I really don't believe in all these food loan requests. What, he doesn't even have money for food at the moment and in a month he will have to cover plus interest.
He needs money for food in a week, but what he will eat next week or the week after? Plus he needs to find the money for fud and for loan repayment.
I think all of the food-loan requests is just an attempt to provoke empathy, and more like begging.
Also, all of them offering gaming accounts as collateral are nothing but lazy people. They have spent a lot of time playing games, having a problem with their existence, and having no food on the table.
You are right that they are just trying to get sympathy from lenders or from the members of the forum. And these types of loan request you will get from those who are not active on the forum and also from those who are newbie. I have not yet found any loan request for food from any reputed users of this forum.