Is it a bird? A plane? No... it's Butt Man!

April 5, 2007 4:38 AM

Claude Laundry hates litterbugs and has the spontaneous camera footage to prove it.
posted by debralee (40 comments total)

There's a pair of jerks immortalized on film. It's only a pity the busybody hightailed it so soon, thus depriving us of the rare sight of a punch-up where each participant heartily deserves to be punched.
posted by aeschenkarnos at 4:56 AM on April 5, 2007

Internet Celebrity Littermatch!

(I do sympathize with the busybody, though.)
posted by Iosephus at 5:08 AM on April 5, 2007

I've done that countless times. My advice is when it's a burning cigarette toss it in the back seat. They'll have to choose between pummelling you and finding the cig before the seat catches on fire.

aeschenkarnos, the person's a 'busybody' because they're sick of seeing trash littering their neighborhood streets?
posted by dobbs at 5:32 AM on April 5, 2007

That guy's not a busybody and doesn't deserve to be punched, but he is kind of a wuss for scampering down the street so quickly. He (or his friend) is also a terrible video editor in that the action consisted of about 10 seconds but the video is 1.5 minutes long.
posted by DU at 5:37 AM on April 5, 2007

Pair of jerks? If the 'busybody' deserves any crap it's for not managing to get 1/2 the pile before he throws it back in the douche's car.
posted by phearlez at 5:54 AM on April 5, 2007

Littering is illegal in most jurisdictions. Putting litter into a car is not. Advantage busybody.
posted by birdherder at 6:03 AM on April 5, 2007

From the first link: ...the usual Quebec curses involving chalices and tabernacles

???
posted by Slithy_Tove at 6:09 AM on April 5, 2007

Landry, not Laundry, though he is doing his best to clean things up.

Littering is illegal in most jurisdictions. Putting litter into a car is not.

Maybe, but be careful. If you toss a lit cigarette butt into a car, I think the cops will go after you harder than they go after the guy who tossed the butt on the ground.

Is there someone doing this for people who let their dogs shit on sidewalks? Like picking up the shit in a bag, following the walkers home, and smearing the shit on their door handles? Just a suggestion.
posted by pracowity at 6:15 AM on April 5, 2007

Littering is illegal in most jurisdictions. Putting litter into a car is not.

Uh, I'm pretty sure he didn't just throw the ashes in the guy's car, but rather on the guy. That's quite different, and while maybe not assault, certainly not legal.
posted by zardoz at 6:23 AM on April 5, 2007

Slithy_Tove, the fellow in the car swears as he's getting out and says "Mon Tabarnak! T'es un calisse!", which are Quebec swear words. They are bastardizations of the words "tabernacle" and "chalice".
posted by splice at 6:38 AM on April 5, 2007

So, a Quebecois who has Tourette's would be going on about chalices and tabernacles all day?
posted by chuckdarwin at 6:48 AM on April 5, 2007

This is a pet peeve of mine too. It infuriates me that people don't seem to be bothered by it.

I can be sitting at the traffic light and see someone flick their butt out the window and no one gives a damn.

If you tried to do that with your empty soda cup people would lose their minds. I don't see the difference. Litter is litter, and here in Tobacco Country^TM, a lot of people smoke.
posted by BeReasonable at 6:50 AM on April 5, 2007

This seems particularly absurd to me, living in a city where trashcans are rare and garbage pickup nonexistant. You should empty your ashtray by the side of the road in Jaipur; somebody may want to salvage the tobacco from your butts. Littering should be done as conspicuously as possible to save scavangers the trouble.
posted by bookish at 6:54 AM on April 5, 2007

I'm waiting to see how long a TV writer and TV writer/actor whose spontaneous, unrehearsed footage which gets major media play the week of a government anti-litter campaign are outed as having set the whole thing up after all.

> ...the usual Quebec curses involving chalices and tabernacles

Wikipedia knows Quebec French profanity. Interesting that 'tabarnak' is used in Acadian French but not Cajun French.
posted by ardgedee at 7:28 AM on April 5, 2007

Reading those YouTube comments was a mistake. Reading YouTube comments is always a mistake.
posted by not_bitter at 7:37 AM on April 5, 2007 [2 favorites]

crisse: ... crimpuff
sacrament: ... sac à papier ^

Mon crimpuff en sac à papier, ces sacres sont embrouillant!

Hard to believe the only free-range site I could dig up right quick with the Google and the tubes is that Wikipedia page, in zee fronch and zee ainglisch. Such a rich vein of profanity deserves global celebration!
posted by mwhybark at 7:51 AM on April 5, 2007

Is there someone doing this for people who let their dogs shit on sidewalks?

There's this kind of crazy old lady in our neighbourhood who walks her small dog and twice now I've seen the dog shit on the sidewalk. I've watched the lady for a second, and she sort of pretends to be taking out a bag until you look away. But when I looked back she had in fact taken out some kind of plastic card and was sweeping the shit off the sidewalk onto the street. Two times I've seen this no, so I think it's her regular schtick.
I kind of laughed at her elaborate ruse at first, but it still grossed me out.
Unfortunately, the fact that she's always walking with her granddaughter and also that I'm wimpy prevent me from saying anything.
posted by chococat at 7:57 AM on April 5, 2007

I am ardently against the leaving of dogshit in the streets. It gives me bad bad rage, heart attack rage. I have a dog, when she shits I am scrupulous about picking it up. Sometimes, because she is a dog and doesn't know or care about the things that torture my fevered mind, she shits twice. I don't usually bring two bags. Witness then the comic antics of me taking a few steps away from the shit to find a bag, then a few steps back to make sure no one thinks I am leaving the shit there. Then a few more steps and then back, like a horrible self-conscious pendulum.

Finally I rush off to my house, grab a bag or some newspaper and rush back, hoping if any of my neighbors saw me they will not have turned away and marked my down as a shit-leaver, but stayed at their window to see if I came back. Sometimes I want to grab somebody and say "I'm coming back for that shit, that shit right there, I got that, ok? Just wait here and tell everyone that I'm going to get that in just a second, please."

It is for this reason only, that surely sometimes that shit you almost step in is just waiting for someone like me to come right back and get it, that I don't fully implement my neighborhood shit-vigilante patrol. All I need is a couple of spotters and some kind of air powered bazooka that will fire a compressed slug of dogshit the size of a coke can right between the shoulder blades of a scurrying shitleaver. The whole "conclusive proof of guilt" thing is also why I'm against the death penalty. I might have to do it anyway.
posted by Divine_Wino at 8:34 AM on April 5, 2007

Is there someone doing this for people who let their dogs shit on sidewalks?

Our local Verizon people are much more polite about it.
posted by Armitage Shanks at 8:40 AM on April 5, 2007

Why can't you just bring two bags regularly?

(This kind of disgusting maintenance activity is one of the reasons I don't own a dog.)
posted by DU at 8:50 AM on April 5, 2007

Because she only pulls the double shit on me once in a while and then I'm walking around with an extra plastic shopping bag in my pocket like a crazy old lady, all hoarding tea bags and plastic forks and trying to hand out diabetic candy. I can't do it. Also I tend to forget.
posted by Divine_Wino at 8:53 AM on April 5, 2007

I bring 3 bags on every walk to avoid Divine-Wino-Syndrome (DWS).
posted by dobbs at 9:03 AM on April 5, 2007

I flip cigarette butts out of my car window religiously. It gives the community service thugs something to do.
posted by tadellin at 9:05 AM on April 5, 2007

Metafilter: The usual Quebec curses involving chalices and tabernacles.

(Sorry.)
posted by Dr-Baa at 9:15 AM on April 5, 2007

Anybody here remember NYC pre pooper-scooper law? The way everyone walked with their heads down doing a sidestepping jig? Hoards of shoppers coming out after every major rainstorm? Everytime a group of people assembled in a car or white-carpeted appartment hearing the inevitable "OK, who stepped in it?"
posted by StickyCarpet at 9:30 AM on April 5, 2007

I shake the fist of impotent rage at you tadellin. Shake. Shake.
posted by BeReasonable at 9:32 AM on April 5, 2007

I'm the side of the "busybody".

It seems that careless, thoughtless people (yes, I know littering as a minor little offense, but when sooo many people do it, it gets very noticable, and it pisses me off) can act however they want, and when confronted, they never acknowledge their "crime" (same goes for people that speed, run red lights, etc. - one person running one red light is not a big deal, but when so many rules are ignored so often, someone will pay the price), but instead get immediately defensive. You were a jerk, someone called you on it, now suck it up, asshole!

I've got rage...
posted by ObscureReferenceMan at 9:50 AM on April 5, 2007

I saw a UPS driver chase down a female resident for flicking a cigarette from her convertible. This was fire season in a densely populated southern california canyon. He didn't really have to explain much, there are signs all over the place, but his main gripe was that the canyon was his work place and if it went up in flames he would lose a coveted delivery route. The confrontation went down in her driveway and she didn't really have much to say. Her large boyfriend? came out of the house to deal with the aggressive guy in brown until he found out why he was yelling at her. Her guy friend started browbeating her too.

Community service thugs the both of them. I had half a mind to complain to UPS, but that would have made me the busybody.
posted by lazymonster at 10:05 AM on April 5, 2007

Walking with my sister in her small town, I noted she would diligently bag the copious amounts of waste from her enormous black Labrador.

Then, stopping at the General Store she would chat with her neighbors, her bag-carrying hand propped casually at head height against the porch pillar, the mortified local citizenry transfixed by the gently swaying clear plastic bag.

Colour selection in used baggies is important.
posted by CynicalKnight at 10:48 AM on April 5, 2007

lazymonster: "I had half a mind to complain to UPS, but that would have made me the busybody."

So you're for people starting fires?

If you ever listen to a show where they talk about banning public smoking, one of the topics that comes up is the slovenly habits of smokers, leaving their butts everywhere, without thought. And then inevitably smokers call in saying that it's a minority that drops butts and they of course never do that.

Anecdotal evidence: When sitting in line waiting for the ferry, I make a note of smokers. Every single one drops their butts out the window. (Here is Washington it's a $1001 fine for dropping a lit cigarette butt, but it's unenforced.)
posted by maxwelton at 12:57 PM on April 5, 2007

Our local Verizon people are much more polite about it. Hope they aren't running DSL through that box. They won't be able to get through the Internet CAPTCHA. "You'r distroying your Dial Tone!"
posted by cairnish at 1:05 PM on April 5, 2007

Also, baggie strategy: if you can get your hands on the long, thin baggies sometimes used to wrap home-delivery newspapers, they can be 'reversed' to handle two poops per walk (even three if you're careful). Downside? Sometimes the bags have holes in them from being lobbed onto driveways. Inspect before leaving the house. Bonus? They are long and with a single poop can be twirled in the air and used like a one-ball poop bolo.
posted by cairnish at 1:14 PM on April 5, 2007

max, I'm on your side buddy.

I am militantly opposed to anything that remotely resembles littering. Tossing of ignition sources in wildfire prone SoCal shows disregard for public safety on a whole other level. They should lock the poop leavers and the butt flickers in a room and see how they like it. Better yet, put them in an intersection with the red light runners as the last to arrive.

The links in my above post should have lent clarity to my tone. I especially encourage following the first of my links, great little stories from days gone by (in the same directory there is a fire 20 years older, but less interesting reading).

Without giving away too much, I knew that UPS driver and he was an awesome guy. He had the soul of a fireman.
posted by lazymonster at 1:29 PM on April 5, 2007

On rereading my original post, I can see that you could read the driver was only looking to protect his own interests. I meant to communicate that he had the smallest of attachments, whereas she had everything to lose. I think I lost you there. In fact he could have easily lost his job (banished from driving anyway) over the incident or say, if the man friend was a litterbug himself, there could have been some red on that brown. Well, I'm not a writer (obviously), just a fan of the medium.
posted by lazymonster at 1:39 PM on April 5, 2007

lazymonster: Gotcha. (Not enough carbonated sugar water yet, which is my equivalent to coffee.)
posted by maxwelton at 1:46 PM on April 5, 2007

Unfortunately, the fact that she's always walking with her granddaughter and also that I'm wimpy prevent me from saying anything.

As a multiple-bag-carrying Dog Person who does her damnedest to be scrupulous about pickup, and will clean up after less-considerate pet owners with any excess bags I might have handy, I'd suggest the following tactic if you want to say something to shame her without being nasty in front of the innocent grandchild: waltz on over with a huge friendly smile on your face, and say "Oh gosh, did you run out of baggies? I hate it when that happens! Here, have one of mine!" Keep smiling, hand over bag, continue making chirpy dog-lover small talk as you wait for her to pick up.

(And DW -- I'd second the rec for newspaper bags if you can get 'em, they can easily be used for a second load if you're careful and they roll up into such a nice tight little non-crinkly ball that you can carry more than one in your pocket without feeling like a bag-hoarding little old lady. Or you can get a little pouch or bag cannister like this or this or these that clips onto the pooch's leash for baggie storage.)
posted by Smilla's Sense of Snark at 2:13 PM on April 5, 2007

maxwelton, i bet you do make note of every smoker. you certainly sound like you would make note of every smoker. geez.
posted by brandz at 7:48 PM on April 5, 2007

I ran after a dog walker and handed him his dog's poop in a bag once. He just looked at me like I was crazy. I give these people the benefit of the doubt usually, because I forget bags when walking dogs myself on occasion. However, butt throwers always get a dirty look from me.
posted by BrotherCaine at 8:27 PM on April 5, 2007

Brandz, have you ever sat in a ferry line? You'll start counting them too if you forgot to bring reading material. It's either that or endlessly ponder exactly what the state patrol is going to do if one of their dogs decides yours is the car with the bomb in it.
posted by maxwelton at 1:34 AM on April 6, 2007

UPDATE: I guess the 'Cigarette Butt Hero' is now just a 'Butt' as he's admitted that the video was staged.
posted by debralee at 7:43 AM on April 6, 2007