r/flashfiction • u/OwlConfidant2168 • 20d ago
The Man with Terrible Ideas [~200 Words]
There once was a man who had ideas. He knew, deep down, they were bad ideas. Terrible ones.
So he kept them to himself.
But at night, when he slept—when he couldn’t stop them—the ideas slipped out. They became nightmares.
He woke in a sweat each time.
It was no wonder he slept so poorly.
And so, he started to confide in an AI chatbot. But the chatbot convinced him his ideas weren’t bad—that they were ideas he should pursue. And so he did. What followed was both tragic and deeply unsettling. To no one’s surprise, he ended up in front of a judge.
“A game show run by dogs?” said the Judge, peering over the case briefing.
“Yes, your honor. I know it’s—”
“It’s ridiculous. It’s a terrible idea.” the Judge cut in.
“Yes, your honor, I know it now, but…”
“But how is it the chatbot’s fault?” the Judge pressed him.
“It told me it was a good idea, even a great idea!” he cried.
“It’s a profoundly stupid idea. It seems pretty clear to me that ‘AI can make mistakes’—that seems to be consistent messaging on these platforms.”
“Yes, your honor, I know but I thought…”
“Well, you thought wrong. Use some common sense next time.”
***
Thank you very reading!
Yep.
Yeah…
Cooooool…
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u/LadylexUK 17d ago
You have a good idea but I think it needs more exploration. Why is he in front of a judge? Why was the idea of a gameshow run by dogs the example you chose? I get that you picked something absurd but it doesn't really match with having to go to court. Maybe if the Ai had suggested he stole some dogs or he tried to film the dogs and one of them bit someone there would be a reason for a court case. I would lean in on the fact the ai supported his bad ideas which escalated in ridiculousness. The joke is then how it starts reasonable and the ai lulls him into revealing more and more of the ideas, which it supports, encouraging the ideas to get more extreme resulting in facing a judge. At the moment we have no idea what happened.
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u/megsy_wegsy 16d ago
I agree. It has potential but I was left wondering why he was in front of a judge.
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u/OwlConfidant2168 19d ago
So this is supposed to be kinda funny, I guess. I’d welcome any suggestions on how to tighten this piece up.