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12 Angry Men Jury Duty Essay

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Jury duty is often seen as an option people are seeking to avoid at times. However, jury duty should not be seen as a negative, but rather jury duty should be seen as a chance for a civilian to do their part in contributing to justice. Twelve Angry Men is mainly about twelve men coming together to discuss and argue whether a young man should be put on the death penalty, the play continuously makes it a point to make the jurors have a hard time deciding a final verdict. Jurors argued their side of what occurred with the defendant and the victim, some would change their answers or few would make a point of trying to convince the other jurors why the defendant is guilty. As the act progresses, the jurors finally realize one important detail of …show more content…

In particular, jurors engage in rhetoric to gain other jurors’ attention. As an example, “This boy- let's say he's a product of a filthy neighborhood and a broken home. We can't help that. We're not here to go into the reasons why slums are breeding grounds for criminals; they are. I know it. So do you. The children who come out of slum backgrounds are potential menaces to society.” (Sergel 22). Not to mention most of the jurors take one piece of information about the defendant to piece out why the boy is guilty, they argue that because he is from a poor background that he is automatically a menace. For this reason, jurors like this have control over how they can change others' …show more content…

Jurors do this by challenging prejudices, this is how they articulate what to say next. Specifically, “I don't mind telling you this, mister. We don't owe the kid a thing. He got a fair trial, didn't he? Do you know what that trial costs? He's lucky he got it. Look, we're all grown-ups here. You're not going to tell us that we're supposed to believe him, knowing what he is. I've lived among 'em all my life. You can't believe a word they say. You know that.” (Sergel 17). In the same way, this juror heavily believes his interpretation of what the kid is like, a criminal, he stereotypes the boy due to his own experiences. As a juror, people are allowed to point out what you may believe are some factors that need to be considered, which is why this can be a reason to consider jury

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In Reginald Rose’s play Twelve Angry Men, the story dives into a jury in a conflict of choosing the verdict of a murder trial. The jury is in a hot room fueled by heated arguments and discussions on whether the young man is guilty or innocent. At the beginning of the decision process, the majority had decided that the boy was guilty of murder, but Juror #8 contested otherwise. Throughout the play, Juror #8 maintains his conformist views that altered the outcome of the court case. Furthermore, the argument set by how jurors decided the final verdict is shown in Twelve Angry Men by how they are challenged through the idea of conformity and nonconformity.

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Since he is unable to look into the facts and is in denial when they are presented, he does not closely analyse the details because deep down, he wants the boy to die, guilty or not. Had Juror 8 voted guilty, the boy would have died, whether he committed the crime or not. If the accused was innocent, they would have sent an innocent man to die without even taking the time to dig deeper to uncover the truth, to which justice would not have been served. Additionally, prejudice and stereotyping creates a fear within those subjected to them. They start to think negatively and feel ashamed over something they have no control over.

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In the play Twelve Angry Men by Reginald Rose, we can see that prejudice gets in the way of truth. Many of the jurors that participated have let prejudice get in their way to see the truth and look at the real situation and facts, for example, Juror Three, who “is a very strong, very forceful, extremely opinionated man within whom can be detected a streak of sadism… is intolerant of opinions other than his own, and accustomed to forcing his wishes upon others.” He has a son that he identifies as a “tough guy”, which is one of the descriptions of the 19-year-old accused, Juror Three let the image of his own son be reflected on the boy and made him think unfairly. Getting to the bottom of a complex issue takes time and effort. At the beginning of the play, most jury members wanted to get over the case and go home as early as they could, but one of the jury members, Juror Eight, who was sure the boy was not guilty, took many hours to question the evidence and the case and murder itself, but he was not the only one as other jury members also spoke about what they thought in the past options, fairly quick, it was almost six in the evening and Juror Six wanted to leave to go to his family, it may have been more of an excuse to leave, but the jurors did not let him leave because they had gone far enough to decide where the trial was going

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Maybe it serves 'em right." Juror 12 holds the opinion that an individual's childhood affects whether or not they develop criminal behaviours. However, regardless of the environment they were raised in, anyone could become a criminal. Juror 4's statement that "...the children who come out of slums are potential menaces to society," is another example of this. Here, he displays that he has a negative opinion of kids from underprivileged backgrounds.

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This process continues throughout the course of the movie, and each juror’s biases is slowly revealed. Earlier through the movie, it is already justifiable to label juror 10 as a bigoted racist as he reveals strong racist tendencies against the defendant, stating his only reason for voting guilty is the boy’s ethnicity and background. . Another interesting aspect of this 1957 film is the “reverse prejudice” portrayed by juror

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