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Prejudice In Reginald Rose's 12 Angry Men

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Reginald Rose’s ‘12 Angry Men’ is a play set in New York that focuses on prejudice and the injustice of the American jury system. The idea that “truth can be concealed by prejudice” is encapsulated by the biases of jurors 10 and 4, however, this notion is not the only way truth is concealed, as shown by both jurors 3 and 7. Rose undoubtedly emphasises the idea of prejudice concealing the truth through Juror 10. Throughout the deliberation process, he vehemently expresses his prejudiced beliefs against the defendant because he is “one of them”, encapsulating his entrenched racism as he dehumanises the defendant because of his background. He states that since they are “born liars” and inherently “violent”, he must be guilty. This highlights …show more content…

When he recounts his prior experiences, readers discover his deep-rooted resentment for his son. He states that “the way they talk” is disrespectful, signifying that he believes that kids must be troubled nowadays. This assumption influences the way he votes, as due to his past experiences, he finds all kids “rotten”. He can “feel that knife goin’ in”, displaying that he feels betrayed by his own son. This idea is also exemplified by the defendant being the same age as his son when he ran away, emphasising that juror 3 personally wants to see him die because he sees him as his own son; and when he finally votes not guilty, it is because he realises that “its not [his] boy”. Another way personal experiences are used in the voting process is seen by Juror 11. Although not to the extent of the 3rd juror, he “understands” juror 5’s “sensitivity”, because he has also been discriminated against because of his German background, implying that he can not only empathise with the 5th juror, but also the defendant, which is a reason why he votes ‘not guilty’ earlier. Both of these past experiences shape the jurors in different ways – both positive and negative – which can shift their stances, and change the

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Block 4 Prejudice is a big problem in today’s juries, as it can put an innocent person in jail, or worse. Twelve angry men by Reginald Rose is a great example of what can happen if jurors' minds are poisoned by prejudice and bias. The book is centered around Juror 8 who has the big job of showing a prejudiced jury that a kid who was alleged to have committed premeditated homicide was innocent. Reginald Rose uses the 3rd juror to develop the ideas of prejudice on juries by showing how personal experience can help feed into prejudice heavily, and how.

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He displays the tendency of an introverted Pragmatist with the Thinker preferences. Therefore, it takes him very long and requires several opinions laid out by other Jurors to change his mind from ‘guilty’ to ‘not guilty’. At the same time, he was firm and unafraid to stand up for himself once he changed his vote. He is sympathetic towards the boy as he grew up in the slum himself which caused him to disagree with Juror 3 numerous time. Therefore, his own upbringing in the slum makes him more knowledgeable about how the boy could have handled the switchblades and also the traits of living in the slum in

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In addition, Juror Ten shows prejudice when he claims that all people from slum backgrounds “get drunk” to the point where they don’t care if there is “someone lyin in the gutter”(59). While Juror Ten is ranting about people from slum backgrounds, the rest of the jury leaves the table as they cannot handle the discriminatory behavior anymore. This further disrupts the discourse of the jury as all of the jurors become angry due to the fact that prejudiced ideas are being brought up. People becoming livid due to one’s discriminatory behavior can occur in today’s society, as there are many events such as bullying or racial profiling that occur often. Furthermore, Juror Ten’s previous interactions with people from slums create his bigoted idea that no matter what new evidence is shown “you know what you're dealing with”(12).

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By the end of the play, they came to an anonymous decision that the boy was acquitted. In this play, Juror 10’s influence impacted the vote becoming unanimous in favor of not guilty because he was prejudiced as well as hypocritical. In this dramatic play, Juror 10 has been prejudged and hypocritical to impact the vote in favor of not guilty. By

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Juror Five is a white man, also born in the slums, but no one assumes that he is a criminal because he is white. Through the statements of Juror Four, his partiality is shown towards people of lower socioeconomic status. His prejudice, based on the race and social status of the defendant, is something not taught, but intrinsic in his psyche. Through this characterization, Twelve Angry Men reveals the origins the

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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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10th Juror represents those who are prejudiced against people from differing cultural and socio-economic backgrounds. This prejudice reaches its peak during his fear against these people. To him, this trial is a chance to get rid of one of them by finding the accused ‘guilty’, even at the expense of a fair trail. Like the other defendant, the 5th Juror and other Juror are recognized for they childhood

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Juror 8 is a natural leader, and one by one he persuades the other jurors to accept his arguments through persistence, supposing the evidence and suggesting that there are possible explanations to the witness stories and evidence given for the murder case. Rose uses Juror 8 to exemplify that there are many who take the aspects of justice seriously and can decide on fair verdicts. He says that he cannot “send a boy off to die without talking about it first”, demonstrating the ethical qualities that some of humanity possesses. He is also able to assert the views of intolerance and also comprehends that “prejudice obscures the truth”.

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4th juror has the strong opinion that where a person comes from is directly correlated to their character. He states, “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 reasons why slums are breeding grounds for criminals” Juror 4 believes because the defendant grew up in the slums, he is guilty of the crimes in which he is charged. Just like in our society today, many like Juror 4, believe that people who live in the inner cities are automatically gang members who commit crimes.

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Judgment of character isn’t always black and white. Those on trial for their alleged crimes rely on a jury chosen of their peers to decide their fate. The life of a juror and the events that they have gone through to get to that specific point in their life alters their standpoint in any situation. A jury could be made up of a combination of people with different economic backgrounds, races, or ages. In ‘Twelve Angry Men’ by Reginald Rose, two jurors have drastically different fundamental beliefs.

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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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One of the most critical part of the movie was how the personalities and experiences of these men influenced their majority vote of guilty. Juror number three, juror number ten, and juror number eleven, were three of the most influential men during the debate. Their past experiences and personal bias lead their opinions and thoughts to have an affect on their decisions through out their aguments. Therefore, this shows how a person feelings are reflected in his/hers thoughts, behavior, and opinion.

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On the other hand, Juror 11, despite being an “immigrant”, has full faith in the American Judicial System and allows himself to take decisions logically rather than emotionally. He explains other jurors that they have no “right to play with the boy’s life”. Juror 4 passionately tries to influence the jury into “[talking] facts” whereas he himself is obscured by the truth that he himself is giving opinions. Rose conveys to the audience that people who take decisions based on emotion are not always accurate.

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With selfish attitudes like this, it was unlikely that Juror 10 would be interested in the truth behind the evidence and the case itself. Hence, his racial prejudice was important in determining his vote. He believes the boy is guilty, not because the facts point to it, but because of the boy’s ethnicity. It is clear that Rose has constructed Juror 10 as a means of identifying that prejudice,

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The movie “Twelve Angry Men” illustrates lots of social psychology theories. This stretched and attractive film, characterize a group of jurors who have to decide the innocence or guiltiness of an accused murder. They are simply deliberating the destiny of a Puerto Rican teenaged boy accused of murdering his father. Initially, as the film begins, except the juror Davis (Henry Fonda), all other jurors vote guilty. Progressively, the jurors begin trying to compromise on a point that everybody agree because the decision of the jury has to be unanimous.

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