San Francisco dog owners to protest right-wing rally by leaving poop where the demonstrators plan to march

Dogs at Crissy Field. Photo / Getty Images

Activists in California plan to greet demonstrators marching as part of an alt-right rally on Saturday with dog poop.

Hundreds of dog owners plan to leave San Francisco's Crissy Field, where right-wing protest group Patriot Prayer will gather, covered in feces.

Tuffy Tuffington, a 45-year-old artist and designer, created a Facebook event page titled 'Leave your dog poop on Crissy Field' and, so far, hundreds have indicated their interest, said the Daily Mail.

"I just had this image of alt-right people stomping around in the poop," Tuffington, who said the idea came to him as he was walking his two Patterdale terriers, Bob and Chuck, told The Guardian.

"It seemed like a little bit of civil disobedience where we didn't have to engage with them face to face."

The group is also planning to reconvene on Sunday to "clean up the mess and hug each other", according to Tuffington.

The demonstrations planned for Friday, Saturday and Sunday across the Bay Area raised concern among San Francisco police and elected officials two weeks after right-wing activists, including neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan, fought with anti-racism protesters in the streets of Charlottesville, Virginia.

A woman was killed at that "Unite the Right" rally when a man thought to have neo-Nazi sympathies drove his car into a crowd of counter-protesters. Nineteen other people were injured.

The Saturday event is billed as a "free speech" rally, but critics say the Oregon-based organizer, Patriot Prayer, is a white nationalist group, pointing to plans that may include the far-right Oath Keepers to provide armed security. The group has decried racism and neo-Nazis.

Patriot Prayer founder Joey Gibson said in a video message posted on the group's Facebook page that it was "absolutely not" white supremacist, pointing out that he is a person of color.

"What I'm trying to do is bring people together who believe in freedom, who believe in love, believe in peace and believe in free speech," he said.

Although the presence of Patriot Prayer is bound to cause tension by appearing in notoriously liberal San Francisco, many residents see the event as an opportunity to fight back creatively.

One group created a Facebook event called "Flowers against Fascism" filled with people who intend to greet the protesters with flowers to wear in their hair.

Also prepared to meet the protesters are kayakers, cars, clowns and kids - each using a different tactic to battle what is seen as hate.

"You have a significant number of people who would like to go and punch Nazis, and then you have people who think they should be entirely ignored," veteran labor and LGBTQ rights activist Cleve Jones told The Guardian.

"In between you have all sorts of creative and crazy ideas. I kind of like that."