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CockneyRebel
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09 Apr 2010, 1:10 pm

I don't think that I'd be able to handle jury duty.


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earthmom
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09 Apr 2010, 1:17 pm

Your impression of the process is very much like a fairy tale.

Sounds good but it's not reality.


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justMax
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09 Apr 2010, 3:37 pm

visagrunt wrote:
This is a facile argument which is anything but realistic. I am not suggesting that the trial by jury system is a perfect model--far from it. But it is a superior system to the alternatives. The presence of juries as triers of fact introduces an element of unbiased, common-sense decision making. I can understand your reticence about the court system--if you have a better idea, then share it. Otherwise, recognize it for the flawed, but necessary institution that it is.


I defer to the wisdom of Rothbard, Spooner, Tucker, and others here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarcho-capitalism

That is the only logical society I can imagine, based on the clearest, most inalienable rights of all people.

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Libertarians are committed to the belief that individuals, and not states or groups of any other kind, are both ontologically and normatively primary; that individuals have rights against certain kinds of forcible interference on the part of others; that liberty, understood as non-interference, is the only thing that can be legitimately demanded of others as a matter of legal or political right; that robust property rights and the economic liberty that follows from their consistent recognition are of central importance in respecting individual liberty; that social order is not at odds with but develops out of individual liberty; that the only proper use of coercion is defensive or to rectify an error; that governments are bound by essentially the same moral principles as individuals; and that most existing and historical governments have acted improperly insofar as they have utilized coercion for plunder, aggression, redistribution, and other purposes beyond the protection of individual liberty.


If a trial is based on laws which are seeking to make whole or right a wrong, then it is valid. If I am not a part of the transgression, then requiring my involvement in the solution when there are people paid to perform these services, and those who have direct knowledge of the situation, is silly.

Just what struck me as being logical, apparently many others felt this way through history, maybe they were on to something?

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This is not a case of me, or any individual, claiming an ethical or moral right to pass judgement, but rather twelve ordinary, reasonable people playing the part that the law has created for them as decision makers in a process. It is a decision making framework that sits atop an adversarial process. It has served well for over 8 centuries, and will continue to do so until someone conceives of a better way.


I would disagree with your claim of "served well", as that is only true in absence of a more valid arrangement of laws.

That a part functioned admirably in a horribly broken machine does not mean the part is ideal.

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I see this as no different than voting, or paying taxes. In Canada, the first-past-the-post voting system and rigid partisanship has unbalanced the House of Commons. But I still vote. Government makes spending decisions with which I do not agree. But I still pay my taxes. Juries sometimes get it wrong, but I would serve on a jury if summoned. (I am presently immune from summons due to my professions, though).


This is why it is hard to get alternatives running, and the fact that these alternatives do not benefit those who are currently in power makes it even less likely.

Nonetheless, I do not accept a bad scientific hypothesis just because it has been accepted by others, I consider it on it's own merits. I do not take the reviews of a product as absolute statements of truth, not until I have learned the truth of the product myself.

I do not accept that an arbitrary entity claiming it has rights above those of the individual is valid, though it has been accepted by others, if I can not see where it is valid myself.

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It appears to me that your claim that you cannot honestly perform this function is itself dishonest. It appears to me that you have all of the cognitive ability to listen to evidence, separate that which is credible from that which is not, and answer the question of whose story you believe.


It is not my right to pass judgment like that over someone who has not wronged me, or asked me directly to consider their case. Even then it is not my right to make a lawfully binding decision like that for another. I can not honestly do this.



earthmom
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09 Apr 2010, 4:22 pm

Excellent post, justMax

And when you add in how tainted the system is, how filtered the information, it's impossible to be impartial or logical. It's actually impossible to do the task.

They may as well give each of the 12 people a dart and ask us to throw it at a board and then count how many hit "guilty" and how many hit "not guilty". I bet the statistics would be the same as the verdicts after entire court trials. And would save the courts untold amounts of time and tax payer money.


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visagrunt
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09 Apr 2010, 6:02 pm

justMax wrote:
I defer to the wisdom of Rothbard, Spooner, Tucker, and others here.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarcho-capitalism

That is the only logical society I can imagine, based on the clearest, most inalienable rights of all people.


Well, a deconstruction of Anarcho-capitalism is beyond the scope of this discussion. I will limit myself to saying that you would have to marshall a very compelling argument to suggest to me that an Anarcho-Capitalist society would not quickly descend into warlordism.

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If a trial is based on laws which are seeking to make whole or right a wrong, then it is valid. If I am not a part of the transgression, then requiring my involvement in the solution when there are people paid to perform these services, and those who have direct knowledge of the situation, is silly.

Just what struck me as being logical, apparently many others felt this way through history, maybe they were on to something?


Part of the problem I have with your view is that those who are, "paid to perform these services," are, at some level, beholden to the State for which they perform these services. Juries existed primarily as an exercise of placing Royal authority in the hands of people who did not owe their position to Royal patronage. As such, they were a unique creature of English Common Law, and represented a significant limitation on Royal authority. In that vein, I am perfectly content with a legal system in which jury nullification is superior to the inherent jurisdiction of the Court.

I, for one, take comfort that the State may not exercise its coercive authority to punish an offender unless it can persuade twelve disinterested people that the exercise of that authority is justified. It is precisely the jurors lack of direct knowledge that makes them admirably suited to the task.

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I would disagree with your claim of "served well", as that is only true in absence of a more valid arrangement of laws.

That a part functioned admirably in a horribly broken machine does not mean the part is ideal.


The first part is certainly granted--so I will confine myself to say that the system of trial by jury has, "served." But equally, I do not believe that you can demonstrate a justification for describing the machine as, "horribly broken." Anecdotally, there is certainly scope to identify errors. But individual examples do not suffice to demonstrate a systemic dysfunction. In my view, where Courts go seriously off the rails in criminal matters is when juries are dispensed with and judges become both triers of fact and triers of law. It is the factory-style legal decision making of inferior courts that I see as the greater weakness.

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This is why it is hard to get alternatives running, and the fact that these alternatives do not benefit those who are currently in power makes it even less likely.

Nonetheless, I do not accept a bad scientific hypothesis just because it has been accepted by others, I consider it on it's own merits. I do not take the reviews of a product as absolute statements of truth, not until I have learned the truth of the product myself.

I do not accept that an arbitrary entity claiming it has rights above those of the individual is valid, though it has been accepted by others, if I can not see where it is valid myself.


Also granted--entrenchment is a significant weapon in the establishment arsenal.

But we come back to a fundamental question (on which I suspect we are still some considerable distance apart), which is, is there a need within a society for an established system of dispute resolution? To me it is axiomatic that some people will, from time to time, infringe upon the rights of others. A person whose rights have been so infringed ought properly be entitled to redress of that infringement. What appeals to me in a positivist, liberal system of rule-of-law is that there is a framework of known rules that can be applied by a disinterested party to arrive at a resolution of the dispute, in a forum in which each party is free to participate. Further, the capacity of the framework to bind the State is an important element of maintaining a free and democratic society.

Now, you may take a different view, but if we need a dispute resolution system, then I suggest we are far better employed making the Courts that we have as fair and objective as we can, than we would be by rubbishing them without putting something demonstrably better in their place.

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It is not my right to pass judgment like that over someone who has not wronged me, or asked me directly to consider their case. Even then it is not my right to make a lawfully binding decision like that for another. I can not honestly do this.


Actually, when empanelled on a jury, that is precisely your right. Rights are legal authorities conferred from sovereign authority--there are no "rights" that exist in natural law. Your right to property, your right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment, and the juror's right to judge all derive from precisely the same source. The US legal theory is that sovereign authority rests with the people, who have codified a framework within a constitution, in which the right to trial by jury is established. There is a clear chain of delegation from people to constitution to court.

(Assuming, of course, that you subscribe to the view that the Constitution represents a valid transfer of sovereignty from the people to the organs of the State--also a discussion for another forum!).


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earthmom
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09 Apr 2010, 6:13 pm

Oh man - don't tell me you're one of the Sovereign Citizen Movement whackos?

http://www.adl.org/Learn/ext_us/SCM.asp ... 4&item=sov


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justMax
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10 Apr 2010, 1:22 am

If you mean me, then no, I am most definitely not. I am an anarchist, apparently I am roughly an anarcho-capitalist, though I reached these conclusions before I learned what it was.

The constitution would be valid if all citizens had agreed to it, instead the prior agreement is assumed to hold in perpetuity, and in fact is forced upon many who were merely born in a region that it claims to hold power over.


Warlordism would occur if you couldn't generate private defense agencies, as we can already make them, security agencies exist now, the process of turning all law enforcement over to private businesses is not out of the realm of possibility.


A right is something you only have in theory, until you are pressed to defend it. I have the right to wear a funny hat and recite the alphabet backwards in the shower, so long as no one questions it.

The only rights which must be bestowed upon all without the prior requirement of defensibility, is the right of self ownership, and the freedom from aggression.

Murray Rothbard wrote:
No one may threaten or commit violence ('aggress') against another man's person or property. Violence may be employed only against the man who commits such violence; that is, only defensively against the aggressive violence of another. In short, no violence may be employed against a nonaggressor. Here is the fundamental rule from which can be deduced the entire corpus of libertarian theory.


Smart guy.

I am not given rights by the state, rather the state protects against the removal of some rights, in exchange for forfeiture of others.

I can not in good conscience state that I possess that right to pass judgment, or sit in judgment, or deliberate upon a judgment of another. I would not defend my claim to that right, it is not something I will do.



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10 Apr 2010, 2:11 am

I have not been called for Jury duty yet, ( I am 25 years old )

Maybe I haven't been called yet because I work in the legal industry.



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10 Apr 2010, 2:17 am

jeffhermy wrote:
What do you do when you get Jury Duty?

Has anyone been on a Jury? Did you run into any difficulties?

Is it necessary to reveal you have ASD?

I was interested in asking this question to see how other people on the spectrum deal with this issue. My concern was if we make good jurors or is this just another thing that differs from person to person.


I've been called for jury duty many times, but never served on a jury. If interviewed, the attorneys for the defense and the prosecutor, as well as the judge, may ask you a series of questions designed to see if you are the kind of juror they want. Just answer then honestly. TThat has always had them happily and quickly excusing me from service. (I tend to say I'm capable of making up my own mind, am not easily swayed by emotional arguments, and that I am perfectly capable of deciding if something meets a statutory requirement regardless of how my personal feelings are on the topic. From what I've seen in all those interviews, that's the last thing they actually seem to want to hear.)

I manage to be called every year for county court, and at least once every few years for federal court. Many of the people in my office seem to be called at about the same time, so we are thinking they are using some sort of employment records rather than voter registration or driver's licences (since some of us are not registered to vote and some do not drive).

There would be no real reason to mention ASD that I can think of - unless it interferes significantly with your executive functioning. If it does, you really should ask to be excused.



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10 Apr 2010, 3:53 am

justMax wrote:
Warlordism would occur if you couldn't generate private defense agencies, as we can already make them, security agencies exist now, the process of turning all law enforcement over to private businesses is not out of the realm of possibility.


Absent a regulatory authority, it is precisely these "private defense agencies," that are the source of the warlords' power. Anarcho-capitalism ultimately allows the strong to prey on the weak, because there's no one to enforce the rule against aggression when one guy has access to more power than the next.

Turning over law enforcement to private business in your current system still implies that there is government oversight. In an anarcho-capitalist society that would not be the case.

It's a cliché, but Juvenal was not far wrong when he asked, qui custodiet ipsos custodes?


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10 Apr 2010, 3:56 am

justMax wrote:
I have the right to wear a funny hat and recite the alphabet backwards in the shower, so long as no one questions it.


Actually, those aren't rights. They are freedoms. Rights, freedoms and liberties are not equivalent concepts and should not be used interchangably.


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10 Apr 2010, 4:42 am

Quote:
Rights are variously construed as legal, social, or moral freedoms to act or refrain from acting, or entitlements to be acted upon or not acted upon.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rights

Quote:
Liberty is a concept of political philosophy and identifies the condition in which an individual has the right to act according to his or her own will.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberty

A right generally doesn't exist until you are willing to defend it, in my mind at least.
Liberties are akin to rights that have not been defended, except they do not require defense specifically.
Freedom and liberty are virtually the same thing.


The rights I mentioned earlier, which I feel hold for everyone, actually place bounds on my moral code as well. It is not right for me to own someone else, as by definition they own themselves, and have a superior claim. It is not right for me to harm someone else, be it physically, or financially, and I have the right to expect similar restraint from others. I have the right to defend myself if there is no other recourse, as the situation merits, and to seek to be made whole if damaged.

I was not granted these by anything but logic, to deny them for anyone is to deny them for yourself as well.

A nation, or government, does not grant rights to people, especially not those rights. Ideally a social contract replaces government, in which all citizens agree to protect and respect those rights for each other.

When an entity claims it has rights above those of the people, in particular the exclusive right to inflict harm upon others, it is evil.

Were I in a position to eliminate it, I would, as it is I merely seek to avoid such structures, and to do no more than is necessary to prevent inciting harm upon my person.

I do not act out of respect, or recognition in the rightness of the U.S. government, only weakness, the inability to defend myself against it. This weakness is enforced by that same entity, limiting the ability of it's populace to fight back against it. I may have a skewed view of the situation, but there is no way that I would ever willingly choose to take part in a nation such as this.

My lack of options elsewhere is unfortunate, as is the observation that I would be forced to leave the place I was born in, in order to even try to seek alternatives, or to construct my own. As the world is already divvied up between similar, and actually worse, entities... well, let's say I look forward to the colonization of space.



If a private defense business began striving to violate the social contracts in place, what makes you think people would continue paying them, rather than paying their competitors to protect them from the transgressor? The watchmen watch themselves, because the people are watching, and determining who to hire.


I recognize that the world is far from an ideal place, but recognition is not acceptance, so I remain an anarchist, and abstain from doing anything other than avoiding (unbalanced) conflict with the government.



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12 Apr 2010, 12:33 pm

I cannot, of course, speak to your moral objections. They are personal to you, and perfectly formed.

I am still struck, though, by the idealism of your position. A Social Contract might well exist, but of what value is it if one citizen refuses to participate? You posit the "right" to seek to be made whole if damaged. From whom would you seek this? If it is from the person who damaged you, how do you compel that person in the face of a refusal to answer your claim?

One a more general note, though more closely tied to the subject of the thread, I wonder what the legal right of a person is to avoid a duty imposed by law, based on moral grounds?

This is not meant to be a flippant question--we generally (though not universally) hold passive resistance to be a laudable response to an illegitimate authority, but for every Gandhi or Sophie Scholl, there is an Oswald Mosley and a William Joyce. History, being written by the victors, does not always deal well with people of conscience on the losing side.


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12 Apr 2010, 7:37 pm

I'd never be able to handle jury duty without a panic attack that could potentily lead to a nervous breakdown and then severe cataonia and PTSD. I'm very easy to tramatise. I'd suck at being a witness because unless the topic is about my special intrests, I tune it out. I can't handle boredom. They wouldn't let me bring my DS or laptop. I have panic attacks around any amount of strange people unless I have my pet lizard with me and actualy hold and stroke her. They'd never let me bring her into a courtroom. If the religion excuse didn't hold up, I suppose a letter from my phycatrist would do.



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12 Apr 2010, 8:15 pm

I had my psychiatrist write me a letter so I didn't have to do jury duty.



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12 Apr 2010, 11:45 pm

As you pointed out, there is a lot of idealism in my positions, on those political spectrum tests you can find online or whatnot, I always land right where Ghandi and the Dalai Lama do.

Trying to describe it is rather like trying to tell someone about a painting you've yet to make, I can see the structure in my head, and I can turn it into language to some extent, but it isn't actually the same as the finished result.