San Francisco “Doom-Loop Tour” Canceled as Commissioner Identified as Organizer

Since the once-great city of San Francisco apparently wasn’t dystopian enough, a public official from the city had planned to pocket a tidy little profit by hosting a “Doom-Loop Tour” of the worst and darkest San Fran has to offer. And before you ask, no, this isn’t the plot of a Ray Bradbury short story.

Alex Ludlum is a 35-year-old real estate professional and, until recently, the VP of San Fran’s Commission on Community Investment and Infrastructure. He resigned after his email address was linked to the tour through refund notices. Rookie mistake.

Organized by “SF Anonymous Insider,” the event was originally hosted on Eventbrite with tickets going for $30 before being canceled due to an inability “to preserve [the host’s] anonymity].” A description read, “You’ve read the headlines, you’ve seen the Tweets, now get close and personal to the Doom and Squalor of downtown San Francisco” and promised to elucidate on the “policy choices that made America’s wealthiest city the nation’s innovative leader of housing crisis, addiction crisis, mental-health crisis, & unrepentant crime crisis.”

Terrible writing aside, the tour did sound like a potentially effective live satire performance. Which, according to Ludlum, it was supposed to be.

I love satire more than the next person, don’t get me wrong. But when it’s literally YOUR JOB to address the myriad of crises plaguing your city, and instead of rolling up your sleeves and getting to work you devise an exploitative little scheme to make a few bucks, it rings a little hollow.

And it is exploitative– which, in fairness, is kind of the point, but that doesn’t make it any less crappy. Homeless people Persons experiencing homelessness and fentanyl addicts individuals with drug fascinations are not spectacles, they are human beings. Deeply sick human beings in crisis, moreover, who need empathy more than they need a grandstanding politician parading a crowd of voyeurs with cameras through their shantytown. 

Luckily for Ludlum, it appears his dream of shining a spotlight on the worst of San Francisco did come true, as the “anti-doom loop” protest tour led by community activist Del Seymour attracted around 70 people. Seymour’s goal was to show the beauty and positivity within San Fran, but unfortunately our modern-day Gomorrah was a little too. . . doomy and gloomy for the ugly bits to stay at bay. 

The New York Post reports,

“As Seymour took the group [through] the Tenderloin neighborhood, participants passed by rows of tents, many with homeless addicts passed out inside.

“In the corners, men exchanged crumpled up money for balls of foil.

“Some openly smoked fentanyl and other drugs as the tour group walked past them.

“The stench of urine mixed with human and animal feces was at times overwhelming as Seymour quickly walked the group past the notorious corner of Hyde and Turk streets, where drug deals run rampant especially ‘once the sun goes down,’ a local told The Post.”

I feel for Seymour, who seems to really want to help his town. I hope he sees great success. 

But one has to wonder if it’s too late.