San Francisco - The Snitch - Making a Buck off San Francisco's Misery or an Honest Corporation Concerned About Our Welfare? Either Way, Flaming Outhouses Make For Great Publicity.

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Making a Buck off San Francisco's Misery or an Honest Corporation Concerned About Our Welfare? Either Way, Flaming Outhouses Make For Great Publicity.

By Joe Eskenazi in Business, Crime

Tuesday, Mar. 31 2009 @ 12:01AM

Somewhere, in his personal Fortress of Ultimate Darkness, the Outhouse Arsonist has to be burning up. His -- and we're assuming this one is a man, sorry -- little crusade to protest rampant construction in well-heeled Russian Hill/protest consumerism/kick sand in the face of capitalist society/burn things has become the backbone of a rather crass marketing campaign by a large chemical company.

Clorox, as noted earlier on this page, has loudly and publicly jumped into the fray, sponsoring a $5,000 reward for information leading to the Outhouse Arsonist's arrest (which must be a thrill for the relatives of unsolved San Francisco murder victims). The company has also put on a series of public demonstrations -- including one scheduled for today. In what must be a city first, a press conference held in coordination with officials from the Mayor's Office of Criminal Justice has, as its announced location, a shitter on Sansome and Pacific (at 11 a.m. if you're free).

If the Oakland-based chemical company's assistance can help put a serial arsonist away, hey, that'd be great. And yet, on the other hand, it doesn't take a confirmed cynic to postulate that Clorox -- and the amiable PR professionals it hired to call us and politely lobby for a story glorifying the company's foray into crime-fighting -- are opportunistically making a buck off of a San Francisco's most malodorous crime wave.

It's hard not to feel even more cynical when the release plugging today's event notes that the company hopes to "flush out" the arsonist via the deployment of a "potty patrol" -- then adds that the crime spree is "no bathroom joke." This coming from a company that has already produced a "Toilet Bowl of Rights" in part of its marketing blitz related to its Outhouse Arsonist campaign. From the Clorox folks:

With a line-up of toilet cleaning products, Clorox strongly supports the right of every toilet. The company holds these truths as self-evident that all toilets are created equal [ed.: Oh really?] with certain inalienable rights:

Right to be clean [ed.: S.F. public toilets, you fail];

Right to be sanitary [ed.: This is redundant];

Right to smell fresh [ed.: If it's clean and sanitary, this, too is redundant, no?];

Right to not be set on fire [Boy, you'd think this one was self-evident, right?]

Today's press conference/march will start at the aforementioned shitter and then amble past two more (these are referred to as Clorox Outhouses Nos. 1, 2, and 3). This, like Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount, seems to be a rather provocative act. The Outhouse Arsonist has been dormant for a month. What is Clorox hoping to do by belittling his life's work and then plastering its company seal on a trio of outhouses right in the heart of his swath of terror?

While catching the Outhouse Arsonist would be spectacular pub, being preyed upon by the fiend would be quite a coup as well.