mistake we made that time was to attempt popcorn distribution before security was completely in place. It's not a complicated thing. We have the popcorn all prebagged behind the folding table that we distribute it from. The inmates make a line, walk past, get a bag, go back to the end of the line to try for another, etc. But it's basic human nature that what's mine is not yours, and what I can take from you becomes mine. So the instant that the first guy tried to take all of the popcorn, everyone did. Instantly the four of us were pinned between the table and the wall and the only thing we could do to save ourselves was to heave the garbage sacks of bagged popcorn over the heads of the mob. Then they turned around and fought it out in the center of the floor and the single staffer there hit his "panic button" and had overwhelming force there in under two minutes.
Do I believe the stories of filippinos looting/rioting in the face of starvation? I've never believed anything else for even a second since I first heard the news of the existence of the Yolanda monster. Some looting has probably been "opportunity based" rather than shock or hunger bred, but picture in your mind the worst case you can imagine, and be prepared for news far beyond that.
For my part, I take a more jaundiced view of human nature than most do. I easily picture filippino police manning checkpoints and allowing to pass only that amount of food that is in excess of what they and theirs have to have. Filippino police are not overly known for service or professionalism even in the best of circumstances, and we're clearly moving further into the period when there is going to be a vast additional amount of life and death going on.
We and the rest of the U.S. part of the family of my wife are sponsoring ongoing food runs for the forseeable future, as there is still zero government presence for our family in northern Cebu to see aid from. Sadly, if the police are not fat and happy up and down the only road able to supply the more than one hundred thousand persons left sitting in an area where no food (and nearly none of anything else) remains, that four hour journey is going to become far worse than it is already destined to be.
So, yes, feed the police first.
And send much more through fast. The crisis feels like it's starting to build.