Dear Luv Doc,
Since COVID times, I have been taking long, daily walks with my dog. Usually at some point during our walk, she will have to poop. I always carry a bag with me to pick it up and after doing so I always place it in the nearest trash receptacle. Yesterday, I put my trash in a bin on the street and an enraged man chased me down the street to tell me to come take my poop bag out of his bin. I told him I was sorry and didn’t mean to upset him, but I thought that putting it in a trash bin is better than leaving it on the street. I always tie off the bag and seal it. He said that I should carry it home and throw it in my own trash bin. That seems silly when there is a trash bin nearby. Anyway, I picked up the bag and put it in an apartment dumpster down the street. I just don’t get why he was so bent out of shape. Trash is trash. Am I the only one who feels this way?
– Too Pooped to Argue
No, you are not the only person who doesn’t see the problem with putting your dog’s poop in other people’s trash bins. In fact, there are a whole lot of people who are just fine with it. They are called “horrible people” … or maybe, in a less generic sense, “the asshole,” as in, “If I ever catch the asshole who keeps leaving his dog shit in my trash bin, I am going to chase him down, light it on fire, and throw it at him.” If you’ve never come across a sentence like the preceding, my guess is you have never spent time on Nextdoor. If you’re shopping for crazy, Nextdoor is always having a sidewalk sale.
Look, I think I know where you’re coming from. Poop in a bag is no big deal. In fact, I would bet that if I were to drop a steaming twosie into a flimsy biodegradable bag, knot it up, and casually toss it in your trash bin, you would wave at me, smile, and say. “Top o’ the morning to you, sir.” I would of course wipe the sweat from my brow, exhale a deep sigh and say, “You’re welcome! That chicken vindaloo I ate last night was beating on my back door all morning!” That’s the way civilized folks would handle it. No need to go dragging our dirty laundry all over the interwebs, right?
Besides, dog poop is practically antiseptic – well, except for dog diarrhea, which, I believe, is registered at the Hague as a chemical weapon. There are certain strains of dog diarrhea so acidic they could burn barnacles off a battleship. That’s why if you ever see a dog with bad diarrhea, it will be freaking the fuck out, running away from its asshole as fast as it can, which is a decent blueprint for how any bystanders should behave as well. There is absolutely nothing to be gained from witnessing that shitshow.
But back to the question of your questionable ethics: Why isn’t it OK to drop your dog poo in someone else’s trash bin? Here’s why: because it’s not your fucking trash bin. Furthermore, you are perfectly capable of carrying that bag of shit all the way back to your house, you just don’t want to be inconvenienced … or maybe you don’t like the idea of being seen walking around with a bag of dog shit. Maybe that doesn’t jibe with your personal aesthetic. I get it. Carrying around a bag of hot dogshit is embarrassing … just a little bit, right? What if you run into a friend? She’s probably going to notice you’re holding a bag of dogshit. She might even seem a little judgmental about its girth and heft. Oh well, there goes that cocktail party invite. Nobody wants to slam margs with a shitbag carrier.
So, you quickly dump that hot shit into some unsuspecting stranger’s bin and start furiously cooking up rationalizations like, “Trash is trash. Who cares whose bin it’s in?” Well, that’s a mighty generous attitude to have – especially when it’s not your trash bin. Here’s my advice – not that you actually asked for it: It’s a good baseline to assume that literally no one wants you dropping bags of shit in their trash bin or on any other part of their property without their expressed consent.
Now, it being a free country and all, you can certainly do the neighborly thing and ring some random stranger’s doorbell and ask if you can deposit a bag of your dog’s poop into their trash bin, but that just depends on whether you’re OK with some random stranger thinking you’re insane. Otherwise, just own your role as dogshit carrier. Beats being a horrible person.
This article appears in March 26 • 2021.
