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Last Podcast On The Left

Episode 654: Topsy the Elephant

27 Feb 2026

Transcription

Chapter 1: What is the story of Topsy the Elephant?

1.465 - 11.172 Ben Kissel

There's no place to escape to. This is the last podcast. On the left. That's when the cannibalism started.

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21.445 - 24.75 Unknown

I don't care if I run into Alec Murdoch.

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24.77 - 29.496 Marcus Parks

No, no, no. Because if you have, if you do, that means you've committed murder in South Carolina.

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29.597 - 31.359 Unknown

Hey, hopefully. Or you're visiting.

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33.682 - 37.167 Henry Zebrowski

Thanks for the content. If you're in town. Are you guys ready?

37.688 - 43.977 Unknown

Ready. So should I not do any of my Crow or Raven characters in this?

43.957 - 67.618 Henry Zebrowski

no no no no well maybe if you change the voice a little bit maybe if you use the hong kong henry zaprowski voice oh then that's fine they'll all cancel each other out sure yeah yeah okay if you use one racist voice to replace another racist voice maybe it can work out 60 yeah

67.598 - 68.94 Marcus Parks

At 60, yeah.

68.96 - 76.472 Henry Zebrowski

And we are focusing more on Asian elephants than African elephants today.

Chapter 2: What were the circumstances of Topsy's death?

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268.343 - 271.749 Henry Zebrowski

Absolutely not. And there's nothing corrupt in it. Nope.

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271.769 - 272.83 Marcus Parks

Nothing at all.

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272.85 - 292.502 Henry Zebrowski

Today, I didn't use a particular book or documentary as a source. I just researched to the best of my ability about stories that intrigued me and found some even crazier ones along the way. So let's get this pack of thermos stomping in true Marcus Parks fashion with a little context.

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292.522 - 292.623 Ben Kissel

Yeah!

292.643 - 295.347 Henry Zebrowski

Elephant context. Elephant context.

295.327 - 300.773 Ed Larson

That's right, man. It's big. Yep. Slide right in. Very similar to a human vagina.

300.833 - 328.554 Henry Zebrowski

You can put your whole head in there. Elephants can be found naturally in Asia and Africa. Africa has two types of elephants, bush and forest elephants, which can get as large as 13,000 pounds. In Africa, elephants are the third most deadly mammal after humans and hippos. Hmm. In Africa, elephants kill about 500 people annually. Cool. But today we're going to focus on Asian elephants.

328.875 - 354.676 Henry Zebrowski

At about 8,000 pounds, Asian elephants are smaller than their African counterparts, but they are the elephants we're more familiar with as far as circus performers go. Yeah. Even though they could be 5,000 pounds smaller than African bush elephants, they are still extremely deadly. To help put their sheer size in perspective, a Honda CR-V weighs roughly 3,500 pounds.

Chapter 3: How did Topsy become a notorious elephant?

456.102 - 461.812 Henry Zebrowski

There's nothing racist about this. I'm not a scientist. I'm just obsessed with huge living creatures killing humans.

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461.832 - 466.279 Marcus Parks

Yeah. And that makes you woke, I think. Yeah. I think so.

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466.48 - 473.852 Unknown

I think it does. Disgusting. I at least told you there's a difference between the Asian and the African ones. Oh, we know.

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475.501 - 496.783 Henry Zebrowski

Obviously, we know that humans have been killing, kidnapping and torturing all animals and especially elephants ever since we figured out how to do so. When it comes to killing elephants for their ivory, that is much more popular in Africa than it is in Asia. And in a positive spin, those numbers are going way down. But they are extremely high still.

496.763 - 508.28 Marcus Parks

How does it, like, in the, like, let's say the cutting off gorilla paws for, you know, to make medicine and such, where are elephant tusks on that scale? It's much worse. Much worse.

508.441 - 529.616 Henry Zebrowski

It's much, much worse. It's a horrible thing. You know, the exact number seems... To be impossible to find. Sure. Current estimates suggest that up to 15,000 elephants are killed for their tusks and skin in Africa every year, or 41 a day. Dang. In peak poaching years, that number was expected to be around 40,000.

529.636 - 535.466 Marcus Parks

And that's when we were making like every piano was made with elephant tusks.

535.486 - 538.311 Henry Zebrowski

Honestly, back then it was probably worse than that.

Chapter 4: What role did public perception play in Topsy's execution?

795.553 - 796.194 Henry Zebrowski

Wonder why.

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796.234 - 796.855 Ben Kissel

Yay, Stephen.

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799.13 - 816.38 Henry Zebrowski

Eventually, a hunting party was sent out to kill Osama bin Laden, and he was shot down by a team of men, but many believe that they killed the wrong elephant, and bin Laden is still at large. Where's the fucking body? Yeah. Where's the fucking body? Probably in the Indian Ocean.

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816.521 - 823.483 Marcus Parks

Yeah. Did they dump this elephant in the ocean, too, without letting anyone look at it? I think they just left it in the field, probably. I imagine.

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823.884 - 828.67 Henry Zebrowski

Rodded. It's interesting. A lot of these elephant news stories, not much detail.

829.391 - 830.693 Unknown

Yeah, they just kind of let it go.

830.713 - 834.257 Henry Zebrowski

I think a couple things got lost in translation over multiple oceans.

834.277 - 841.607 Marcus Parks

I get it, yeah. It's not like there's a New York Times elephant reporter who's really on the elephant beat. That's my fucking job. Yeah, it's true.

841.587 - 867.686 Henry Zebrowski

Now, Osama bin Laden, or just Laden, is often a name given to murderous rogue elephants. The most recent rogue bin Laden is still on the loose as of January 18th, 2026. This rogue elephant killed 22 people in 10 days. He is believed to be currently in Moth. He Moth be. As well as being rogue and only has one tusk. Whoa, like Hitler.

Chapter 5: What were the methods used in Topsy's execution?

1065.288 - 1065.709 Henry Zebrowski

You never know.

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1066.25 - 1074.85 Marcus Parks

Sometimes you do. The cure. We can say that there was no sexual attraction between the elephant and Miss Mermu.

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1074.87 - 1077.836 Unknown

There's nothing sexual about being fascinated with the sheen of pantyhose.

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1078.899 - 1103.915 Henry Zebrowski

You love pantyhose. No, I just love its containings. Now, apparently in history, every time an Asian elephant killed someone, it was not the elephant's own lust for murder. But until the early 20th century, some South Asian cultures used elephants as a form of execution. I didn't know about any of this shit. I actually didn't know about this either.

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1103.955 - 1106.319 Marcus Parks

And I'm a bit of a student of execution.

1106.58 - 1106.68

Yeah.

1106.66 - 1128.529 Henry Zebrowski

This was not really seen often in Africa except around 240 BC in Carthage, but that's the story for another trunk. Execution by elephant seemed to be a tactic primarily seen in Burma, India, Thailand, and Sri Lanka. Each were similar in the basic fact that elephant big, human small, elephant cross human.

1128.749 - 1129.41 Ben Kissel

It does! It does!

1131.905 - 1139.515 Henry Zebrowski

But let's not discredit all of them. Each had their own methods of torture and execution by way of elephant. Cool. Do you want to hear them?

Chapter 6: How did Topsy's story reflect the treatment of circus animals?

1398.754 - 1421.067 Henry Zebrowski

Like fucking dino wars. Dude, it's fucking crazy. crazy and terrifying and i love it yeah it's awesome i just wonder what it's like to try if they don't want to go no more that's the problem the thing is the elephants because they were like get rewarded they liked it of course from all reports it seemed like the elephants were having fun oh i bet I bet.

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1421.087 - 1442.192 Henry Zebrowski

When someone was tossed to the elephant garden, there would be a trainer riding the elephant and command the elephant to kill the wretch. And the elephant would then pick the person up with their trunk, throw them in the air, and impale them on their tusks when they came down. The elephant would then cut the victim into pieces, throwing their limbs into the crowd watching. There was a splash zone?

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1442.212 - 1444.835 Ben Kissel

Yes.

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1444.855 - 1450.682 Henry Zebrowski

It is legend that sometimes Emperor Jonganir would... It doesn't matter.

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1450.702 - 1451.883 Ben Kissel

It doesn't fucking matter.

1451.904 - 1469.145 Henry Zebrowski

He would order the elephant to skin people alive. His staff would then stuff them with hay and feed them to dogs. So that's nice. For everyone but the dog. Yeah, because he's got all that hay in his mouth. Yeah, the dog thinks it's going to be eating a dude and he just gets hay. I get some outside skin and then the hay is good for fiber.

1469.265 - 1478.782 Henry Zebrowski

I didn't understand why you would stuff them with hay and then the dogs would eat them. Yeah. It didn't make much sense to me. I think, again... We're just talking about fun. Yeah.

1478.802 - 1488.483 Unknown

We're just talking about why do people do anything? Yeah. You know what I mean? Why does Bob Dylan do the fun thing where he used to put a cigarette in the frets of his guitar? It's fun to do. It looks cool.

1488.623 - 1492.647 Marcus Parks

It does look cool. I also don't know if the elephants knew how to skin a man alive.

Chapter 7: What other infamous elephant stories are mentioned?

1667.624 - 1690.74 Henry Zebrowski

Yeah. There is the story of a slave that killed his master and was sentenced to death by elephant. They laid him on the ground and tied three ropes to his legs and arm. And then those ropes were tied to a ring on the elephant's hind leg. He then walked across a 500 yard field over the course of an hour. Every couple of steps the elephant took, it would dislocate his limbs from hip or shoulder.

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1691.04 - 1722.529 Henry Zebrowski

His elbows and his knees came out of socket while he was very much awake for the entire process. By the end of the march, the man was covered head to toe in mud and was screaming in unspeakable pain. Well, that's not unspeakable pain. I'm the true mind of a sultan. Yes, he was screaming in pain. Because he was saying the word, ow, very loudly.

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1722.549 - 1724.091 Unknown

Let's think about this for a second.

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1724.512 - 1738.45 Henry Zebrowski

Ow. But he was then put out of his misery when the elephant was instructed to step on his head until it was soup. Eventually, in the late 19th century, this form of execution ended in India and Sri Lanka, only when the British found it to be too cruel.

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1739.011 - 1748.644 Marcus Parks

Yeah, when the British were telling you to calm down. In this time period, in the late 19th century, yeah, you're... You're going pretty far. You're going very, very far.

1749.065 - 1770.06 Unknown

Well, I believe perhaps that elephants are a bit far. My question is, aren't elephants cute? I don't think there's such a thing as wonderful, cool animals. And also, you can just shoot him. Shoot him in the head. It's actually quite fun.

1770.08 - 1770.441

No fuss.

1771.282 - 1773.225 Unknown

I do like how you make them slaves.

1776.511 - 1777.913 Ben Kissel

That's quite enjoyable for me.

Chapter 8: What lessons can we learn from Topsy's tragic tale?

1894.966 - 1899.631 Unknown

Let me see what it says. Let me see what it says here. It says not interested.

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1900.452 - 1924.864 Henry Zebrowski

Well, he started using the elephants himself, and eventually they became sort of like a mascot of his. You can watch that shitty Oliver Stone movie. They're in there. I'm pretty sure they were the producers. The war elephant concept started evolving especially after the invention of gunpowder. Eventually, they started covering them in armor and placed archers and musketeers on top of them.

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1925.244 - 1946.892 Henry Zebrowski

But once muskets evolved into cannons, bombs, and machine guns, elephants were in great use in battle, big targets and such. But they never stopped being used in an auxiliary role, pulling heavy equipment, building bridges, launching ships, and even in World War II were used to perform tasks in regions where... That were problematic for motor vehicles. They couldn't get in there.

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1946.912 - 1948.918 Henry Zebrowski

So they'd have an elephant get in there and pull something out.

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1949.319 - 1953.49 Unknown

Those elephants had no idea they were working for the goddamn Nazis, man.

1953.59 - 1958.322 Henry Zebrowski

I think they're on our side. Are they both? I'm pretty sure the elephants were ours. You think Rommel didn't do anything with elephants?

1958.603 - 1976.033 Marcus Parks

I don't think the Germans ever did anything with elephants. They'd be scared of them, I imagine. I would imagine if there was something like the elephants, I would imagine that would probably have been an Indian thing from India, which, of course, India at the time was a British colony, and the British were allies. I would imagine anything elephant-wise was us.

1976.133 - 1979.458 Marcus Parks

Actually, the allies were pretty good about it. We had Wojciech the bear.

1979.498 - 1987.791 Henry Zebrowski

The Polish had the bear. We used a lot of animals. That's fucking awesome. The Italians used fish. Useless. I can't believe this.

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