The Birthday Party
By Eleftherios Chelioudakis
A nervous young student in a foreign city
Was looking for ways to make his birthday pretty;
But drones in the skies above his head
Decreed as suspicious his shaky tread,
His skin’s too dark, his clothes are too old,
The algorithms race to determine his mold.
They shout to the boy – STOP RIGHT THERE!
They run his face through their classy software,
They ponder and predict his risk-assessment score;
It’s the highest, they muse, it’s a four out of four!
“The system tells us you’re a troublemaker,
You are a drug dealer, a potential house-breaker;
You’ve served four years in the Gates lock-up.
What? No. Not possible for our system to mess-up.”
“But it’s just not true”, the young boy protested,
Suddenly terrified he was being arrested,
“Please scan my face just one more time,
I have never been in any prison for any kind of crime.”
“REQUEST DENIED” the policemen said,
“Please place your hands behind your head!
Our system is perfect its A-L-W-A-Y-S correct!”
And thus, on his birthday, his dreams were wrecked.
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