I believe jury duty is an awful way to decide justice and it shouldn't exist. Other countries manage without it just fine. In my opinion it's your civic duty to get out of it and not support it.
Demand for being judged by one's peers is Magna Carta level stuff, and it's also in the American constitution, so people clearly cared about it for centuries. You can see why in principle: the judge is a government official, and with your peers you should have more room for maneuver. I don't think that ensuring that judges are impartial and actually apply law is a solved problem at all. That "other countries manage without it just fine" is a big assumption, ignoring possible corruption and any number of pathologies.
I live in a no jury country and I would probably feel a tiny bit safer with a jury of my peers, even being aware that this also has plenty of flaws. (That being said, I do prefer European inquisitorial system of justice over the adversarial one -- the latter is present in Anglophone countries and prefers reaching a decision over establishing the truth of the matter.) Even in Poland, the hamfisted "reform" of justice that is fought over with the EU does have some nuance to it. The government wants to control the judges, which is obviously against any sane separation of powers, but the public perception is that the previous system of judge corporations was also corrupt.
I do think, at the face of it, that all jurors should be made aware about nullification.
Where I'm from there are no jury duties, so this is my opinion on juries from the outside perspective.
But also, even if I did it the way you say - does that....make the reasoning any less powerful in your mind?
For instance, I decided I don't want to smoke long before I was mature enough to formulate an argument why smoking is bad for an individual and for the society and before I could see how the tabbaco industry is spending heavily on getting people to smoke.
Is the fact that I decided I don't want to smoke at the age of 15 making the argument I can finely flesh out decades later less powerful in your opinion? Or are you just using it as a logical instrument to undermine what I'm saying based not on a logical point but rather an emotional one?
Netherland, for example. There's probably no shortage of other examples. From what I understand, most civil law systems do not rely on juries, or to a much lesser extent than common law systems tend to do. But even many common law countries rely a lot less on juries than the US does, and often with better results than the US with its frequently blatantly racist/classist verdicts.
The big problem with juries is that guilt is determined by a random cross section of the population in that area, and if certain prejudices are common in the population in that area, those prejudices will influence the verdict. For example, black people are more likely to be found guilty in racist areas, and white people less so.
Of course judges can also be subject to prejudice, but it's a lot easier to train them out of those prejudices and hold them accountable for them, because it's a much smaller group that requires special training.
The defendant in the US has the choice of a jury trial or a bench trial. It is not a requirement. The latter has no jury, only a judge. If the defendant chooses a jury trial obviously they think that’s going to have a better outcome for them.
If a verdict is “blatantly” classist or racist, there may be more going on than you’ve read about the case. This is pretty common, US journalism is not great and when cases get reported internationally it usually gets even worse.
> Honesly I have no idea how you'd define what is a "better" outcome.
I think less blatant racism or classism in the verdicts would be better. In the US there's no shortage of examples of poor people of colour getting far more severe punishments for crimes for which rich white people get minor punishment or barely a slap on the wrist.
Europe is nowhere near as homogeneous as the USA. People from New York speak the same language (in general) as those from California and subscribe to the same cultural ethos (to a degrees). The difference between France and Lithuania in terms of Language is huge, and similarly so is their cultural heritage.
As far as I know vast majority of countries in Europe don't use a jury system and are doing quite fine. Which was what GP stated, that they are managing quite fine without it. Not that they have better outcomes.
It's a metaphor, I mean that an individual who disagrees with a jury system trying to avoid jury duty does nothing to help dismantle it. In fact, their refusal to participate likely comes with a human cost.
My mother was a court stenographer. She had a job in a small court once in nowhere northern california. They had a few jurors skip out of jury duty. The judge told the bailiff walk outside get 2 random people. Sure enough, there was a chef wearing a uniform and some construction worker. BAM. The court is ready.
That's only true in some cases. What about when it's a frivolous civil liability suit, e.g. a slip and fall case. Is there a moral duty to participate in that?
The court for me is 40 minutes away. They make you park in a parking lot down town that isn't safe and you have to walk or take some shuttle to the courthouse. Can't take my gun with me for obvious reasons. Spend my gas getting there. Then if the parking lot gets full I have to pay for parking as well. All for me to be sent home because I know what jury nullification is, don't believe prostitution is a crime, or minor drug charges. But yeah, tell me more to suck it up.
You get compensated for your jury duty - not well compensated, but enough to cover gas for sure. The rest of your whining is likely just as factually false - get over yourself.
What do I gain from lying? I get paid $6 for each day of jury duty. It's 50 miles round trip per day. Depending on traffic that does not cover my gas. Your comment adds nothing to this discussion.
