...Deadly Dogma...

Within the annals of dogdom, 

certain individuals 

of the human persuasion 

place very high in the column 

marked "Canine Genocide". 

Yes, there at the top of the list 

concerning such mass murder 

lies the infamous name of 

Thomas Alva Edison. 

 

Mister Edison involved 

with the holocaust of

man's best friend? 

You might ask how I know this. 

 

Well, if you paid attention to your dog 

   (as I do mine), 

you'd know that Canis Domesticus

have maintained an oral history 

   since the dawn of dog. 

This must be oral as 

all written history via 

paw-scratch calligraphy 

unfortunately perished 

  when the 

libraries of Alexandria burned.

This    and the fact that 

no Rosetta Stone has ever surfaced 

to explain the strange markings 

   on my back door. 

 

So when my dog talks, I listen, 

and he's personally conveyed to me 

that dogdom had no friend 

   in Thomas Alva Edison. 

 

Now apparently the holocaust of 1890 

began a few years after Edison 

met a certain Nikola Tesla. 

 

Tesla had conceived 

and brought to bear 

the electric principle of 

alternating current or 

as my dog refers to it,    AC. 

 

This was a vast improvement 

over the puny direct current that 

Edison had been using to 

   run his light bulbs. 

 

Yes, Tesla's process was superior, 

and Edison hated him for it. 

It was a blind hatred and 

Edison would go to no end 

proving to the world 

the absolute horrors of 

alternating current. 

 

He began his defamation of Tesla 

   prior to 1890, 

but it is on this date 

that he decided to proceed 

to the final solution. 

It began on the streets of 

West Orange, New Jersey, 

and spread from there

across the nation. 

 

Edison had his men 

pay young boys 

to capture dogs off the street 

and have them brought to him. 

Here he would then take 

these dogs to town halls, 

have them stand 

on large metal floor plates, 

run wires to their ears and switch on 

the dreaded 

alternating current. 

At each consecutive town hall meeting, 

yet another 

     and another dog 

died convulsing 

upon the provided stage.

 

All because Thomas Alva Edison 

so hated Nikola Tesla. 

This and that he, Edison, 

could not and would not admit 

that he was wrong 

and that Tesla was right. 

 

Such is the power of dogmatic belief. 

 

And so, my dog and I sit there 

while an AC powered light bulb 

hums above our heads.

A quiet moment passes between us, 

and finally      

he speaks. 

 

"You know, 

an awful lot of dogs had to die 

just so one man 

could make his point.

    His flawed point. 

And I'd just like to know... 

Do humans have men 

who would send 

other men to their deaths, 

even if they knew that their 

reason for sending them 

    was flawed?" 

 

At this, I take pause, 

reach down and gently

scratch him behind the ear. 

 

"Yes," I say. 

 

"Yes. It happens all the time, 

but as in alternating current, 

we as humans 

 

can always 

 

change direction."  

 

© 05 Jack David Hubbell