It was moderately entertaining when a Tennessee-based company called Poo Prints lobbied the City Council to implement a citywide dog-crap DNA testing regime. But even the considerable charm of total A-list actor David Keith couldn't convince council members to transform the city into a giant CSI: Dog Poop.
It was a stupid idea but a brilliant marketing ploy. The company's service was being used by a small handful of Dallas apartment complexes before the inane City Council pitch. In the wake of all the resulting free press, it's picking up more and more customers.
Poo Prints' system works by matching the DNA from that pile of feces festering in the grass with the dog that left it. This way, apartment managers can pinpoint the culprit and, ideally, make would-be scofflaws rethink their rule-breaking ways. The rub is, for the system to work at all, an apartment complex has to have a DNA sample for every dog that lives there. And that is raising some very important civil rights questions.
"I'd like to live in a poopless community, but if they're gonna tell me I have to do something that's not in that lease, it's my turn to say, 'Tough luck,'" a Dallas man, Brian Barcus, told WFAA.
He has a point. We all want to live in a "poopless community," but at what price? Today, it's an innocent-seeming DNA swab. Tomorrow, it'll be a colostomy bag shoved down Fido's rear. And if you think this doesn't affect you because your apartment complex doesn't DNA test poop, beware.
Poo Prints CEO Cedric Moses tells WFAA that he's adding local clients every day and is expanding to include military housing, student housing and assisted living facilities. All part of his mission to banish dog poop to the dustbin of history.
"It's a privilege to have an animal," Moses told WFAA. "You need to be responsible for that, not make someone else clean up after your animal. That's not how we do business in the United States."
No, we do business in the toilet.
