The German army marched across the land
Hitler's men designed a code machine
Enigma gave the Reich the upper hand
Invasion led by messages unseen
Machine defeats machine, history tells
Invention of a British scientist
Turing's child rang Germany's death knell
Achieved by mild computer analyst
The courts declared his lifestyle was a crime
Ignorance was rife back in the day
Once hero, now he lives on borrowed time
No mercy shown to anyone who's gay
Genius of math and logic, gentle man
Assassinated by our ignorance
May we not travel down that road again
Enlightened thinking must become our stance.
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Author Notes
Alan Turing is known as a computer science pioneer, leader in artificial intelligence research, mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst and theoretical biologist.
His work on decrypting German ciphers has been estimated to have shortened the war in Europe by between two and four years.
In 1952 Turing was prosecuted for the criminal act of homosexuality, and chose compulsory chemical castration in preference to prison. He died by his own hand in 1954, sixteen days before his 42nd birthday, from cyanide poisoning.
In 2009, the British Prime Minister made an official public apology for the "appalling way he was treated". Queen Elizabeth II granted him a posthumous pardon in 2013.
The 2014 film "The Imitation Game" won a bucket full of international accolades. It was nominated for eight Academy Awards, but won only one minor award - Best Writing, Adapted Screenplay. The Imitation Game grossed $227M worldwide, compared to the Best Picture winner Birdman (seriously?), which won four awards in that year, and grossed $103M. It seems that in death, as in life, Turing suffers injustice.
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